August 12, 2025 • 33 mins
New grad or seasoned pro? Every startup faces this hiring choice. We break down when fresh talent beats experience, why culture trumps credentials, and how to build a team that won't jump ship in six months.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
I think I would look at it as atleast for App Armor, we always,
I always say these people, we had to grow our talent.
Yeah, kind of like a triple-A baseball team.
We were playing, you and I were playing, you know, big leagues,
whatever, big league ball. We were pretty big deal.
I don't know, the old cracker factory.
So we were playing big league ball and then we would, you
know, grow our talent. So people would start out, they
would have a minimal impact on the business.
(00:21):
As time went on, we would bring them up to the big leagues.
Let's get it rolling. Big ideas, money folding hustle,
smart dream so wild turn that grinded through a joy.
Ride. Want to talk to you today about
what we did in our company whichwas hired a lot of new grads
(00:43):
cause startup. We didn't have a ton of money,
OK. We were also looking for there
were government programs to encourage hiring of new grads,
things like that, and. So are we putting just so I know
before two to two things I want to say before we started out OK
or as we started episode one, are we putting AI on a shelf
just for this conversation? This will be part of the
(01:04):
conversation because I want thisto be a.
We did have kind of a similar discussion, so I wanna make sure
a little bit different, OK. Second is while our policies
were biased young people, we do not hate old people.
We do not hate old people. I am old people.
Chris is old people. Yeah, alright.
Yeah, yeah, OK. You still.
Youthful and full of life. Though, So yeah, so obviously
(01:26):
hiring new grads versus hiring kind of like the experienced
person with like a career in thefield, you know, that kind of
that kind of stuff. OK, so why don't we give a
little bit of a story of our hiring background and kind of
how we built. So it was the two of us at
first, OK, we hired 2 recent grads.
(01:48):
We had a complete culture failure that went sideways.
One quit and one we had to let go.
So we were back to just us. OK, so we then moved to a
coworking location because we realized culture is actually
kind of important Co working kind of and.
We didn't. We just didn't know how to do
it. Yeah, we just had.
We didn't, I don't know, we didn't, we skip that course in
(02:08):
the NBA or something, but we just couldn't build the.
Culture of good at it. Yeah.
So what we did, the way we achieved that was we we moved.
We moved from kind of crummy office space to a coworking
location that had a better vibe.Other companies in there, they
they had like the perks. They had the beer, beer,
o'clock, all those types of things.
And then so we started hiring again.
(02:30):
And again, it was younger, rightout of school, you know, minimal
experience. We hired interns that were
students that graduated and thenbecame employees.
So Yep, we really built our talent from or through.
The, we would find people who had an interest in business but
had a different degree. So we, we would look for at
(02:53):
Queens University, they had the graduate diploma in business,
which was you got an arts and science degree in something,
politics, history, insert whatever extremely useful
degree. And then you get a, I got a
history degree. So I'm allowed to say that.
And then, and then you got like a supplementary like diploma
from the School of Business about something business
related. Those were the target because we
knew that they were keeners for business and we're looking for
opportunity exactly like a startup or.
(03:15):
Something Yeah. What we didn't hire ever was the
experienced career person. Why didn't we?
Yeah. OK.
So a couple of reasons. So I'm gonna talk from my
perspective and you can fill in the blanks.
So I think the first thing that I had a problem with was I
thought it would be an issue. I was pretty young, like I would
(03:36):
like 22/23/24 depending on whichyear here.
And I thought it would be an issue that I would be younger
than the person I was managing OHP.
And I thought that and I think that's a rational expectation
for a lot of reasons. So for one thing, they have more
experience in presumably our market, otherwise why are we
talking more with our technology?
(03:56):
Yeah, otherwise why are we talking to them?
So this I felt would be challenging and something that
like, for instance, if I was to think of myself now as a 36 year
old and have somebody 26 managing me, I would have to
really, it's not that I don't believe them.
It's just that their experienceshave to be really specific and
(04:19):
the industry or the company, we have to have something I'm
really about. Otherwise, like you would have
these moments being like, that'sstupid, you know, I mean, right.
Or like, I know better because of whatever.
It would be hard to not have those thoughts creep in your
mind. And the other thing I worried
about too is I, I just, I was like, I was the blank slate new
grad effectively. And you were almost like
(04:40):
mentoring me a lot on certain things to some extent, like you
didn't mentor me on sales. I kind of just like got into
that. But I do think there's something
to be said there where it was going to be.
I was worried it was going to get weird.
Yeah, it got weird. Didn't.
OK, that is an interesting comment.
So if I think back to the the time before.
(05:00):
Dave land before time. Yeah.
So you recall I was document management software.
I was selling it through photocopier dealerships.
And I had two employees who weresignificantly older than me.
So I was probably like 20-3 and the employees were probably like
60. What were that?
(05:20):
Much they were, they were. Like that feels like an
impossible set. They were like.
Industry veterans. They were people that worked.
One guy all previously owned a photocopier dealership and one
guy was a photocopier like salesperson.
Right, man, that's so. Can I tell you that baggage?
I definitely like felt like I was getting run by them.
(05:41):
You know what I mean? Like like they knew the industry
really well. I was like the newcomer, but I
knew the technology and we were thinking this is a good marriage
of these skills, but I I felt like I was always out negotiated
because like I never negotiated A compensation plan.
Yeah, they knew how to do it. They've done it.
They've done it A. Whole bunch I didn't know that,
you know, the games that go on with like expense reports and
(06:04):
things like that, but you know, and I didn't know how to manage
or I imagine, you know, employees or.
Something you saved me from so many stupid decisions like
there. Is I made them already?
Yeah, yeah, you during the book too.
