1. Skills to Land a VC Talent Role
"Think about hiring as investing. When you're an investor, you're investing in a founder. So when you're thinking from a hiring perspective, think about how hiring impacts the revenue of an organisation rather than just filling a seat."
Breakdown: Framing hires in either revenue gain or revenue loss (e.g the cost of the seat sitting empty) is maybe the quickest way to get buy-in from business leaders.
For each role can you quantify the:
- Revenue impact
- Growth potential
- Market opportunities
- Runway implications
Harriet shares some other skills you can develop in an internal talent role that help in an advisory role during our full conversation.
2. The Early Stage Hiring Playbook
"Everything is downstream from your first 10 hires. They'll help you define your culture, the values that you're creating, and also set the bar for the rest of the hires that you then go on to make."
Harriet shares some specific steps for early-stage hiring success:
1. Assess Readiness First:
- Has the founder cracked the function themselves?
- Is there consistent market traction?
- Are processes becoming too complex?
- Is time being pulled from other crucial areas?
2. Define the Real Need:
- Identify the specific problem to solve
- Understand required expertise level
- Consider market stage impact
- Map out growth expectations
3. Run Strategic Processes:
- Get deeply familiar with candidate experience
- Understand their business model background
- Verify their sales cycles and deal sizes
- Check stakeholder management experience
- Test motivation for startup environment
Key Questions to Ask:
- Are they ready to join an early-stage company?
- Do they truly understand the expectations?
- Will they work well with founders?
- Can they add to the culture?
3. Managing Time-Poor Stakeholders
"Meet them where they are whether that's WhatsApp, Slack, whatever communication method they prefer. Be brief but precise and direct on what it is that you need."
Breakdown: Make it easy for busy stakeholders to engage with recruitment:
- Aim to be concise
- Focus on critical information
- Use their preferred communication channels
- Frame everything in terms of business impact
Question for Your Team: How can you make your hiring processes more stakeholder-friendly without compromising quality?