The Founder's Guide to Hiring

‌Hiring is hard.

If you get it wrong, it drags down the whole company until you take action. If you get it right, it becomes a bigger and increasingly difficult part of your job.

When you hire well, your company grows and you end up hiring people for jobs that you haven't done and at levels of experience that you have no way to judge.

Out of an acute fear of screwing it up, I've made hiring an area of focus and study for myself.

The first breakthrough for me was reading Who? by Geoff Smart after seeing it recommended in The Rockefeller Habits. Who? is a must-read for founders and hiring managers. You can read my notes before buying the book. Then dig into my advice below for hiring managers.

5 Signs That a Candidate Can Work Remotely: Not everyone is cut out for remote work. Here's how to filter candidates without remote experience.

Should You, the CEO, Hire a General Manager?: How we prepared to hire our first general manager.

How to Hire Customer Service Reps: Don't overlook this critical role. Want people who care about your customers? Hire your customers.

How to Get an Interview:  This article was written for job seekers but I use it every time we hire for a new role. I include a link to this article in the "Further Reading" section of every job description that we post so that candidates know what we want and can write better applications. I can tell which candidates didn't read the post—or didn't heed the advice—and can filter them out. I've included the post here in case you want to write one for your company and include it with job postings. As our Operations Manager, Carlos, once said, "If the teacher gives you the answers to the test, you should probably listen to them."