We talk about them and it's like, and this is when Chris
saved my butt on this one and this one.
He helped me with this one. And it was because you had been
through some of this. And I had made the mistake,
(06:24):
yeah. So I knew that that was gonna be
which. Is like the story of my life,
right? Because you had like gives your
10 years ahead of me. So you've experienced a lot of
stuff and I see you screw up andbe like, wow, I'm not gonna do
that. But I never taught you anything
like actually, no, never said. I just like.
I didn't lecture you, just demoed.
I was just like Dave, I got a terrible story about something
(06:45):
bad that happened and This is why we shouldn't do that thing.
Yeah, no, for real. Yeah, OK.
So. You're hitting a lot of
interesting things though there.So I think that with older, OK,
let's play devil's advocate for a second.
So the case for older employees I think is like, OK, they have
relevant experience in your market.
I always think of from sales perspective because, but this is
(07:05):
here's the two sort of that in just a second.
But so they should theoreticallyhave the context, the Rolodex,
which is really important. They're basically a rainmaker.
They're gonna come in, they're gonna make money for your
company. I think this is complicated for
a couple of reasons. And by the way, that can work
and end of sentence. Yeah.
Where this gets complicated is that older employees have a
deeper field of knowledge, whichis which is good and bad.
(07:26):
On the one hand, it's good because they know things about
your market. It's bad that they can use that
information against you. There's like a built-in
information asymmetry that's challenging that you really
can't get its experience. They have experience and you
don't. I think that they what do you
get with a younger employee? You get a crazy keener Beaver.
They're gonna be usually if you're hiring correctly, you're
get someone who's very keen and excited and willing to learn.
(07:49):
I think as you get older, I mean, you can comment to this
again, being 10 years older thanme that you kind of get like
more set in your ways. This is how this is done.
This is how we've always done it.
Yeah. So you come with this is the the
cultural and organizational likestructural baggage.
You you're gonna get the way they work, and that's going to
work its way, especially if it'sone of the early employees of
(08:11):
your company. You're gonna start doing work
the way they've always done. Work right, because that's how
they operate. And that's a bit of a risk,
especially if you're a startup, because you are gonna wanna
mess. Requiring like, again, like a I
always changes everything in this.
But like, imagine hiring like somebody who's 60 years old in a
world where AI is this disruptive new technology.
(08:32):
They've never used it. They don't understand it.
Yeah, like, like, and then not all, not 100%.
I always like little caveats cause, you know, there's
probably a 5% of people in their60s who are like, so engaged
into AI. Great.
Yeah. But I would say overwhelmingly
they're not. And also overwhelmingly they are
tired. Like I have two kids, energy
(08:54):
level. I can feel it going.
Down Each year I get older. Yeah.
I can't even. I have no idea how I'm gonna
feel when I'm 60. So can I give an example of that
from my story about the photocopier dealer guys that
worked for me? So the, the software I built was
document management software, OK.
(09:14):
And the way, the way we priced it was very similar to a
photocopier. You, you paid for the software,
right One time, right. We paid the Commission to the
sales Rep and the dealer got wasable to mark it up and make
their, their margin on it. That was it.
OK, that's ridiculous and but it's because that's how they
(09:35):
sold in that. Market right, they wanted a big
check, a big deal. They put it in their pocket and
they go on to the next big check, the next big deal Yeah,
whereas how it should have been sold would would have been a
monthly recurring. OK, but then the photocopier
sales Rep, the totality there islike well I don't want 10 bucks
every month for you know the next you know what I mean?
(09:57):
Like, the margin on that, the amount of money was not worth
their while. They need to make thousands of
dollars on each deal. Yeah.
And move on to the next deal. They didn't wanna do they.
Like, they weren't in it for thelong game.
They just want their money up front.
Yeah. And they wanted out, you know,
like. Even the fact that you sold
through dealerships is an example of like legacy thought
(10:19):
construct. That's the way it works.
This is the way we've always done it, you know, but you could
have just as easily gone direct to consumer, direct to these
enterprises, charge these recurring models and done way
better. Yeah, right.
The, the, the, The thing is likeyou, you, you operate in their
box. And and yeah, because they have
experienced there is, again, going back to my original point,
(10:40):
there is some level of feeling like they have authority over
you, right? Or they're playing you or they
could be playing you. Yeah.
And I think there's also becauseof that, a fundamental mistrust.
I I just see it as a lot of problems.
Now this is kind of an extreme example, just to be clear.
Like you were 20 something and they're 60 something.
Yeah, I think really what we're talking if you're really
category where they're within like 10 years, maybe it's OK.
I think as the years go out, it gets worse this this issue.
(11:03):
But it's like, so if I'm 36 and I'm hiring somebody who's 46, I
bet we could make that work. I think we could make that work
better. I think they would be they were
more relatable, right? You're so far from being able to
relate to those, those guys who have been like they would have
been selling fax machines, bro. Yeah, like that's.
They definitely sold fax They. Definitely sold that.
And typewriters, electric typewriters, like this is a
(11:24):
different universe. They're from now, yeah.
So let's. Break that.
That's that part of the equation.
Yeah, yeah. So why don't we kind of like,
why don't we kind of, we've kindof talked a little bit about
both sides. Why don't we just break down
more systematically for the? Listeners.
So wait, one more thing there. Yeah, I also think that can be
an issue with investors. So if you have a startup and you
(11:46):
have a lot of invest, so investors are not employees, but
they generally are older becausethey made a bunch of money now,
they have that money now. They're investing that money.
And I think this creates problems when again, they want
to have influence over the way you're running the business.
They manage their investment, right?
But they operated in the market because they're not operating
anymore. They operated, you know, 5-10,
twenty years ago and then they bring that expertise, which is
(12:07):
out of date to your company, which could be doing it totally
differently. And that's gonna have
complicated consequences. It may be OK, It may work or
might really not work anymore. Yeah.
So I don't know. This is it goes back.
It's these issues of alignment most of the time.
How do you get your first customer hint?
They might be right under your nose.
(12:29):
Find the answer to this questionand dozens more in Startup
Different. Find it on Amazon, Audible, and
Kindle. OK, so, alright, so we've got
we've got new grads, we've got seasoned veteran employees, I
guess is what you would call them, or career career employees
that are hiring. And I want to talk about the
pros and cons for each one. OK, so let's let's take the new
(12:49):
grads first, OK, Because we've been there, we've done that.
OK, I wanna, I'm gonna put out there some pros and you give me
your comments on them. So first pro of hiring manager.
Had on. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Cost savings for a new grand, it's no brainer, right, OK.
They are newer, they don't have as much.
Parents are probably gonna pay the blast.
Nowadays with the job market, like if you're actually hiring a
(13:09):
person and not using an AI bot, I also would suspect that you
could command actually even a a pretty decent like not a very
expensive salary for most peopleright?
Just trying to get their. Foot in the door?
In the door, yeah. Especially in programs that
don't have huge hiring rates. OK.
So actually I'm gonna get to a comment on that later.
So next piece talk about like think about moldability or
(13:31):
trainability of a new hire versus.
So here's the the the two edged sword of the new hire is on the
one hand, they are a blank slate.
You can condition them to have your values to work the way you
do, to buy into your culture more easily.
They don't come with preconceived notions.
However, they also come with a general lack of obviously
(13:54):
experience and know how. What does this translate to?
Like, literally this is like showing people how to send
emails that don't come off as you being a Dick, OK.
Or, or that are just like, not helpful, like communication
training. Yeah.
There's a, you know, we actuallymentioned this in the book.
So it's like if you hire a new person, you have to teach them
how to send emails. If you hire an older person, you
(14:15):
have to teach them not to put the entire e-mail in the subject
line. Yeah, You know what I mean?
Like, there's like, there's there's complications on both
sides. But I would say that for those
new grads, yeah, the blessing and curse is that you can coach
them and they require coaching. Yeah, you must do must,
otherwise they will just. You must burn it and train them,
but they are moldable and trainable.
Correct. So it's I think I would look at
(14:36):
it is at least for App Armor. We always, I always say this
people, we had to grow our talent.
Yeah, kind of like a triple-A baseball team.
We were playing, you and I were playing, you know, big leagues,
whatever, big league ball. We were pretty big deal.
I don't know. The old cracker.
Factory so we were playing big league ball and then we would
you know grow our talent so people would start out they
would have a minimal impact on the business as time went on we
(14:57):
would bring them up to the big leagues, more customer facing
bigger deals with their salesperson, more important code
of their coder, bigger projects if they're implementation so on
and so. Forth.
OK, my next right and my research brought up this one,
which was that a new employee and a new grad would bring fresh
perspectives and innovation. True.
I I don't know if I agree with that.
Oh, why? I don't know.
(15:19):
I think some employees would sometimes bring up an idea that
they might have, but a lot of the times they would be more
like, well, what do you want me to do?
OK, you know what I mean. Hold on, hold on hold.
On what? This is all.
Tell me what you want me to do and I'll do it.
Yeah. Well, this is dependent on the
kind of here people you're hiring and for what role you're
hiring. So I would definitely say.
I just don't think necessarily because they're new graduate,
(15:40):
they're gonna bring up fresh perspectives and innovative
ideas. The third thing?
There is that. Do they exist in a culture where
they believe they can bring up ideas?
Right. OK.
So if you've built a culture where, hey, you're new here,
shut up. Listen to us.
I know everything or whatever you're saying is stupid.
I had scenarios where sales repsbrought things to me.
OK. Now, sometimes they were pretty
(16:01):
dumb because it's like they wereliterally not in the market and
there were reasons why we did stuff.
Yeah, I think I think back on how we used to do a morning
scrum meeting and that we used to be like this 15 minute
meeting we do every morning to kind of like just a standing
meeting. What are you doing?
What are you stuck on? What do you need help with?
You know, that kind of thing. And I remember we had new
(16:23):
employees and you know who you are who would push on that being
like what we do, this is a wasteof our time.
I'm like, no, we're doing this because everybody needs to have
the day get going, get set and we're in.
And it was really important. Then overtime, they're like, Oh
yeah, I see it. I see why we do this to maybe to
their dismay. So I guess it's like kind of
complicated, but I, I think but and, but I've had good ideas
(16:45):
come from it too. I've had genuine ideas come from
that, because when you can standwhen you're not in the business
all the time, you can see it with a different.
Lens. So I would just say mileage may
vary on these fresh perspectivesand innovation.
I would actually say that young grads aren't good for that as
much as somebody who's been in the market for five or six
years, OK, because they have exposure to other systems and
(17:06):
other companies and other like ways of doing things that's more
valuable than coming like hot out of.
School OK, so next piece is I definitely think this is true
technology adoption, so more willing to take on try new
technology and I think this is areally big opportunity with AI.
If you can, if you can get a newgrad with a piece of AI that
they're using to help them do their job.
(17:27):
I think you are going to get some real productive value out
of those people. And I think they'll be more
likely to just use the AI you know, to now, which is a little
scary at times too, because I'vedefinitely had I lied me and
tell me things that were incorrect.
So, so able to question the AI and think think critically about
it. But if you can get an employee
(17:47):
at a lower cost that can also beaugmented with an AI tool, that
might be the sweet spot. Yeah, I mentioned this a couple
of weeks ago when I talked aboutwhat's Google looking for.
They get millions of applicants and they're looking for people
that show AI proficiency with a variety of tools and also
showing that they that they they've they've tried it.
(18:09):
Like if you set up a little ecommerce story of something
going that's like highly appealing to Google.
Yeah, that makes sense to me. And for the same reasons you
said, there's like a base level proficiency and knowledge, even
if you're reasonably fresh grad,you've like tried some of this
stuff and can talk about it and kind of understand how to use
it, maybe teach me something about it that's like, yeah, I
would say that natural curiosityis what you're looking for in
(18:29):
addition to the productivity improvements through.
Through it. So those are like the the pros
of new new hires. The thing is, I'm so biased here
because we did this new hiring. Yeah, like we always alright.
So let's, let's talk about the flip side though, let's talk
about the cons of the new graduate hires and, and kind of
one of those, and I, this, this first one, I'm going to put some
(18:50):
numbers in front of you is like,you know, like just overall
performance. And I got a, I'm going to quote
this. The most frequently cited
reasons for why these hires didn't work out were a lack of
motivation or initiative, 50%, poor communication skills, 39%.
Yeah. And I would agree with that
because. The first one is a bad hire.
(19:11):
Yeah. And this is probably your hiring
process. Yeah, that is not working well
if you're. Yeah.
I think an important thing for afounder to hear here is that if
you have high turnover, it's a failure of your hiring process.
It is not a failure necessarily of those people.
It's it's a failure of the hiring process to evaluate those
people. And then it could also be a
(19:32):
failure of your onboarding, how well you bring somebody on to
your organization that includes buy in into the mission and
stuff, but literally also like what are they doing?
What systems do they have aroundthem so they can utilize?
So how do they do their job and how do you keep them out of
trouble with those systems? As well.
So kind of on that point, the, the next point I want to bring
up is, is kind of like the, the,the high turnover risk of job
(19:54):
hopping. You know, you're young, you just
graduated, you don't know what you want to do.
And I don't know if I'm passionate about this and like
that's a real thing. But the risk is, is that we
talked about moldability and trainability, but you have to
mold them and you have to train them.
So you're gonna invest a lot of time in them.
And then there is the risk of a job hopping OHS.
This just wasn't for me. They spent six months, of which
(20:14):
you probably spent a month or two training.
So which means you probably didn't get a ton out of that
relationship. Of of course, this is the
inherent risk, the market risk, if you will, of hiring.
You hire someone, it cannot workout, even though you put all
this time into them. I, I agree that that is a real
(20:36):
thing. I think what it is too, is that
in a startup, I think you have to reinforce with people
repeatedly, especially in their early days, that they're on a
path to something that it's, youknow, you could use gamification
if you want, if it's an easy term for you, but you want to
like kind of gamify their role at the company.
What are your objectives here? What are you trying to do?
(20:56):
What do you want to grow into home?
By the way, if you do really well at this, here's where the
company is going, we're hoping to have five more sales reps on
a specific team that does this. I could see you leading that
team if you do really well with this overtime, if you prove to
us you can do those things, likeyou have to give them the field
a glimpse into this hopeful future, this path.
And then especially in the starter, cause really hard to do
(21:18):
that when you're just such a horizontal organization.
And by that I mean like, you know, like a bank.
We got like 6 levels above. You grid the grid.
You know where it's like the triangle, right, where it gets
really narrow and at the top of the CEO and there's like levels
of senior management, middle management.
You're not gonna have middle managers, Earl, you shouldn't
anyway. And in a small startup.
So I think it's kind of like oneof those things where you need
to give them insight and and also that can include like title
(21:40):
progression. Yeah, it might be like a
director role might be what it'scalled later, MVP role, whatever
it's called later, whatever you're comfortable with, but
like something that gives them an idea where they're going.
Yep. Alright.
And they're more likely to say, sorry, that's that's all just
retention. Benefit, no problem.
So that those are the cons of the, you know, new grad.
Let's let's flip over to the experienced employee, the career
employee. We've talked a little bit about
(22:00):
this. Let's talk about the pros of
those hiring somebody who's a career employee.
First one immediate impact. Yeah, they can work right away.
They know. How to come in they can pretty
much like if like I think of thesales perspective if you were to
hire somebody that had worked inpublic safety and we could
bring. Them in like they experienced
coder like. Why wouldn't an experienced
coder be immediately valuable? Exactly right.
(22:22):
Yeah, they can come in and they're writing code.
I heard. First first day.
This has been bounced around a lot in the past few weeks, but
have you heard about like these $100 million bonus packages for
coders for AI tools with AI? Researchers.
And you're gonna have to be pretty good to be getting.
I think I'm in that category. Well, shit, for $100 million
(22:43):
maybe I could figure this. Out and apparently they they pay
it out over like a few years, soit's not like a check day.
One Toronto podcast internship was putting up $100 million
bonus. I'm pretty sure we'll see
anyway. You know that, OK, so go back
for not giving out $100 million?So you don't have 100 really
actually quite a success if you want to get a really good
(23:03):
person, $100 million. So experienced employees,
another Pro is hopefully you're bringing somebody in that
they're, you're not having to train them.
They're they're more independent, autonomous and and
essentially bring in some leadership because they know
what they're what you're trying to.
Achieve that sort of stuff, which includes the two edged
(23:25):
sword of that yeah. So yeah, they might know how to
lead but I leadership styles mayvary and I also worried that
people who come in who came in in those roles, if they were
going to lead that they would like they learned to lead at
another organization that they learned that in another culture.
(23:46):
You better hope that that culture is reasonably aligned to
your values or you're going to have problems.
Because I think about this, there was, you know, I know I've
seen in other companies where, yeah, they make an acquisition,
for example. And the way that company was
managed was so different from like the originally the inquiry
or acquirer that that tension inmanagement style basically ends
(24:11):
up being like all the senior managers are like, oh, and they
have to reset the culture to be more aligned with the big the
acquirer. Company, yeah.
So then my next point is kind ofkind of on that as well as like
the idea of like knowledge transfer.
So like best practices that worked well in other roles that
they had, they're able to bring those in and probably articulate
them very effectively and how you can think out there.
(24:33):
And I think that is a real thing.
There's two ways to do that. There's this is how we did it
here and that's right, or this is how we did it there.
And I think that could be something we consider, right, is
really different. Yeah.
It's really how dogmatic is thisperson exactly.
So much of this is on an individual level, right?
Can they handle being in a new company and we don't do all the
(24:54):
things they think are super great, right?
That's a huge, that's a huge obstacle.
This last piece I think really ties into the sales side is
their network and their relationships, whether it be
like a network with potential clients or a network with
potential like suppliers and vendors and that sort of stuff.
Like on both ends of the business if you can find
(25:15):
somebody that has good relationships with potential.
Clients. Potential vendors that actually.
So the network is half the battle, right?
All right, you a salesperson? A good salesperson is 2 things.
They are who they know. Yeah.
And they are how much they hustle.
Yeah. OK.
That second, please. I'm always nervous with somebody
older sales people have the tendency to bounce, do that
(25:39):
career hopping thing that you alluded to.
Yeah, because they get burnt outof the product they're selling
or whatever. They just kind of get to a point
where they're just less motivated.
They it's hard to be as energetic as you were as a 25
year old when you're 35 and you have two kids and you're just
trying to pay the mortgage. You feel like, you know, just,
it just feels real different. OK.
And so I, I kind of think that like, yeah, that can be really
(26:02):
good. It can be.
It can also be. Again, it comes back to the
hiring process, you know, like can you, can you sniff this
stuff out in the hiring? Tell you what, you gotta be a
damn good HR department and a really good manager if you can
identify a salesperson who's a good seller who's also like
actually secretly burnt out and hoping to just sort of sit on
their Rolodex. Yeah, you know.
(26:22):
So the other thing, the other thing that happens when you have
a big Rolodex is you lean on it really hard.
And if those leads don't materialize, you're not as
motivated. Go out and get.
New ones, right? Right.
So I mean like some of this can be helped through AI tools that
are gonna generate leads for you, like think through Apollo
or something or from an SDR who usually gets.
(26:43):
So that's like you're talking about an account executive.
There's like 3 levels of sales people.
We talked about this before. SDR is the lowest level.
They booked meetings and find opportunities.
The account executive does the demo, goes on site, does the
thing. Sometimes there's a senior at
being the third level who does the closing, right?
Come in. I see you can be if you, if
they're the middle one or higher, they can be supported
(27:06):
and enabled to be successful. But I, I, I it's such a pain to
get sales people to prospect. Yeah, that I worry about it
quite a bit. OK, So now I want to talk about
the cons of hiring experienced people.
So I'm going to RIP through these pretty quick because I
think we've kind of covered someof this, but obviously they're
more expensive, They're going tohave a higher salary, They have
(27:28):
job before. They need a big salary and they
probably need benefits and they probably need all the other
things. Yeah, yeah.
Second one is they're gonna be more resistant to change.
Like they probably liked the waythey've done things in the past.
If you throw something completely disruptive,
innovative at them, they might be more.
Resistant to do it yourself. Put yourself in those shoes for
a second. What would you your ideal
(27:49):
scenario as a new employee and who's been working for a while
at a new company is that you cango in doing the same level of
effort, getting paid more exactly.
That's exactly the way you want.So with that in mind, it's
inherently misaligned with new initiatives, new systems, new
process, things you have to learn, tools you have to learn.
That's why it's related. I'm just gonna go back to sales
people. That's why it's so damn hard to
(28:10):
get sales people to do anything new.
Yeah, right. Because once you kind of get
there's like a natural inertia to sales, you can just get like
a decent level. And keep doing what you're
doing. Absolutely it worked.
Before it's gonna work again. So the next one is cultural fit
challenges, which I think is really tough in a startup
because culture is so important that if you bring somebody in
that's like been in other cultures for a long time and you
(28:31):
are completely different, it maybe awkward.
You know, it may be difficult for them to fit into that
culture and be part of the. Team, again, this is another
thing. We were so young that I was
worried about having someone older.
Yeah, because just not necessarily for the young
people, but for that employee. It's hard to relate to anyone
and it weighs on you. If you're going to work, you
(28:52):
can't talk to anybody. It sucks.
So my last colon is overqualification risk.
You bring somebody in, you got them doing something that's
frankly like too easy. You under employ.
Them you under employ them and then you lose them or you know,
they're not contributing, you know, according to their like
salary and and that sort of stuff.
You don't you, just you. Just throw pieces.
(29:13):
They're underemployed. They come in and they're cool
working. Not very much.
Yeah. Or not very hard.
Like what? You, you, you.
You feel every minute you miss when you're paying someone a
gazillion dollars and they're not doing something, they're not
delivering or they're not delivering at the expectation.
Yeah. OK.
So best practice, like let's wrap this up for the, your
(29:34):
listener first thing I, I think it's about balance.
I think it's the right way to dothis.
OK, you, you definitely want young people that you train that
you can mold and you really wanna pick out the good ones.
I think tying in some AI tools to a young new employee could be
a real game changer as far as making them productive.
(29:54):
Understand you're going to have to train them, they're going to
have to mold them. And, and you might, there might
be a risk of some job hopping. They might just decide.
That this isn't for me. Risks exist with all employees.
Exactly, exactly. So you know, it's, it's also one
of those things you think you wanna look at it like role
specific, like are there places where a more experienced person,
(30:15):
is there a role that that personcan fit into versus a young
person? So that's pretty
straightforward. And then of course, you know, do
the skills assessments like sniffing things out in the
interview process to make sure. It's really challenging though.
It's so easy to be like, you have to do this like we we hired
for skill, skills, fashion fit. Yeah, that helped.
There are a lot of frameworks out there.
(30:35):
Have a framework. Do not wing it, you will waste.
Your time now startups have an advantage with new grads in that
there was a recent study found that 61% of undergraduates
thought they would learn more skills and develop quicker in a
smaller business. And on top of this, 77% thought
they would receive earlier responsibility.
And I think that was true with our our.
(30:58):
Higher. You wanna have a Yeah.
You wanna feel so useless, you go through school, you get all
this education. But I wasn't special and
important you are and all these different things.
And then you get there and you're making PowerPoint decks
that don't go anywhere like it'sin a big company, you go to a
startup, you will be probably customer facing in some
capacity, which is about as serious as it gets.
Yeah, so, so another key motivator and a survey of
(31:22):
graduates conducted by give a grad a Go last year.
I don't know what that is, only 11% that's a joke save on the
compensation though side. On the salary side, only 11%
said that an adequate pay would be a big concern to start in a
small. Business what a youthful thing
to think exactly they. Willing to work cheap it sounds
(31:42):
like. Yeah, I'm just willing it wanna
get a job. Yeah, wanna get a job, you know?
Wanna get a job A. Job in the door.
Why don't you wanna get? Going yeah.
Your life otherwise doesn't really feel like it's going.
Yeah. So and I think a a key success
factor for the more experience would be like when you're in a
situation in your business, you just don't have time to hide to
like train and mold and do all that sort of stuff.
(32:04):
Maybe that's when you're lookingfor a more experience person
because you need them to hit theground running and come in and
help, right? You don't have the money though,
like I, I don't I. Don't have the money?
Like that, that kind of feels silly.
And I also think that they come in and they bias your cultures.
Now they can do it in a good way.
And they might have even know how to structure culture in a
way that you enjoy or that you find effective for your working
(32:24):
style. Yeah, but there's a huge amount.
I mean, there's a huge risk either way.
So the hiring people is terriblebecause it's so it's so hard.
You can get it wrong. It's really costly.
Like there we have a sign, a thing in the book.
There are no small bets in HR. Yeah, it's very true.
Like you, It is. It is.
I think it is the hardest part of business.
What? No matter?
Well, for the most part, for 95%of businesses, the hardest thing
(32:47):
they're gonna do is hire and manage and fire people.
Yeah, I think for the most time.Well, hopefully we've given
startups some advice that might help them out to avoid some of
the mistakes that we've made. I don't think we had such a
comprehensive analysis of of whywe were doing things we were
doing them. It was more gut instinct.
But hopefully there's some some pieces there that people could
(33:07):
take away. Good luck folks, God bless.
See you next week. Let's get it rolling.
Big ideas Money folding hustle. Smart dream.
So why turn that grind into a? Joy Ride.
I think I would look at it as atleast for App Armor, we always,
I always say these people, we had to grow our talent.
Yeah, kind of like a triple-A baseball team.
We were playing, you and I were playing, you know, big leagues,
whatever, big league ball. We were pretty big deal.
I don't know, the old cracker factory.
So we were playing big league ball and then we would, you
know, grow our talent. So people would start out, they
would have a minimal impact on the business.
(00:21):
As time went on, we would bring them up to the big leagues.
Let's get it rolling. Big ideas, money folding hustle,
smart dream so wild turn that grinded through a joy.
Ride. Want to talk to you today about
what we did in our company whichwas hired a lot of new grads
(00:43):
cause startup. We didn't have a ton of money,
OK. We were also looking for there
were government programs to encourage hiring of new grads,
things like that, and. So are we putting just so I know
before two to two things I want to say before we started out OK
or as we started episode one, are we putting AI on a shelf
just for this conversation? This will be part of the
(01:04):
conversation because I want thisto be a.
We did have kind of a similar discussion, so I wanna make sure
a little bit different, OK. Second is while our policies
were biased young people, we do not hate old people.
We do not hate old people. I am old people.
Chris is old people. Yeah, alright.
Yeah, yeah, OK. You still.
Youthful and full of life. Though, So yeah, so obviously
(01:26):
hiring new grads versus hiring kind of like the experienced
person with like a career in thefield, you know, that kind of
that kind of stuff. OK, so why don't we give a
little bit of a story of our hiring background and kind of
how we built. So it was the two of us at
first, OK, we hired 2 recent grads.
(01:48):
We had a complete culture failure that went sideways.
One quit and one we had to let go.
So we were back to just us. OK, so we then moved to a
coworking location because we realized culture is actually
kind of important Co working kind of and.
We didn't. We just didn't know how to do
it. Yeah, we just had.
We didn't, I don't know, we didn't, we skip that course in
(02:08):
the NBA or something, but we just couldn't build the.
Culture of good at it. Yeah.
So what we did, the way we achieved that was we we moved.
We moved from kind of crummy office space to a coworking
location that had a better vibe.Other companies in there, they
they had like the perks. They had the beer, beer,
o'clock, all those types of things.
And then so we started hiring again.
(02:30):
And again, it was younger, rightout of school, you know, minimal
experience. We hired interns that were
students that graduated and thenbecame employees.
So Yep, we really built our talent from or through.
