Founder Notes · Published July 15, 2026
Hiring Is Harder Than Selling
Clients can be chosen over time; people must be judged in a narrow window. Most of our mistakes trace back to hiring.
Founders often assume the hard part is finding clients. After a few years it becomes clear that the hardest part is finding the right person at the right moment and keeping them. One bad hire usually costs more than one lost deal.
Two kinds of people we got wrong
Strong engineers who avoid conversation. No project is purely independent work, and a brilliant build that misses the requirement still gets rebuilt.
People with impressive résumés and unclear motives. They stayed three months, learned what they came for, and left.
How we hire now
Forty minutes on what they have built and how they handled problems, never on strengths and weaknesses.
A small paid task at a realistic pace, so both sides see how the other works.
A final conversation with the two people they would work with, who can veto the hire.
Hire slowly and the team stays stable. We would rather leave a seat empty for three months than spend three months repairing a mistake.
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