Equity Compensation Consulting
You don’t need another vendor. You need someone who’s been inside the equity platforms, run the administration, navigated the compliance, and can tell you what actually works before you commit to a plan design, a platform, or a strategy that’s going to create operational headaches for the next five years.
Countsy provides equity compensation consulting for companies at inflection points: launching their first equity plan, scaling beyond what their current setup can handle, preparing for an IPO, or working through the equity implications of an acquisition. We bring the operational perspective that pure advisory firms don’t have, because we’re the ones who have to administer whatever gets designed.
Get equity advice from people who actually do the work
Tell us what you’re navigating and we’ll outline how Countsy can help.
What We Advise On
Most equity consulting engagements fall into one of five categories. Some clients need help with just one; others are dealing with several at once. Either way, we scope the engagement to what you actually need. No boilerplate. No unnecessary deliverables.
Equity Plan Design and Benchmarking
Designing an equity plan that attracts talent, aligns incentives, and doesn’t create administrative nightmares requires balancing a lot of variables: award types, pool sizing, vesting structures, exercise windows, and termination provisions. Countsy advises on all of it, benchmarked against what companies at your stage and in your industry are actually doing.
Award type selection: ISOs, NSOs, RSUs, RSAs, performance awards, SARs, and phantom equity, which ones fit your goals and your tax situation
Pool sizing and dilution modeling: how much equity to set aside and how to think about future rounds
Vesting structure design: cliff, graded, milestone-based, or hybrid schedules
Plan document review: ensuring the legal terms match your operational intent and platform capabilities
Platform Selection and Evaluation
Choosing an equity management platform is a decision most companies only make once or twice. Get it wrong and you’re stuck with a tool that doesn’t fit your plan complexity, your international footprint, or your reporting needs, or you’re facing an expensive migration later.
Countsy evaluates equity platforms based on your specific requirements, not based on reseller relationships. We’ve administered plans on every major platform, which means we know their strengths, limitations, and hidden costs from the inside:
We’ll give you an honest comparison based on your plan types, headcount, international needs, integration requirements, and budget, and we’ll help with the implementation once you decide.
409A Valuation Support
Getting a 409A valuation wrong creates real financial exposure, a 20% excise tax plus interest on every affected option holder. Countsy doesn’t perform valuations directly, but we manage the process around them: helping you choose the right provider for your stage, timing valuations correctly, preparing your financials, and maintaining the documentation trail that protects you in an audit.
IPO Readiness
Going public changes everything about your equity operations. The participant base grows, SEC reporting requirements kick in, blackout window policies need enforcement, and the volume of exercises and settlements spikes. Companies that don’t prepare their equity operations for this transition end up scrambling after the bell rings.
SOX compliance readiness for equity processes and controls
Blackout window policy design and enforcement procedures
Insider trading compliance: Rule 10b5-1 plan administration and pre-clearance workflows
Operational scaling: staffing models, platform capacity, and process documentation
Pro forma financial modeling for equity compensation expense under ASC 718
M&A Equity Integration
Mergers and acquisitions create some of the most complex equity scenarios a company can face. Outstanding awards need to be assumed, rolled over, cashed out, or cancelled. Each with different tax, accounting, and participant communication implications. If both companies have equity plans on different platforms, you’re looking at a consolidation project on top of everything else.
Accelerated vesting analysis and processing for change-of-control provisions
Award assumption, rollover, and cancellation modeling
Platform consolidation planning and execution
Participant communications: what’s happening to their equity and what they need to do
Post-close equity administration for the combined entity
Why Companies Choose Countsy for Equity Consulting
There are plenty of firms that will advise on equity compensation. Here’s what makes Countsy different:
✓ We do the work, not just the advice.
Most consulting engagements end with a recommendation deck. Ours can end with a fully implemented plan, a configured platform, and an ongoing administration engagement if that’s what you need. The advice is grounded in operational reality because we’re the ones who live with the consequences of the design.
✓ We’re platform-agnostic.
We don’t resell any platform. Our recommendation is based on what fits your company, not what earns us a referral fee. We’ve administered plans on all eight major platforms and we know their trade-offs from the inside.
✓ We’ve seen the full lifecycle.
From seed-stage companies issuing their first option grants through post-IPO public company administration, we’ve supported equity programs at every stage. That means we can design your plan with future complexity in mind, not just today’s needs.
✓ We understand the operational cost of complexity.
A clever plan design that creates administrative nightmares isn’t clever. We’ll tell you when a simpler approach achieves the same goals without the downstream burden.
Equity Consulting FAQ
Q: How is Countsy different from a Big 4 compensation consulting practice?
Big 4 firms are strong on benchmarking data and plan design theory. What they typically don’t bring is hands-on operational experience with the equity platforms and day-to-day administration. Countsy bridges that gap. We design plans that are operationally sound because we’re the ones who administer them. We also work at a different price point and engagement model than Big 4, which makes us more accessible for growth-stage companies.
Q: Do I need consulting or administration services?
If you need strategic guidance — plan design, platform selection, IPO prep — that’s consulting. If you need someone to process grants, run vesting, handle exercises, and manage your platform day-to-day, that’s administration. Many clients start with consulting and transition into an ongoing administration engagement. We can do both.
Q: What does an equity consulting engagement cost?
Consulting engagements are typically project-based, scoped to your specific needs. A focused engagement like platform evaluation might be a few weeks. A comprehensive plan design with benchmarking and implementation support is more involved. Contact us for a scoped estimate. We’ll give you a clear scope and fixed price before we start.
Q: Can you help with international equity plans?
Yes. International equity compensation adds layers of complexity: country-specific tax treatment, local compliance requirements, employment law considerations, and currency issues. We’ve supported companies with employees in 30+ countries and can advise on both the plan design and the operational requirements for international participants.
Q: What if we already have an equity advisor?
That’s fine. Countsy often works alongside existing legal counsel, compensation consultants, or HR advisory firms. We bring the operational and platform-specific expertise that complements their work. If your current advisor designed a plan and you need someone to implement and administer it, that’s a natural fit.
Let’s Talk About Your Equity Strategy
Whether you’re designing your first equity plan, evaluating platforms, preparing for an IPO, or figuring out the equity implications of an acquisition. We’ve been through it. Tell us what you’re working on and we’ll tell you how we can help.
Schedule a Consulting Call
No commitment. We’ll listen to what you’re navigating and outline a clear path forward.
