Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong • Hacker News Board

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#11

Post by danielweber » Fri, May 09, 2014, 6:21 PM UTC

Paul Graham talks about hiring people who aren't hapless: http://www.paulgraham.com/relres.html (2009)

Which I agree with. I've worked with people who started crying at the first sign of trouble. I've worked with people who wanted to make every single encounter into a fight. Both of these are completely toxic to a start-up.

I really worry, though, about these hiring practices that are just psychological tests designed by non-psychologists, like this:

Hire people who emailed you a dozen times before you had a chance to reply

I usually stop emailing after 3 or 4 times, figuring that that 4th email already made me look desperate.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: a lot of these "how to find good employees" are as rigorous as dating advice in the latest issue of Cosmo.

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#12

Post by nmac » Fri, May 09, 2014, 6:21 PM UTC

lucisferre wrote: post #8

Hire who's right for your startup, not who someone (who may have really only written this blogspam as a way to get eyeballs on job postings) tells you to hire. These "how to hire" posts are getting so tired. Not because its a bad subject but because they are completely empty.

I agree. At the end of the day, it always comes back to personality types and drives. Each startup needs different things in different phases. Maybe a really smart coder is exactly what a non-technical co-founder might need, whilst a resilient hustler is what a well groomed hacker needs. In general, universal quantification over statements that are not law-like are doomed to fail. (<- yes there is an embedded pun there).

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#13

Post by zcarter » Fri, May 09, 2014, 6:27 PM UTC

I would reframe the suggestion as two ideas. 1) "hire for your culture" and 2) conditioning on a cultural expectation of individuals putting up with lots of problems on their own, "make sure new hires can cope."

The latter is an important point, but the idea that all startups have this attitude towards employees and crisis management is not accurate.

How important is it for potential candidates to know if the culture at a startup they are considering working for has these values? I'm guessing a blog like this turns off a lot of people, but to the author's point, not anyone they would hire. Effective :D

FD: back end dev at Mighty Spring, we do startup hiring. (mightyspring.com)

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#14

Post by zcarter » Fri, May 09, 2014, 6:43 PM UTC

danielweber wrote: post #11

Paul Graham talks about hiring people who aren't hapless: http://www.paulgraham.com/relres.html (2009) Which I agree with. I've worked with people who started crying at the first sign of trouble. I've worked with people who wanted to make every single encounter into a fight. Both of these are completely toxic to a start-up. I really worry, though, about these hiring practices that are just psychological tests designe…

Coming from an investment management background, it has been hilarious to see people espousing all manner of foolish nostrums about tech hiring, showcasing biases that have proper names in the investment community,

My favorites are of the "never hire Xs" variety, as a manifestation of the snake bite effect. Woah... what happened between you and someone with a dual CS/Art History major?

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#15

Post by tbrownaw » Fri, May 09, 2014, 7:42 PM UTC

Jormundir wrote: post #9

birken wrote: post #3

And if you are a prospective employee joining a company that is planning to have "oh shit" moments, just make sure you are being compensated with a lot of equity. There basically is no worse deal than joining a risky company at the stage where they already have some funding and employees. Assuming you are the resilient type who is capable of founding a startup, you'd get a much better deal either founding your own co…

I greatly second this. I'm doing a job search now and have already had to turn down three offers from early stage startups, because the compensation is delusionally low. I'm talking 40-60k below market rate, with pitiful stock options to make up for it. I often wonder who would even let themselves be taken advantage of so strongly? Why would any halfway decent engineer take 65-80k with 0.25-0.5% equity? Either be a f…

I'm talking 40-60k below market rate, with pitiful stock options to make up for it. I often wonder who would even let themselves be taken advantage of so strongly? Why would any halfway decent engineer take 65-80k with 0.25-0.5% equity?

    see news about $100M exits ==> 0.5% == $500k
    heard mention of a 10% success rate ==> $50k expected value
    $50k == (market_rate - salary) ==> sounds about right

Which of course misses that (1) the utility of large amounts of money isn't linear (expected value doesn't work that way on single occurrences); (2) future money should be discounted by some rate; and (3) your equity will get diluted.

And that the slaray difference is per year, and the equity is a one-time thing. And whatever else I missed.

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#16

Post by watwut » Fri, May 09, 2014, 8:21 PM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #6

bruceb wrote: post #2

Though one could argue if you higher smarter people you might have less "oh shit" days?

Are you saying that if we looked at companies that have indeed hired smarter people, they would be found not to ever have had "oh shit" moments?

I would expect the companies with capable management and employees to have less "of shit" moments and mostly not to repeat then same "of shit" moment every deadline.

By capable I mean not only smart, but also able to plan etc.

For example, if unforeseeable things in your business happen often, you can and should plan for them. E.g. know what the priorities will be in advance (what is more important speed or quality?), take aside some money/time for solving these etc.

If the company spends too much time putting out fires, then something is wrong no matter how smart they think they are.

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#17

Post by Jormundir » Fri, May 09, 2014, 8:57 PM UTC

tbrownaw wrote: post #15

Jormundir wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I greatly second this. I'm doing a job search now and have already had to turn down three offers from early stage startups, because the compensation is delusionally low. I'm talking 40-60k below market rate, with pitiful stock options to make up for it. I often wonder who would even let themselves be taken advantage of so strongly? Why would any halfway decent engineer take 65-80k with 0.25-0.5% equity? Either be a f…

I'm talking 40-60k below market rate, with pitiful stock options to make up for it. I often wonder who would even let themselves be taken advantage of so strongly? Why would any halfway decent engineer take 65-80k with 0.25-0.5% equity? see news about $100M exits ==> 0.5% == $500k heard mention of a 10% success rate ==> $50k expected value $50k == (market_rate - salary) ==> sounds about right Which of course misses t…

Yeah, though this is napkin calculations, 10% chance of $100M exit is wayyyy too high. I would love for someone to cite a real figure, but I would guess it's less than 0.5%.

Having been through a $50M acquisition with some options, it's really not worth the risk at all. I keep with the opinion: anyone who sacrifices salary for options is a fool. I also suspect the people getting ripped off here tend to be younger people who don't really know what they're worth, don't know just how much money they're giving up.

Re: Hiring for startups: You're doing it wrong

#18

Post by rhizome » Sat, May 10, 2014, 2:14 AM UTC

watwut wrote: post #16

rhizome wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying that if we looked at companies that have indeed hired smarter people, they would be found not to ever have had "oh shit" moments?

I would expect the companies with capable management and employees to have less "of shit" moments and mostly not to repeat then same "of shit" moment every deadline. By capable I mean not only smart, but also able to plan etc. For example, if unforeseeable things in your business happen often, you can and should plan for them. E.g. know what the priorities will be in advance (what is more important speed or quality?)…

Isn't that a tautology?