The, we would find people who had an interest in business but
had a different degree. So we, we would look for at
(02:53):
Queens University, they had the graduate diploma in business,
which was you got an arts and science degree in something,
politics, history, insert whatever extremely useful
degree. And then you get a, I got a
history degree. So I'm allowed to say that.
And then, and then you got like a supplementary like diploma
from the School of Business about something business
related. Those were the target because we
knew that they were keeners for business and we're looking for
opportunity exactly like a startup or.
(03:15):
Something Yeah. What we didn't hire ever was the
experienced career person. Why didn't we?
Yeah. OK.
So a couple of reasons. So I'm gonna talk from my
perspective and you can fill in the blanks.
So I think the first thing that I had a problem with was I
thought it would be an issue. I was pretty young, like I would
(03:36):
like 22/23/24 depending on whichyear here.
And I thought it would be an issue that I would be younger
than the person I was managing OHP.
And I thought that and I think that's a rational expectation
for a lot of reasons. So for one thing, they have more
experience in presumably our market, otherwise why are we
talking more with our technology?
(03:56):
Yeah, otherwise why are we talking to them?
So this I felt would be challenging and something that
like, for instance, if I was to think of myself now as a 36 year
old and have somebody 26 managing me, I would have to
really, it's not that I don't believe them.
It's just that their experienceshave to be really specific and
(04:19):
the industry or the company, we have to have something I'm
really about. Otherwise, like you would have
these moments being like, that'sstupid, you know, I mean, right.
Or like, I know better because of whatever.
It would be hard to not have those thoughts creep in your
mind. And the other thing I worried
about too is I, I just, I was like, I was the blank slate new
grad effectively. And you were almost like
(04:40):
mentoring me a lot on certain things to some extent, like you
didn't mentor me on sales. I kind of just like got into
that. But I do think there's something
to be said there where it was going to be.
I was worried it was going to get weird.
Yeah, it got weird. Didn't.
OK, that is an interesting comment.
So if I think back to the the time before.
(05:00):
Dave land before time. Yeah.
So you recall I was document management software.
I was selling it through photocopier dealerships.
And I had two employees who weresignificantly older than me.
So I was probably like 20-3 and the employees were probably like
60. What were that?
(05:20):
Much they were, they were. Like that feels like an
impossible set. They were like.
Industry veterans. They were people that worked.
One guy all previously owned a photocopier dealership and one
guy was a photocopier like salesperson.
Right, man, that's so. Can I tell you that baggage?
I definitely like felt like I was getting run by them.
(05:41):
You know what I mean? Like like they knew the industry
really well. I was like the newcomer, but I
knew the technology and we were thinking this is a good marriage
of these skills, but I I felt like I was always out negotiated
because like I never negotiated A compensation plan.
Yeah, they knew how to do it. They've done it.
They've done it A. Whole bunch I didn't know that,
you know, the games that go on with like expense reports and
(06:04):
things like that, but you know, and I didn't know how to manage
or I imagine, you know, employees or.
Something you saved me from so many stupid decisions like
there. Is I made them already?
Yeah, yeah, you during the book too.
We talk about them and it's like, and this is when Chris
saved my butt on this one and this one.
He helped me with this one. And it was because you had been
through some of this. And I had made the mistake,
(06:24):
yeah. So I knew that that was gonna be
which. Is like the story of my life,
right? Because you had like gives your
10 years ahead of me. So you've experienced a lot of
stuff and I see you screw up andbe like, wow, I'm not gonna do
that. But I never taught you anything
like actually, no, never said. I just like.
I didn't lecture you, just demoed.
I was just like Dave, I got a terrible story about something
(06:45):
bad that happened and This is why we shouldn't do that thing.
Yeah, no, for real. Yeah, OK.
So. You're hitting a lot of
interesting things though there.So I think that with older, OK,
let's play devil's advocate for a second.
So the case for older employees I think is like, OK, they have
relevant experience in your market.
I always think of from sales perspective because, but this is
(07:05):
here's the two sort of that in just a second.
But so they should theoreticallyhave the context, the Rolodex,
which is really important. They're basically a rainmaker.
They're gonna come in, they're gonna make money for your
company. I think this is complicated for
a couple of reasons. And by the way, that can work
and end of sentence. Yeah.
Where this gets complicated is that older employees have a
deeper field of knowledge, whichis which is good and bad.
(07:26):
On the one hand, it's good because they know things about
your market. It's bad that they can use that
information against you. There's like a built-in
information asymmetry that's challenging that you really
can't get its experience. They have experience and you
don't. I think that they what do you
get with a younger employee? You get a crazy keener Beaver.
They're gonna be usually if you're hiring correctly, you're
get someone who's very keen and excited and willing to learn.
(07:49):
I think as you get older, I mean, you can comment to this
again, being 10 years older thanme that you kind of get like
more set in your ways. This is how this is done.
This is how we've always done it.
Yeah. So you come with this is the the
cultural and organizational likestructural baggage.
You you're gonna get the way they work, and that's going to
work its way, especially if it'sone of the early employees of
(08:11):
your company. You're gonna start doing work
the way they've always done. Work right, because that's how
they operate. And that's a bit of a risk,
especially if you're a startup, because you are gonna wanna
mess. Requiring like, again, like a I
always changes everything in this.
But like, imagine hiring like somebody who's 60 years old in a
world where AI is this disruptive new technology.
(08:32):
They've never used it. They don't understand it.
Yeah, like, like, and then not all, not 100%.
I always like little caveats cause, you know, there's
probably a 5% of people in their60s who are like, so engaged
into AI. Great.
Yeah. But I would say overwhelmingly
they're not. And also overwhelmingly they are
tired. Like I have two kids, energy
(08:54):
level. I can feel it going.
