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12/12/14 | Uncategorized

How to Attract Top Technical Talent for Your Early-Stage Startup

Don’t try to get really good at something you suck at. Instead, get really good at hiring people who are already have that skill set. 

By Poornima Vijayashanker (Founder, BizeeBee & Femgineer)

There are a lot of things I really suck at. The first is visual design. I’ve never been trained as a designer, and while it would probably take just a month or two to learn Photoshop, I know my time would be better spent doing other things. So I don’t even bother doing more than some light CSS and HTML, and on occasion I fiddle with a Photoshop file someone else has already designed for me.

You’d think that as an engineer I’d want to learn design, and believe me, I do! I’ve read some great books on design and I’ve learned about UX (user experience), which is why I can create wireframes and do usability tests. But I just haven’t made the time to learn visual design.

As it turns out, I might never have to, because I’ve learned to recruit some top notch designers. I can instead focus on what I’m actually good at: engineering, writing, and what absolutely needs to get done — sales!

Since design leaves a lasting first impression on a customer, I focus on finding the best folks to work with and then delegate away.

I know it seems easier said than done, which is why in this post I want to share some of the best techniques for sourcing and recruiting technical talent like software engineers and designers.

In this post, I’ve distilled my knowledge and experiences from having conducted 100+ interviews, from intern-level candidates to CTOs. If you’re in the early stages of building a product, these strategies will get you far.

Read more on Femgineer >

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