Building the startup team
Missed the previous posts on our startup? Read our complete startup chronicles here.
The hardest thing to do as a founder is to build the right team for their startup. A right-fit early team member can be a catalyst in growing the startup, while a wrong hire can derail even the most ambitious plans.
The Co-founder
Utkarsh and I have been fortunate in knowing each other from our student days at IIT Bombay, and then meeting again after 15 years to work together at Honeywell.
What brought us together are the complementary skills we possess. He is the creative, customer-oriented right brain; while I’m the analytical, business-oriented left brain.
But, more importantly, what kept us together for eight years is that our value systems and moral compasses are aligned.
We have come to learn that this is probably the most critical and understated requirement when looking for a co-founder.
The Early Team
We look at early startup roles in two buckets: domain specific and generalist.
We look for experts in domain specific roles such as technology architecture, product design and legal. Domain experts need to know what they are doing, and hit the ground running. Aptitude is key.
For generalist roles such as sales, marketing and operations, we look for fundamental first principles thinking to question the “this is how it is always done” thumb rules. So we like to hire folks who are from adjacent or different fields, not necessarily experts. Consequently, generalists need to step up on the effort quotient and get up the learning curve quickly. Attitude is key.
What’s In It For Me?
It is important to talk about a key aspect of our hiring — what’s in it for the employee?
As I moved through my career, I have always looked for two things in a new job opportunity:
- The exploitative part of the job: What the company needs from me. This is usually specified very well in the job description and outlined in my resume. It consists of skills I already possess, experience I’ve had and things I’ve learned so far.
- The explorative part of the job: What I need from the company. This is seldom talked about, but a critical component of job satisfaction. It consists of what I want to learn, what new skill can I add to my portfolio, or what additional responsibility I can take up that is above my competency.
Startups offer the joy of creation — an opportunity to experience first-hand, how big things start from scratch. Startups also offer ESOPs to participate in the upside of growth, which may be significant as seen in the Flipkart exit.
What’s your approach to startup hiring? As a founder? As an employee?
Originally published at https://www.cnbctv18.com.
This article is a continuation of our startup chronicles as we build our latest and greatest. You can read the previous posts here:
