The 7 Biggest RSU Mistakes Stryker Employees Make

For many Stryker employees, Restricted Stock Units (RSUs) can become one of the most valuable components of their overall compensation. They arrive gradually through annual grants and scheduled vesting, making it easy to underestimate just how much company stock has accumulated over time. What begins as a relatively modest equity award can, after a decade or more with the company, quietly grow into one of the largest assets on your balance sheet.

That growth is often the result of long-term equity participation in a successful company. Stryker has created meaningful wealth for many employees, and long-term equity participation has been an important part of that success. The challenge isn’t necessarily owning company stock—it’s allowing that position to grow without periodically evaluating how it fits within your broader financial plan.

I recently recorded a video discussing seven of the biggest RSU mistakes Stryker employees can make. While the conversation focused on the questions employees should ask each time their shares vest, the broader lesson is that equity compensation should be coordinated with your investment strategy, tax planning, retirement goals, and overall financial life. In this article, I’d like to expand on those ideas and share a framework for making more intentional decisions as your company stock grows over time.

Every Vesting Event Is a New Investment Decision

A common misconception surrounding RSUs is that once the shares vest, the decision has already been made. In reality, vesting simply marks the point where compensation becomes an investment decision.

A question we encourage employees to consider is this: If Stryker had paid you cash instead of stock today, would you immediately use all of that money to purchase Stryker shares? 

That question can change the conversation. Once your shares vest, continuing to hold them represents an active investment decision just as much as purchasing additional shares would. Every vesting event creates an opportunity to evaluate whether your company stock still aligns with your overall financial goals rather than simply remaining in your account because no decision was made.

1. Never Re-Evaluating Your Position

Many Stryker employees receive annual grants that vest over several years. As a result, it’s common to have multiple grants vesting on different schedules at the same time. Over the course of a career, this can create a significant equity position without any single vesting event feeling particularly large.

The mistake isn’t necessarily holding the shares. The mistake is never stopping to ask whether holding them continues to make sense. A periodic review allows you to evaluate your allocation, your goals, and any changes in your financial circumstances before the position grows larger than intended.

2. Confusing Loyalty With Portfolio Construction

Employees often feel a strong connection to the company they work for, particularly when company stock has become a meaningful part of their financial picture. There’s nothing wrong with believing in your employer or wanting to continue holding its stock.

At the same time, your investment portfolio serves a different purpose than your career. Your portfolio exists to help support your family’s long-term financial goals, while your employment reflects your professional opportunities. Those two decisions should complement one another, but they don’t have to be identical. Diversifying a portion of your company stock isn’t a statement about your confidence in Stryker. It’s a portfolio construction decision that may help manage long-term concentration risk.

3. Overlooking Concentration Risk

Risk is often associated with market volatility, but concentration risk deserves just as much attention. When your salary, future bonuses, RSU grants, and investment portfolio all depend heavily on the same company, a single unexpected event has the potential to affect multiple aspects of your financial life at once.

This isn’t a prediction about Stryker or its future performance. Even successful companies can experience periods of uncertainty. Diversification simply recognizes that relying too heavily on any single investment may expose your family’s long-term financial plan to more risk than intended.

4. Assuming Taxes Are Fully Covered

Taxes are generally withheld when RSUs vest, but withholding doesn’t necessarily equal your final tax liability. Depending on your overall income, bonuses, multiple vesting events, investment gains, or a spouse’s earnings, you may owe additional taxes when you file your return.

Rather than waiting until tax season, many employees benefit from reviewing year-end tax projections while there is still time to make adjustments. Proactive planning may help reduce surprises and create opportunities to coordinate equity compensation with broader tax strategies.

5. Asking the Wrong Question

One of the most common questions we hear is, “Should I keep my RSUs or should I sell them?”

While understandable, that question tends to focus on a single transaction rather than your overall financial picture. A more productive question is, “What percentage of my family’s wealth should depend on one company?”

Approaching the decision from that perspective shifts the conversation away from trying to predict short-term stock movements and toward establishing an investment allocation that reflects your long-term goals. Once that framework is in place, future vesting decisions often become much more straightforward.

6. Allowing Small Decisions to Become a Large Position

Large concentrated stock positions rarely develop overnight. More often, they’re the result of dozens of small decisions, or the absence of decisions, made over many years.

Each individual grant may seem relatively insignificant on its own. Over time, however, those grants can accumulate into one of the largest assets a family owns. Regular portfolio reviews can help evaluate whether your company stock continues to reflect an intentional strategy rather than years of unattended growth.

7. Treating the Decision as All or Nothing

Many employees believe managing RSUs requires making one major decision: either sell everything or never sell at all. In practice, thoughtful financial planning is usually much more gradual.

Consider a hypothetical Stryker employee who has spent more than a decade with the company. Assume that, through annual grants and changes in market value, her company stock position has grown to more than $1 million. Rather than selling the entire position at once, she developed a multi-year strategy. As each new grant vested, she evaluated whether her allocation remained consistent with her long-term goals. Some years she sold shares, while other years she held them or coordinated sales with charitable giving and broader tax planning strategies.

The objective wasn’t to react to the market. It was to make consistent, intentional decisions over time.

Final Takeaway

There isn’t a universal rule for what every Stryker employee should do with vested RSUs. Some employees may decide that continuing to hold company stock aligns well with their goals, while others may determine that gradually reducing concentration better supports their long-term financial plan.

The important point is that every vesting event creates a new planning opportunity. Rather than allowing your portfolio to evolve by default, take time to evaluate how your company stock fits alongside your retirement goals, tax strategy, investment allocation, and family priorities. Coordinating those decisions can help transform equity compensation from simply an employee benefit into an intentional component of a comprehensive financial plan.

If you found this article helpful, visit the GDS Wealth Management YouTube channel to watch the full discussion and explore additional educational videos created specifically for Stryker employees. Our ongoing series covers RSUs, stock options, retirement planning, tax strategies, and other financial topics designed to help you make informed decisions throughout your career.