Questions regarding practices of recruiting new employees for the business.
78
votes
15answers
5k views
Is hiring average programmers worse than staying solo?
I have a reasonably successful SaaS which is pretty much a one-man show; I always wanted a co-founder but never found the right person. It's been running for a number of years now, growing ...
36
votes
13answers
8k views
Using your startup on your resume while job-hunting?
I have a very new solo startup that doesn't make any money (yet...), but it's time to get a "real job" so that I can pay the bills. I'm very proud of the work I did on my startup and think that it ...
26
votes
10answers
2k views
Am I too old to join a startup?
I just got approached to join a startup.
20 years ago, I had my first startup experience working as employee #5 of a outfit that is now owned by a German multinational corporation. It was the best ...
16
votes
14answers
6k views
Should I put my “startup” experience on my resume?
I have a similar question to this one regarding putting your "startup" on your resume. I have a full time job and started a small company on the side. My startup isn't a product company - I've been ...
16
votes
5answers
508 views
Overwhelmed by Technical Supports
I have 500 paying customers and 7000 free users grossing about $7k a month and growing fast.
I'm tied down at least for several hours a day to handle daily maintenance and answering technical support ...
13
votes
6answers
1k views
How does a technical person evaluate an MBA-type business partner?
I've read a lot of questions asking about how an MBA can find a technical person to implement their idea, but I haven't seen the other direction.
As a technical person, I know that I can get my idea ...
11
votes
10answers
609 views
How do you recruit enough 'top talent' for your company?
For many organizations that have achieved some level of success, effectively growing the staff, without compromising the overall quality of who you bring on board, is a critical challenge. What do ...
11
votes
5answers
277 views
Expanding development team for a startup
I'm a software developer and co-founder of a start up that's in a sprint to launch a web app the next 2 months. We have about 3 months of burn time we have before we need to get some funding. By ...
10
votes
23answers
2k views
Getting a New Hire to Work More
We recently hired a junior developer as employee #1 at our startup. He's doing a great job on all fronts (produces good work, gets along with team, etc.) with one exception--he isn't working long ...
10
votes
5answers
2k views
Is it illegal for me to only consider women for a position I'm about to advertise for?
My startup's products will primarily be purchased by women, and thus I'd like to hire a sales and marketing director who is a woman. Is it against the law for me to advertise this position that I'm ...
10
votes
2answers
446 views
Does the concept of “Unlimited Vacation” increase productivity and attract talented employees?
Does the concept of "Unlimited Vacation" increase productivity and attract talented employees ?
I've read about it here, specifically:
Unlimited vacation fosters productivity and loyalty because ...
10
votes
6answers
2k views
Joining a startup within its first year - salary/equity expectations?
I've recently been headhunted by a startup a year old which I am very interested in leaving my current position in a large established business in the same industry for.
There are a number of people ...
9
votes
12answers
2k views
What are the pros and cons of employees that work remotely?
What are the considerations as we consider employees that would work remotely? I'm particularly thinking about technical positions (programming, web site maintenance) that are remote due to geography ...
9
votes
11answers
2k views
Build in-house or outsource?
I'm working with a SaaS business with a non-technical founder/CEO and am looking for pros and cons for (1) building the software in-house vs (2) outsourcing version 1.0 to a consulting firm.
From ...
8
votes
15answers
1k views
To be a great software company, you hire the best developers… how?
Joel Spolsky is always writing about how companies should treat and offer the best to their developers in order to be able to get the best of them... as a startup, when time comes and you do need to ...
8
votes
14answers
759 views
Argh! Not knowing how to program holds me back
I have experience in running a business, in marketing, research, strategy, customer service, business development, and I have some very important ideas that I want to transform into businesses. ...
8
votes
8answers
878 views
Tips for hiring a freelancer programmer?
I'll be writing my own web-site soon, and some parts of it I plan to outsource to developers (either people I know, or if I won't find any - developers from "freelancers sites").
Has anyone who ...
7
votes
10answers
628 views
Should I trust software development companies from Asia?
There are lots of sites around the internet that offer cheap labour from an offshore location. What do you think about using this type of site to speed up your local business? Is it a good idea? Has ...
7
votes
10answers
1k views
How many programmers should a startup have?
You've got an early software project, it's reasonably popular. There's no known limit to the product's potential size or usefulness. You've just gotten funding.
How many programmers do you hire?
7
votes
3answers
480 views
Are US NDAs enforceable in other countries?
Are NDAs a safe thing to do when hiring out of the country? I'm hiring freelancers to do some mobile programming work, and they reside in France. They have, very kindly, signed the NDA I provided for ...
6
votes
7answers
296 views
How do I find a bona fide Social Media consultant?
Everybody and their brother claims to be a social media "expert" these days.
How do you find a consultant who actually knows what they are doing?
How much should they cost?
What should you get for ...
6
votes
6answers
913 views
If a candidate does not follow up after a job interview should I automatically dismiss them as a candidate?
If a candidate does not follow up after a job interview should I automatically dismiss them as a candidate? I have interviewed a number of very qualified candidates for a position that I am hiring for ...
6
votes
6answers
310 views
How can a Greenhorn get experience?
In this economic climate, competition for jobs is stiff. What should a smart, hardworking recent graduate of a business school program do to try to get a job that will give him the experience he needs ...
6
votes
5answers
408 views
Hire a sales guy for a part-time start-up?
Background:
I'm a tech guy with alot of product building experience
I've built and recently launched a SaaS/cloud application for a niche market, targeting small-size companies
The product provides ...
6
votes
4answers
80 views
How to start hiring people effectively?
Okay, this is not a typical question, but applies in a specific case. Starting out as a freelancer, most of us spend a lot of time in picking up necessary skills and building out a set of happy ...
