How to hire

Spent the past 3 months hiring pretty constantly.

Biggest learnings (n.b. startup centric):

1. Make the final interview a 4+ hour (paid) live challenge. Short interviews reveal how well a candidate can think on their feet. 4 hours reveal how well a candidate can actually do the job.

2. A typo in a CV signals a bad candidate 100% of the time.

3. (Most of) The best talent has already been snapped up. Get off your ass and start crafting highly personalized DMs, outlining precisely why you are what they need in their lives. Send 150 of these and expect to hire 1.

4. Related - recruiters fan the flame, they can’t start it. Take very personal responsibility for DM’ing the first 10 hires. Only you know enough to identify that one thing about your company that is going to get the very best to sack off what they're doing and join your ship.

5. Live challenges >>> take-homes. Candidates hate take-homes (e.g. “Spend 45 minutes drafting a Marketing Plan”) as they inevitably take far longer than the suggested time and seem like free work. Instead, get on a 45 minute call, lay out a current business problem, and work through it together, with the candidate taking the lead. Unbelievably superior signal, and a far better candidate experience.

6. There is an extraordinarily high correlation between people who create apps/blogs/YouTube channels in their spare time and top tier talent.

7. (Almost always) Hire for trajectory, not experience. h/t Entrepreneurs First for being the masters at this.