Decode the plan
We read the equity and incentive documents against your employment agreement, isolating the provisions that actually govern your award.
Practice · 04
Executive Compensation & Equity
For most executives, the largest number on the page is not salary — it is equity. When a company disputes what you are owed, the difference is measured in years of earned value. We recover it.
The Mandate
What we are engaged to do.
We read the plan documents as closely as the people who drafted them, and we hold the company to the terms as written. From accelerated vesting to disputed carried interest to attempted clawbacks, our task is to make sure the largest number in your compensation is the one you actually keep.
Speak with a partnerThe Problem
What is really at stake.
Your compensation is entangled in plan documents, vesting schedules, and clawback language written by the company's own counsel. On departure, employers routinely reinterpret those terms to their advantage, hoping you will not contest the reading.
If You Do Nothing
- Unvested RSUs and options forfeited on a technicality.
- Carried interest and deferred compensation withheld or reduced.
- Clawback provisions invoked to reverse sums already paid.
- Complex plan language weaponized against the individual it was meant to reward.
Our Approach
How we build the position.
Value the position
We quantify the full sum at stake — vested and unvested, current and deferred — so the negotiation reflects real economic value.
Enforce the entitlement
We hold the company to the terms as written, through negotiation, arbitration, or litigation as the matter requires.
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We build the strongest possible position first — so that the great majority of matters resolve favorably, and quietly, without ever reaching a courtroom.
The Mercer & Beekman approach
Representative Outcomes
Results in this practice.
$22M
Carried interest
Recovery of disputed carried interest for a departing partner at a private investment firm.
Vesting restored
Equity forfeiture
Reversed a forfeiture of RSUs for an executive the company sought to disqualify on a pretextual 'for cause' basis.
Clawback defeated
Deferred compensation
Defeated an attempted clawback of prior-year bonuses, preserving compensation the client had long since earned.
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Matters described are illustrative and presented with client permission or in anonymized form.
Not necessarily. Vesting terms, acceleration triggers, and the reason for your departure all matter. We frequently recover value from awards an employer has written off as forfeited.
A clawback lets a company recover compensation already paid under certain conditions. Whether it is enforceable depends on the plan language and the facts — provisions are often drafted more broadly than the law allows.
Equity and deferred compensation are usually the largest sums in an executive dispute. The complexity is exactly why counsel matters — and why the recovery so often justifies the effort.
Confidential Consultation
A conversation, in complete confidence.
Tell us, in a sentence or two, what you are facing. A partner will respond personally, typically within one business day. Everything you share is privileged.