Part 1 - A Crash Course in Tech Hiring for Startups

This is a first of 2 posts I'm making which are a summary of our "Tech Hiring for Startups - Crash Course" event.

About Hiring

It’s important to always keep the cost-quality-and time triangle in mind when hiring.

You need to be able to find the sweet spot that balances the cost of hiring, the time It takes you to hire, and the quality of the talent you hire. Of course, each organisation will have a particular sweet spot that’s different from that of other companies.

There is no single formula that applies to everyone. But what is true for all is that if you focus on one leg of the triangle, you will have to sacrifice the others. For example, if you must absolutely have the highest quality recruit, be prepared to spend a bit more and wait a little longer to find that perfect person to hire. Likewise, if you are constrained by your budget, you probably will not be able to attract the best talent, or it may take you longer to find that person.

The process of hiring is hard. You need to diligently pore through all the resumés, then you need to schedule the interviews before you finally select the person to hire. And then there are the numerous negotiations that happen all throughout the process. Even when you outsource this requirement, it’s still a laborious, time-consuming, and expensive process.

Headcount Planning

The first and most important step in the hiring process is headcount planning. As the term suggests, it involves planning for your hires so that the startup can respond more strategically and efficiently to changes in the marketplace and the needs of the business.

This calls for preparing a comprehensive Job Description (JD). The effective JD identifies what the organisation needs and highlighting the skills, experience, and cost of hiring the right person. This allows you to assess if the company can afford the hire, or if not, explore other options that will allow you to have the needed expertise at a more affordable cost. Also determine when people need to be hired, factoring in such details as notice periods and other factors that can affect the timing of the hire.

The Mindset of a Developer

One of the reasons Silicon Roundabout have been successful at connecting people and facilitating hires is that we ourselves are developers, we understand how developers think, and we take on the developer mindset in recruiting.

What does that even mean?

• Developers are not always motivated by money.
• Developers like to decompose things and break them down into simpler, more understandable components to understand how they work.
• They are compulsive problem solvers. Tech professionals love taking on challenges.
• They are suckers for efficiency and hate anything that is inefficient and wastes time. If a developer feels that a task will recur, they will find a way to automate the process, so they don’t have to do it themselves.
• Each developer is individually unique. They will hate it if you stereotype them into pre-conceived categories.

It’s important that you understand and consider all of these points when you communicate with developers.

To be continued in part 2...