Hiring Basics for Startup Founders

Living and building Recruitcha in San Francisco, we see the competition for talent every day.

Each YC batch creates a new wave of startups all going after the same profiles, making it harder and harder to stand out.

Finding the right people for your team is the highest-leverage thing you can do post-raise to get your startup off the ground.

By the end of this guide, you’ll know the basics of early-stage recruiting and have the templates and tools needed to make your first hires.

Why Recruiting is important

A startup’s biggest asset is the speed of its innovation, and that’s largely driven by the caliber of its people.

The stronger your team, the faster you can build a product that gains real market share.

A strong, trustworthy team unlocks you as the founder to focus on other aspects of growing the business.

In other words, it gives you leverage. If you’re constantly managing underperformers instead, growth slows down.

That’s why it’s worth investing in your recruiting process and keeping a pipeline of strong talent, so you can keep growing.

Let’s dive in.

Recruiting is a numbers game

Recruiting and sales are very similar. Both are numbers games.

Sales is about contacting the right prospect at the right time, with the right offer.

Recruiting is about contacting the right candidate at the right time, with the right opportunity.

In practice, that means:

• You will receive a lot of “no”s.
• Many people will drop off along the way to an offer.
• You’re effectively doing founder-led sales, but for hiring.
• You need to be crystal clear on your why, vision, mission, and what makes your startup different.

The rest of this guide will help you get there: from writing effective job descriptions and building a pipeline, to running interviews and closing your first hires.