“A third feels high for weekend advice. I’d give him advisor-level equity now and let him earn into the founder split only if he actually joins full-time. Vesting protects all of you either way.”

“I would not give him an equal third. Weekend advice and full-time risk are different inputs, and pretending they are equal is the kind of polite fiction that corrodes a founding team over years. At Polyvore, the early equity split reflected who was actually building every day, and even then we had to revisit it as roles evolved.”

“I would not give an equal third to someone who is not full-time, and I would not lock the split in forever. At Appex and the companies I built after, the people taking the real risk, working full-time without salary, were the ones whose equity reflected that risk. A weekend advisor is valuable, but that is a different role with a different risk profile.”

“A weekend advisor is not a co-founder, and an equal third is the wrong answer. I have seen moonlighting arrangements fail on a schedule, and I have said flatly that equal splits create deadlocks investors read as a red flag. Match contribution to risk: full-time, full risk, full vesting; part-time advice gets a much smaller slice or a vesting target that only converts if they join.”

“I split equity equally in a previous company because it felt fair at the time; later I saw it did not reflect who was actually taking risk and making decisions. For a three-founder team, the median Carta split is 47/33/17, not 33/33/33, and that gap usually maps to who quit their job and who owns the final call.”

“I would not give him an equal third. Equity is a function of risk, not effort or advice, and right now he is not sharing the downside the way the two of you are. Give him a smaller slice that vests over four years with a one-year cliff, and write the buyout rules before you need them.”

“He shouldn't get a third. I've seen advisors walk away with 10–20% for weekend advice that never moved the needle, and once the shares are gone you can't get them back. Put him on a vesting schedule tied to hours, deliverables, or revenue milestones, and keep the cofounder equity for people whose salary and risk match yours.”

“I would not give him a full third. I have seen too many cap tables where a part-time advisor ends up with founder-level equity and the full-time team quietly resents it for years.”

“Equal splits rarely survive the first year because the work turns out unequal fast. At Eventbrite, we aligned equity with ongoing contribution and risk, not just the founding idea. I'd give him a smaller founder slice now and let vesting or a performance-based schedule earn him back up if he goes full-time later.”