The particular models that I wanted to look at - the partial ownership - turns out to be incredibly expensive when hiring on new employees - from what I've understood - and so I'm leaning in to the profit sharing model, hard, and perhaps the company design will be one that enforces that aggressively. I didn't understand everything the employment lawyer was discussing and it was just a preliminary discussion. I think it's worth it for every person interested in starting a business to work with and speak with a lawyer.
I'm not really much of a fan of everyone owning stock, though, myself - especially everyone gaining stock over time. There's a million ways to build a company, of course. Giving employees stock over time seems like it could be a good plan if there is real intent to become publicly traded at some point. I personally wouldn't want the profit sharing to be tied to a stock amount. It would reward seniority or tenure a bit too much (in my opinion).
A system I would prefer would be one where:
* all employees regular salaries and all business costs are paid
* a reserve 'warchest' is kept or grown where the goal 'size'
of the 'warchest' is relative size to keep the company afloat for
x years of low or zero income (to survive bad years).
* profit share "the rest" (or most of the rest).
* a flat "every employee gets 1/(# employees) the rest".
* each division gets a percentage and then each employee in that
division gets 1/(# employees in division)
* a point system where tenure gives you more points and you get Xi/(sum X)
portion.
I prefer profit-sharing myself because it doesn't lean in the direction of becoming public and everyone experiences the fruit of their and their coworkers' labors.
I've been warned a bit against partial ownership because "what if the existing employees don't want to be profit sharing anymore", etc? I dunno. Lots of thoughts.