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Ask HN: What do you look for in your first 10 hires?

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Re: Ask HN: What do you look for in your first 10 hires?

#31

Post by thealchemistdev »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #27
wvh wrote: post #18

First you probably need some silent, persistent and occasionally cantankerous folks that can grudgingly work on annoying boring problems all night just because they want to solve it no matter what. If you have a few of those, you really have to start looking for more social people that can glue the herd of cats together so all noses point the same way. My experience has been that solving a very technical problem and…

> First you probably need some silent, persistent and occasionally cantankerous folks that can grudgingly work on annoying boring problems all night just because So you want people who are willing to be overworked and underpaid with the statistically worthless equity? What next? You also want people who after they do a 996 work schedule to also have enough “passion” to work on open source projects during their free t…

[dead]

Re: Ask HN: What do you look for in your first 10 hires?

#32

Post by kittensmittens »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #27
wvh wrote: post #18

First you probably need some silent, persistent and occasionally cantankerous folks that can grudgingly work on annoying boring problems all night just because they want to solve it no matter what. If you have a few of those, you really have to start looking for more social people that can glue the herd of cats together so all noses point the same way. My experience has been that solving a very technical problem and…

> First you probably need some silent, persistent and occasionally cantankerous folks that can grudgingly work on annoying boring problems all night just because So you want people who are willing to be overworked and underpaid with the statistically worthless equity? What next? You also want people who after they do a 996 work schedule to also have enough “passion” to work on open source projects during their free t…

Also unrealistic.

Re: Ask HN: What do you look for in your first 10 hires?

#34

Post by ex-aws-dude »

We only hire 10x programmers at my company

So the first hire must be a 10x programmer

The second one obviously also must be a 10x programmer but keep in mind the bar has now moved so he has to be 10x the previous one (100x)

In short it gets very challenging trying to find the final 10^10x programmer

Re: Ask HN: What do you look for in your first 10 hires?

#35

Post by andyjohnson0 »

ex-aws-dude wrote: post #34

We only hire 10x programmers at my company So the first hire must be a 10x programmer The second one obviously also must be a 10x programmer but keep in mind the bar has now moved so he has to be 10x the previous one (100x) In short it gets very challenging trying to find the final 10^10x programmer

I'm a 10↑↑10x programmer. Can I have a job?

Re: Ask HN: What do you look for in your first 10 hires?

#40

Post by austin-cheney »

This will be down voted to death but I look for ability to communicate and autism.

In the general population about 20% of people shows some traits that qualify as autistic with about 10% showing those traits enough that could qualify for a ASD diagnosis. Among software developers those numbers are roughly double. People with autism are prone to high anxiety with deliberate habits of trying to hide it, masking behaviors. You don’t want Dunning-Kruger type behaviors as the common establishment of your organization. Instead you want people who aren’t afraid to risk doing original things and will bluntly tell you about product risks as opposed to putting their personal preferences first.

Ability to communicate determines how a person organizes their thoughts on the fly. It also exposes their potential for working closely with others. Strong teams come from people that support each other as opposed to people who lack empathy or demonstrate low social intelligence. Strong skills alone can tank a team if communication is garbage.

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