Many people at OpenAI get more of their compensation from PPUs than from base salary. PPUs can only be sold at tender offers hosted by the company. When you join OpenAI, you sign onboarding paperwork laying all of this out.
And that onboarding paperwork says you have to sign termination paperwork with a ‘general release’ within sixty days of departing the company. If you don’t do it within 60 days, your units are cancelled. No one I spoke to at OpenAI gave this little line much thought.
And yes this is talking about vested units, because a separate clause clarifies that unvested units just transfer back to the control of OpenAI when an employee undergoes a termination event (which is normal).
There’s a common legal definition of a general release, and it’s just a waiver of claims against each other. Even someone who read the contract closely might be assuming they will only have to sign such a waiver of claims.
But when you actually quit, the ‘general release’? It’s a long, hardnosed, legally aggressive contract that includes a confidentiality agreement which covers the release itself, as well as arbitration, nonsolicitation and nondisparagement and broad ‘noninterference’ agreement.
And if you don’t sign within sixty days your units are gone. And it gets worse—because OpenAI can also deny you access to the annual events that are the only way to sell your vested PPUs at their discretion, making ex-employees constantly worried they’ll be shut out.
This feels really suss to me:
Sounds like it is time for someone to report them to the NLRB.
I’m not sure if you need standing to complain, but here’s the relevant link.