Hot Seat: The Startup CEO Guidebook

Note that while founders usually invest as a part of the company’s creation without further reward (and this is part of their contribution for their founder shares), family and friends should have some form of structured agreement. An uncapped convertible note with a 20%–30% discount is a good, fair instrument for this that won’t bother most invest

Candidates who come in through referrals are more likely to be hired, more likely to last out the year, and more likely to succeed in performance reviews. Referral candidates are simply better candidates.

No autoresponders. Every email comes from a person. You don’t need an autoresponse when a human responds right away.

I suggest a simple rule: no more than five interviews and two weeks once the candidate sets foot in the building.

Fourth, consider setting up a reward program for referrals. If it’s going to cost you $25K to pay a recruiter to fill the position, it’s not crazy to spend some of that on your team instead. Just a word of caution: reward programs can set up some weird dynamics. Your team may suddenly feel like they’re selling their friends out for a bonus instead

When hiring someone for a role you don’t understand, try before you buy: make the role a temporary one and use a series of short-term contracts until you get a sense of what you’re looking for.

Startups don’t outthink their competitors; they outexecute them. The best startups have founders who stay in sync, but work independently. And there’s a single magic ingredient that makes this work: trust.

Respond to all emails right away — at least, within one business day. At Ontela we went further and had 1-hour response times during business hours, and 10-hour turnaround outside business hours. Candidates loved it and it moved all our recruiting metrics forward.

Hiring a perfect team means finding perfect fits along just two scales: you want people who are ideal for the work you want them to do, and ideal for the culture that you are building.