My previous company was a little beyond the startup phase. I had a decent amount of stock options. Nothing to retire off of, but it would have been a nice pay day had the company grown to an appreciable size (i.e. valuation). Unfortunately that never came to be. After a few haphazard mergers and acquisitions and a downright terrible financial performance my options were worthless when I left. My new employer is a much smaller startup. We'll see how it goes over the next year or two.
