Most companies don’t have a serious, repeatable interviewing process for hiring. Instead they wing it, bringing people in for interviews, asking a few questions, turning it into a fireside chat, and then hoping for the best. In my experience that’s not good enough. At Standout Jobs (2007-2010) we hired some great people. I still consider […]
Recruit Top Talent Before and While Raising Capital
Hiring is an ongoing endeavor. You know you’re doing it right (at least partially) when you’re always doing it, even if you’re not actively trying to fill roles. One of the CEO’s main jobs should be recruiting top talent. Unfortunately, most CEOs don’t put enough systematic effort into recruiting and it falls to the wayside. […]
The Resume Black Hole
Anyone that’s ever applied for a job has experienced the resume black hole. You apply for a job and don’t hear anything back (you might get an automated “thank you”). After a few days you send a follow up message (if you can find an email address) and wait some more. Nothing. No word whatsoever […]
How Many Hours Should a Startup Employee Work?
Every so often I get drawn into the debate about startup employees and how much they should work. Should you hire workaholics? Is it expected that startup employees work 100+ hours per week? Should they be online all the time, constantly available and ready to go? It depends. And it’s up to you. If you […]
9 Ways to Successfully Edit Job Postings
Job postings suck. We all know it. It’s been said many, many times. And it doesn’t seem like complaining about it is helping. I’m experimenting on NextMontreal with a job board hack, but I’ve also been thinking about practical advice I can provide on how to improve job postings. Instead of getting people to completely […]
A Systematic Strategy for Sourcing Startup Talent
Companies with the best record and most success at hiring top people don’t sit around and wait for those people to show up. They go out and grab them by the throats. OK, it’s fair to say that grabbing someone by the throat and dragging them to your office for a job isn’t going to […]
8 Questions to Ask When Interviewing at a Startup
Job interviews are meant to be conversations. The interviewer asks some questions and the interviewee does the same. It’s never a good sign when an interviewee doesn’t have any questions. It shows a lack of interest. This is particularly true when interviewing for a startup job because there tend to be so many more unknowns […]
Hiring a Ruby on Rails Developer for a New Startup
So here’s the scoop — I’m starting a new company. I can’t tell you the name (don’t have one), and can’t tell you what it’s about (not ready). I also can’t tell you who is involved (except for me, of course). I can tell you that it will have a strong mobile component. I realize […]
8 Things to Look for When Hiring Startup Talent
Once you have an aggressive system in place for building a recruiting magnet and sourcing talent you need to have a clear sense of what to look for in each potential candidate. When initially sourcing, you don’t need to spend a ton of time reviewing people’s profiles, analyzing resumes, etc. You just find interesting people […]
10 Steps to Successfully Sourcing and Recruiting Startup Talent
Hiring people remains one of the biggest challenges and mysteries for startups. Since most CEOs and founders aren’t trained recruiters, they generally have very little idea about how to recruit properly. And because they’re so busy running their startups, they rarely invest enough time in the recruiting process. Hiring at startups is extremely difficult Even […]
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