Ask HN: First hire offered to work part-time – what should I do?

We are a startup making our first hires. We are three founders, who respect each other hugely, help each other and forgive mistakes. We've been thru a lot together.

We raised money and are looking for core hires. Given our personal bond, we would like the core team (first 3-4 hires) to share our passion to some degree. Perhaps naively we'd like them to become pillars of our company and help us inspire future employees.

A former colleague of mine came forward, very bright and capable guy. Exactly the technical talent we need. He likes the project, but he offered to work three days a week for us because he would like to continue working on personal projects in parallel. While I appreciate his honesty, I cannot easily decide if he is the right kind of first hire. Had he joined us a year later, I would hire him in a heartbeat. But right now I feel like lack of commitment from him could possibly influence our culture in a negative way. Is this a right way to think about first hires? What would you do?

I am a big supporter of part time too. I can't overstate the importance of work-life balance. Work less, work better, and don't forget yourself nor your family.

However reading the description, I can't tell whether the potential hire fits this category.

Are they looking to have 2 jobs in parallel? What would their side thing be, is it different enough that they wouldn't be working on both concurrently?

If they want to be away from writing software 2 days a week to fulfill a hobby (e.g restore a boat, paint or whatever) then it makes a lot of sense. They will be happy, grateful, and the culture will be great.

If they are seeking part time in order to work for 2 startups or setup their own side business, then I'm not so sure.

Meh... In most cases, talking about "passion" in this context is just a roundabout way of saying "we want people to work harder for less compensation." Expecting founders to have "passion" is fine, since they (presumably) own equity stakes that will make them wealthy if the company is successful. But unless you're giving your early hires a large stake in the company, I'd suggest dropping the "passion" verbiage and treat them like mercenaries - like every other employee. Your vision, your dream, your passion, etc. are yours... there's very little reason to expect other people to share that, given that they likely already have things that they are passionate about, visions they care about, etc.

Hire the guy (or gal), scale their compensation to match the amount of work they actually do and call it good. If you're worried about them leaving too soon if their side project takes off, you can always try some "golden handcuffs" in the form of some perk that disappears if they leave before X months. And who knows, maybe that would make them decline the offer. In which case, honestly, everybody probably wins in the end.

Yeah, "passion" is a huge red flag word for me. In the same realm as "ninja" or "rockstar."

If it was me, I would not hire someone PT as the first employee (or first couple of employees). Why? You are trying to transition from founders to a team and that is hard. You are going to have to build processes, watch other people mess up your baby, and generally have to transition power away from yourself. The emotions behind that process shouldn't be ignored.

In your case, the fact that you are already questioning this person's commitment is a big warning sign to me. Skip it and circle back later once you have a few people working there and see if you feel differently.

Culture - If you are going to build a culture around working differently than the current norms it could make sense though.

PT - I think long term as you build a structure and get to around 15 to 20 people PT is a great way to find amazing people.