Comments on: Talent Crunch

By: Tell Zuckerberg! Does Social Networking ‘Work’ For You? « FoundRead

Tue, 15 Jan 2008 17:36:34 +0000

[...] a regular contributor to both Found|READ, and the Fast Company blog. For samples of his work see: Talent Crunch; and Careers: Who Wants to Be a Political Pundit?. No comments Share/Send Topic: Data [...]

By: marknewman

marknewman — Thu, 10 May 2007 11:27:45 +0000

I completely agree with Alex. You can find the good people you need, it just depends if you want to try to build the good old boys “Valley Company” where you think it’s cool to brag about hanging out working in your loft or if you want to go one step further and build a great team.

ONE MAJOR POINT THOUGH – this is very important, so often do startups think that recruiting a certain person from a big company will be awesome in “building your team” BUT MAKE SURE THAT YOU HIRE A START-UP PERSON NOT A BIG COMPANY PERSON!!! Too often does this happen when you hire the big VP of Sales or VP of Marketing who then gets frustrated when they don’t have any budget or get stressed with a lower salary. It’s definitely a mindset that you need in addition to skills.}

By: alexrudloff

alexrudloff — Thu, 10 May 2007 09:28:51 +0000

Excellent post. We've found that its a lot easier to find solid folks if you are open to telecommuting. Not just because we're located East coast, but because more and more of the best talent we find are in strange places through out the country.

I think decentralized communities (i.e. blogs), lower costs and rising awareness (kids are growing up as coders) are generating larger amounts of talent, but its just spread thin geographically.. It's an interesting trend.}

By: nivi

nivi — Mon, 07 May 2007 23:23:44 +0000

My favorite recruiting advice: "Make no small plans for they have no power to stir the soul."

Good stuff attracts good people.}

By: sean

sean — Mon, 07 May 2007 20:03:41 +0000

This was noted in the opening, but it is worth repeating that even when recruiting is tough it is still one of the single most important factors in the success of the startup…this is true in any market at any time…in my experience, when in doubt dedicate more (not less) time to recruiting key talent…and in the early stages be incredibly selective…as the saying goes, “one bad apple…”}

By: cwodtke

cwodtke — Mon, 07 May 2007 12:41:33 +0000

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