8 Steps to Hiring Right For Your Startup

by PRAVEEN RAJARETNAM

Image Credit: ThinkStock

1.

THE RIGHT ATTITUDE

There are two kinds of people who you can hire,

Those who want to push the train,
And those who want to jump into a moving train.

Just as people love to root for the underdogs in sports, pick the ones for your team who believe they can beat the ones with more funding, more resources and more backers. They are ones who join for the idea and the experience rather than the designation. They will stick through thick and thin, they will relish a challenge and bring forth the passion, every day of the week. At the end of the day, the candidate you pick needs to believe in the vision, and not the money behind it.

Leicester City, 5000–1 outsiders for the English title, were almost relegated from the top division a season ago. Yet, this team of underdogs did the incredible by winning the league last May. Their “most unlikely triumph” has been termed the “greatest sporting achievement ever” since even the bookmakers didn’t believe it was impossible until just a few weeks before Leicester City were crowned champions.

2.

PASSION OVER SKILLS

It’s critical that your first employees have the right mentality and the right desire. Skills do matter, most definitely. But, unlike skill sets, passion and purpose are two things that can’t be bought.

3.

WORK CULTURE

It’s the culture you define that helps you hire the very best. The work environment will need to be intense with lean teams working on full throttle all the time. An attitude of ‘all or nothing’ should surround the group — a sense of urgency; the hunger of wanting to succeed. Right from the concept to early growth stages, the environment will be mix of chaos and high energy. And your new hires will need to fit in to this environment.

4.

DEVELOP LEADERS

If you can hire proven leaders, great! Else, it’s critical to develop them.
However, also remember that,

“Power without responsibility is madness. Just as responsibility without power is useless.”

It’s imperative that your ‘homegrown’ leaders learn to exercise their powers constructively. That requires a certain level of maturity which is usually gained through experience. They would need plenty of guidance. Be sure to provide it. These are good reasons to be extremely cautious when closing the leadership positions in your company.

More importantly, they all need to be able to work together. The last thing you need is a collection of egos at the workplace which will destroy the company bottom-up eventually.

5.

BUDGET HIRES

Start by looking for candidates who fit your budget and make the best of it. There’s no point trying to sign a Lionel Messi when your team is playing in the second division.

Perhaps, you have the budget. But then, everyone wants to pick from that elite pool. Hence, if you decide to swim in that pool, you need to realize it’s too small and too competitive.

So, look for candidates with the right mentality while recognizing their potential. Eventually, your company can then develop that potential and turn it into useful skills.

6.

KEEP ATTRITION LOW

As much as it’s important to hire the right people and develop their skills, it’s equally important to keep them together.

There has rarely been a successful team where the attrition has been high. Most championship winning teams in team sport usually have a squad that has been together long enough and put in consistent performances before winning trophies. Therefore, it’s crucial that the key members of the team stick together. It’s important to create an environment where there’s a feel-good factor amongst everyone. The team needs to be strong enough and critically, patient enough, to become successful.

7.

BUILD LEAN TEAMS

Lean teams are a must for a startup. Such setups flourish because there’s hardly any bench-time, fewer uninspiring tasks and more responsibility thrust upon members.

But, a lack of redundancy can be a weakness too. So, it’s important that key members know not only their roles, but also how to cover for others. That gives confidence and flexibility to the team. Essentially, hire the equivalents of full-stack developers across departments.

Simply put, hire the equivalents of full-stack developers across departments.

8.

STICK BY YOUR DECISIONS

Hiring mistakes will still happen. As the leader, once you’ve convinced yourself of a decision, you have to take it. And sometimes it might not be what people want to hear. If it means someone has to be let go, then so be it.

It’s hard. So, before you take a call, you can and should get inputs from all the relevant people. But, in the end, when you make your decision, you have to take it alone.

However, it doesn’t hurt to be the nice guy until you can’t be the nice guy anymore.

CLOSING THOUGHTS

These points are broadly applicable for seed and early growth stage startups. As a company grows beyond that stage, the Peter Principle invariably takes over. It states,

In a hierarchy, individuals tend to rise to their level of incompetence.

But, in the end, the success of your startup comes down to your leadership. When you leave a meeting room, the atmosphere should not be worse than when you entered it.

If you are the leader who takes responsibility and whose infectious enthusiasm motivates the team, all the while remaining humble and aware of your early days of oblivion, you should have built a positive culture, a cohesive team and hopefully a kickass company!

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• Note: Reproduced from my article for Business Insider.
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