The vest schedule means "if you're still at the company on day X, you'll get Y amount of equity".
You have a specific vest date for a reason.
If you wait to get rid of that employee just because they have equity vesting in a few weeks, it means that the vest is not on "day X", but on "day X - a few weeks". But that's not what the vesting schedule says.
The only logical decision is that whether or not they are vesting soon does not matter, what matters is you want to fire them now, so do it.
I understand that there is a supposed moral aspect to it as well, and that's probably why you asked online. Once again the decision is easy, do you want to fire them today because they are not performing, or do you want to fire them today because they have their vest in a few weeks?
For me the fact that you are even exploring the possibility to keep them onboard a few more weeks means it's the first situation, so I see no wrong there.
Lastly, some comments are predicting doom for your startup due to the bad reputation this would cause, including journalists knocking at your door and customers setting up a guillotine outside of your door, but this is all BS and isn't going to happen. Even your other employees will probably not know about this vesting schedule "problem".
You have a specific vest date for a reason.
If you wait to get rid of that employee just because they have equity vesting in a few weeks, it means that the vest is not on "day X", but on "day X - a few weeks". But that's not what the vesting schedule says.
The only logical decision is that whether or not they are vesting soon does not matter, what matters is you want to fire them now, so do it.
I understand that there is a supposed moral aspect to it as well, and that's probably why you asked online. Once again the decision is easy, do you want to fire them today because they are not performing, or do you want to fire them today because they have their vest in a few weeks?
For me the fact that you are even exploring the possibility to keep them onboard a few more weeks means it's the first situation, so I see no wrong there.
Lastly, some comments are predicting doom for your startup due to the bad reputation this would cause, including journalists knocking at your door and customers setting up a guillotine outside of your door, but this is all BS and isn't going to happen. Even your other employees will probably not know about this vesting schedule "problem".