5
votes
11answers
1k views
Hire or outsource web design?
When building a website in a bootstrapped startup, is it better to hire a web designer or outsource the work? All of the founders are coders and don't excel in web design. Apart from that, if the ...
5
votes
7answers
2k views
What Questions Should I Ask When Interviewing at a Startup?
The ten years I've worked since graduating college have been for companies with more than 40,000 employees. I am being interviewed by a startup. The job seems to suit me and I am ready for the ...
5
votes
7answers
427 views
As a potential employee, should I frown on “zerg hiring”?
In my job hunt, it's incredibly common for me to run into startups that have say 3 people and then have the CTO tell me "We just closed a round of funding, so we're looking to hire 3 or 4 more ...
5
votes
4answers
204 views
When is it wise to start hiring other programmers?
I'm a programmer and a student and I've got lots of ideas/proposals etc for projects. At what point do I start hiring other programmers to help out?
5
votes
11answers
544 views
Where can I get a designer?
For my startup (web 2 SaaS) I am looking for a good designer, probably with HTML/JavaScript skills. It seems this is pretty difficult - all good people have jobs. So I am thinking about remote work. I ...
5
votes
7answers
218 views
Which is more difficult to hire, techie or marketing?
I know it's dependent on the employer's background, but in general is more difficult to hire great marketing staff or product developers?
5
votes
4answers
318 views
How to attract talent as startup?
What are the best ways in attracting talent to a startup? Is it salary, a cool brand, a cool office or something else? Equity is pretty much a standard so I'm looking for some other tips.
A while ...
5
votes
4answers
202 views
How to expand our workforce from 1 technical 'guru' to a productive team of 6
Like many fellow startups that we know, we've started like with one technical wizard who know a lot of stuff and who knows now where everything is and how it works. The system has undergone a lot of ...
5
votes
1answer
196 views
What does employment at will actually mean for an employee?
I've recently (5 months ago) signed and employment-at-will contract with a largish company. I start in 2 months. Given different scenarios, I want to figure out not only what this legally means, but ...
5
votes
3answers
75 views
Do you have rules in place for doing something manually vs. creating an automated system?
I've heard from many successful entrepreneurs that only your job as a startup founder is to constantly be creating systems; However, There's a huge trade-off though between trying new experiments and ...
5
votes
4answers
437 views
Hiring for startups
Hiring for startups is not an easy problem to solve. How do you attract good talent to a company that is just starting out and has an uncertain future. Through this thread I would like to invite ...
5
votes
5answers
292 views
How to select a VP of Sales and Marketing partner
I've been working solo on my startup for longer than I'd care to admit. I'm a coder w/ a fleshed out website/webservice that's finally realized that I might actually need sales people.
I'm thinking ...
5
votes
3answers
125 views
Hiring from Competitors
I am thinking of hiring my staff from my competitor's firm, are there any legal issues in doing so? Both for my firm and for the new joining staff member?
Additional details: To be more specific, I ...
5
votes
2answers
157 views
Who do I need to hire?
I've started a company approximately 2 years ago that provides monitoring services for a niche cloud-based industry. My target customer base are IT and Development shops of various companies ranging ...
5
votes
0answers
76 views
Should I bring in a co-founder, or hire? [closed]
I'm a developer, who has been working solo on a startup for close to 12 months.
The tech side is coming along well, but I'm acutely lacking in my business accumen, and sales skills.
Here's some key ...
4
votes
13answers
800 views
Should you hire a candidate who is arrogant?
I am hiring for software developer position.
Now I got this one guy who solved my C test well. But I find that hes a bit oversmart. I also got this other guy whosdid 80% correctly.
So, now I am ...
4
votes
18answers
1k views
Would you hire offshore developers?
What's your opinion? Should US-based startup hire offshore web developers to reduce costs? Is it worth it?
How would you find them? How much would you pay them per hour of work?
4
votes
4answers
707 views
Can one person do both Marketing & Sales/Business-Development jobs?
Context: We are a small 3-developer company that sells Windows desktop software for small businesses on our website.
We believe that we need both:
"Marketing" - i.e. one-to-many interactions, e.g. ...
4
votes
2answers
476 views
What are the key qualities you look for in a candidate for startups?
I know that it is very difficult to gauge a candidate's attitude / work ethics from the start. What are the most important things you look for a candidate that will be fit for a startup software ...
4
votes
4answers
3k views
What to look for in a Chief Operating Officer?
What traits/requirements should we look for in a successful COO? (We are in software development)
As someone who would maximize the output of our development teams, our COO would oversee multiple ...
4
votes
6answers
1k views
What do I need to know about hiring an intern?
My bootstrapped startup (Textaurant) needs some help with market research. Since we're so close to two of my alma maters (undergrad is ~1 mile, grad is ~5 miles), I figured I would reach out to their ...
4
votes
1answer
172 views
College Interns v/s Professional Developers?
We are currently facing a dilemma as to whether should we hire interns from colleges (as their summer vacations are about to start) or should we approach some professional guys to build our website?
...
4
votes
2answers
2k views
1099 limitations of how much work you can give a contractor. Need some help with that
I think I am pretty good (having dealt with tons of contractor developers) at staying within independent contractor rules and keeping the Labor Department at bay, when it comes to using ...
4
votes
3answers
128 views
To reject or to ignore?
I think we are all faced with this issue: we got an application from someone and we don't want to accept it. The most typical case is for employment. In my project I get many more types and very ...
4
votes
5answers
361 views
Where can I run a background check on a potential hire?
This field seems really shady, so searching for "background check" online is pretty disappointing. Any suggestions?
