Lessons learnt: hiring for product design
People make a business. You can’t create great products without great people. No factor is more important to determine a company’s success. Peoples’ values influence company values. Company values influence how decisions are made. A bad hire can have a detrimental impact on any company — but particularly in a small team.
I think the value of a strong, diverse, and cohesive team is understood — but far too often hiring isn’t given the time to reflect this. Job descriptions are rushed together. Interviewers are unprepared for interviews. Companies arrogantly think great candidates will just flood in.
Investing time to think about how you hire people is something that will pay generous dividends. Time spent up front will save exponentially more time in the future. Recently, we doubled our design team (from 1 to 2, but still counts… no? 🤷♂️) Hiring a second product designer was the perfect opportunity to take a step back, look at our hiring process, and re-evaluate our approach. I’m going to break down the key stages that make up our process — giving a lesson learnt from each stage.
People make a business. You can’t create great…
