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Category: First Employee

  • Employee selection in Start ups: A few useful pointers

    Entrepreneurship
    is often considered the pursuit of a goal without being restricted by
    the limitations imposed by resources. The goal could be limited only to
    financial gains, but could also include larger gains. Invariably, each
    of these goals has an end customer who benefits the most from the action
    of the entrepreneur.     Often, if one doesn’t think of the customer right from the beginning as suggested in the earlier post, one realizes this extremely practical learning at a high cost!  
    Translating the idea into a product/service without being restricted by the resources currently under control would imply seeking support from other sources. While co-founder (read about benefits/drawbacks and implications here) is definitely an option considered there are many other who do not like to cede control over their business and attempt going for an employee who could help realize the idea/concept into a product/service on offer.  
    My interactions with the start up ecosystems have helped me find some better approach that some entrepreneurs prefer. Here are a some of the pointers I believe would help lot of other entrepreneurs:

    What role am I hiring the employee for?
    Often the lack of structure could confuse the founder about the skills that one is trying to look out in his employee. Would it be apt to choose an employee for the IT development involves or for the sales side?
    My personal advice in this is to keep the business aspect with the founders always – not because it could be a business secret, but because there could be important decisions that need to be taken on the ground and direct customer interactions could help this process.
    The need to hire an employee begins from the need to accelerate the production to revenue cycle of the business. This gives a complete spectrum of activities and the notion of job-description wouldn’t make any sense here. Recollect the notion of uncertainty again here – would you prefer some one who is a sort of specialist in one area or a person with generic skills adaptable to the surprise scenario that is so common in the entrepreneurial journey.

    Clearly, independent of the dominant role for which you are hiring. looking for some one who is flexible is better – lets call them Jack of All Trades (JoAT). 
    Note:JoATs are better as long as there is no significant specialization that is to be needed in the product/service development. [We are still in the survival phase]. Working would JoATs for too long could in fact begin limit the growth of the business. Switching over to specialists at the right time is important as one navigates the growth stage.
    What am I looking for in the new employee joining?
    Flowing from the above aspect of preferring a JoAT to a specialist what needs to be understood is that ability to learn quickly is important. If you employee is not willing to bend his/her back and put in the effort with you in your pursuit it better stay away from the candidate. Many candidates come in with the notion of a fixed working time – if one are fixated with a notion of rigidity, it definitely an indicator of the inflexibility that is so essential to live through the survival phase.

    And remember to take note of the thumb rule – attitude is more important than aptitude – this is the ground on which any recruitment has to be based. 

    Reading this blog and thinking about it, is surely a precursor to the large issue of organization culture that is often ignored in start ups – this is definitely an issue for another blog!
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  • Choosing your first employee – Attitude over Aptitude

    The first employee of any start up plays a crucial role. It is in fact a process by which the culture of the organization begins. Navigating this challenge is not easy for start-ups!
    Co-Founders typically are seen to be friends or colleagues and it is very often the employee whom they hire that turns out to be the first external person joining the team. While it is possible that the employee might not really be a complete outsider, but someone in what I could call as the latent network (one which we do not access frequently in the course of our work) and pull him into the active network (that which we access very often).
    As someone who has helped a few start ups in their hiring, and seen many others make their choices, I find there are two broad requirements that emerge out as the most required in my opinion:
    1. Willing to push and attempt to think beyond what he/she already knows
    2. Hungry to work hard if need be
    In addition to this, possessing the knowledge and the skill would only add up to the person as positive points.  But the real deal breaker would be hiring a person who is not willing to think knowing his/her limits and having no enthusiasm to learn if it takes. Simply put, I am looking at the right attitude fit before I look at the aptitude fit.
    Knowledge and expertise of an individual could come with a well defined self-image; the start-up founders would need to know, to what extent these would be beneficial for the company and at what level it would be detrimental to the company’s prospects!
    If the employee is one who would take up additional responsibility beyond what is expected of him and executes this it would be an added positives, the founders however should be willing to give this freedom to the employee to explore and work with them.