…twenty percent of the company to you, or buy your shares back at full market value.”
I had completely forgotten. In 1999, the company had been eight weeks from bankruptcy. The founder, Mr. Harris, couldn’t make payroll. I was thirty-four, and I had just inherited one hundred and fifty thousand dollars from my grandmother.
I lent it to the company. In exchange, Mr. Harris gave me twenty percent of the shares, held in trust until I left. He insisted on the termination clause himself. “If anyone ever pushes you out, you’ll be protected,” he’d said. Mr. Harris retired years ago. His son was now the CEO. The one who wanted “fresh energy.”
My replacement, a young woman named Ashley, had found the agreement while organizing old contracts for the audit. She had read it twice, then called me in a panic, because she’d been told to “make the old files disappear.”
“I’m not doing that,” she said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t sign up for this.”
I called my lawyer. She called the company’s lawyer. The company was now worth about twenty million dollars.
The CEO tried to argue that I had been fired “with cause” for “poor performance.” Unfortunately for him, his own email to HR said, in writing: “She’s great, but she’s too old for the brand.”
The company had two choices: transfer the shares and give me a seat on the board, or pay me four million dollars.
They paid.
Mr. Harris, the founder, called me when he heard. He was eighty-three. “I told you that clause would come in handy,” he said. Then he called his son and, I’m told, shouted at him for forty-five minutes.
I made sure Ashley was protected. My lawyer added a clause to my settlement agreement: she could not be fired for reporting what she’d found. She’s now a senior manager.
I used part of the money to start a consulting firm for small businesses on the edge of bankruptcy. My first employee, part-time, is a retired accountant who was “too old for the brand” at her last job, too.
