Ability to Hire
When I hear entrepreneurs talk about their hiring plans, they generally come in one or more variations of the following themes:
- We will post our jobs on Craigslist and various tech startup job boards,
- We have a pretty established network to pull talent from, or
- We haven’t thought about it that much, but what do you think.
Oh man, that is brutal. I am guilty of this as well ]because I have not pressed hard enough in many past conversations to get a more specific talent plan in place. The discussions typically focus on product development, customer acquisition, pricing strategies, fund raising, and other critical topics. However, if you plan to build a sustainable and growing business, you are going to have to hire people at some point and your ability to hire could make or break your startup.
Charlie O’Donnell brought up the topic of hiring in the blog post the other day. He took investors to task for not digging in and pushing entrepreneurs to think through the recruiting process. Furthermore, while many VC’s tout their extensive networks and recruitment acumen as a value to entrepreneurs, most are pretty useless in this regard. The bitter truth though is everyone is soft on the talent acquisition question.
Entrepreneurs that succeed in hiring quality talent make their startups attractive to candidates. It has nothing to do with the amount of funding a startup has, the number of Foosball tables in the lounge, the amount of press the startup has garnered, or the awesomeness of the perks. Those things don’t hurt, but they are not critical factors.
Hiring requires more than gimmicks and glitz. Hiring is all about making the job interesting, the company a desirable place to work, and thinking about the motivations of the candidate. You align these and you might give yourself a fighting chance to acquire the right talent when you most need it.
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