Down Each year I get older. Yeah.
I can't even. I have no idea how I'm gonna
feel when I'm 60. So can I give an example of that
from my story about the photocopier dealer guys that
worked for me? So the, the software I built was
document management software, OK.
(09:14):
And the way, the way we priced it was very similar to a
photocopier. You, you paid for the software,
right One time, right. We paid the Commission to the
sales Rep and the dealer got wasable to mark it up and make
their, their margin on it. That was it.
OK, that's ridiculous and but it's because that's how they
(09:35):
sold in that. Market right, they wanted a big
check, a big deal. They put it in their pocket and
they go on to the next big check, the next big deal Yeah,
whereas how it should have been sold would would have been a
monthly recurring. OK, but then the photocopier
sales Rep, the totality there islike well I don't want 10 bucks
every month for you know the next you know what I mean?
(09:57):
Like, the margin on that, the amount of money was not worth
their while. They need to make thousands of
dollars on each deal. Yeah.
And move on to the next deal. They didn't wanna do they.
Like, they weren't in it for thelong game.
They just want their money up front.
Yeah. And they wanted out, you know,
like. Even the fact that you sold
through dealerships is an example of like legacy thought
(10:19):
construct. That's the way it works.
This is the way we've always done it, you know, but you could
have just as easily gone direct to consumer, direct to these
enterprises, charge these recurring models and done way
better. Yeah, right.
The, the, the, The thing is likeyou, you, you operate in their
box. And and yeah, because they have
experienced there is, again, going back to my original point,
(10:40):
there is some level of feeling like they have authority over
you, right? Or they're playing you or they
could be playing you. Yeah.
And I think there's also becauseof that, a fundamental mistrust.
I I just see it as a lot of problems.
Now this is kind of an extreme example, just to be clear.
Like you were 20 something and they're 60 something.
Yeah, I think really what we're talking if you're really
category where they're within like 10 years, maybe it's OK.
I think as the years go out, it gets worse this this issue.
(11:03):
But it's like, so if I'm 36 and I'm hiring somebody who's 46, I
bet we could make that work. I think we could make that work
better. I think they would be they were
more relatable, right? You're so far from being able to
relate to those, those guys who have been like they would have
been selling fax machines, bro. Yeah, like that's.
They definitely sold fax They. Definitely sold that.
And typewriters, electric typewriters, like this is a
(11:24):
different universe. They're from now, yeah.
So let's. Break that.
That's that part of the equation.
Yeah, yeah. So why don't we kind of like,
why don't we kind of, we've kindof talked a little bit about
both sides. Why don't we just break down
more systematically for the? Listeners.
So wait, one more thing there. Yeah, I also think that can be
an issue with investors. So if you have a startup and you
(11:46):
have a lot of invest, so investors are not employees, but
they generally are older becausethey made a bunch of money now,
they have that money now. They're investing that money.
And I think this creates problems when again, they want
to have influence over the way you're running the business.
They manage their investment, right?
But they operated in the market because they're not operating
anymore. They operated, you know, 5-10,
twenty years ago and then they bring that expertise, which is
(12:07):
out of date to your company, which could be doing it totally
differently. And that's gonna have
complicated consequences. It may be OK, It may work or
might really not work anymore. Yeah.
So I don't know. This is it goes back.
It's these issues of alignment most of the time.
How do you get your first customer hint?
They might be right under your nose.
(12:29):
Find the answer to this questionand dozens more in Startup
Different. Find it on Amazon, Audible, and
Kindle. OK, so, alright, so we've got
we've got new grads, we've got seasoned veteran employees, I
guess is what you would call them, or career career employees
that are hiring. And I want to talk about the
pros and cons for each one. OK, so let's let's take the new
(12:49):
grads first, OK, Because we've been there, we've done that.
OK, I wanna, I'm gonna put out there some pros and you give me
your comments on them. So first pro of hiring manager.
Had on. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Cost savings for a new grand, it's no brainer, right, OK.
They are newer, they don't have as much.
Parents are probably gonna pay the blast.
Nowadays with the job market, like if you're actually hiring a
(13:09):
person and not using an AI bot, I also would suspect that you
could command actually even a a pretty decent like not a very
expensive salary for most peopleright?
Just trying to get their. Foot in the door?
In the door, yeah. Especially in programs that
don't have huge hiring rates. OK.
So actually I'm gonna get to a comment on that later.
So next piece talk about like think about moldability or
(13:31):
trainability of a new hire versus.
So here's the the the two edged sword of the new hire is on the
one hand, they are a blank slate.
You can condition them to have your values to work the way you
do, to buy into your culture more easily.
They don't come with preconceived notions.
However, they also come with a general lack of obviously
(13:54):
experience and know how. What does this translate to?
Like, literally this is like showing people how to send
emails that don't come off as you being a Dick, OK.
Or, or that are just like, not helpful, like communication
training. Yeah.
There's a, you know, we actuallymentioned this in the book.
So it's like if you hire a new person, you have to teach them
how to send emails. If you hire an older person, you
(14:15):
have to teach them not to put the entire e-mail in the subject
line. Yeah, You know what I mean?
Like, there's like, there's there's complications on both
sides. But I would say that for those
new grads, yeah, the blessing and curse is that you can coach
them and they require coaching. Yeah, you must do must,
otherwise they will just. You must burn it and train them,
but they are moldable and trainable.
Correct. So it's I think I would look at
(14:36):
it is at least for App Armor. We always, I always say this
people, we had to grow our talent.
Yeah, kind of like a triple-A baseball team.
We were playing, you and I were playing, you know, big leagues,
whatever, big league ball. We were pretty big deal.
I don't know. The old cracker.
Factory so we were playing big league ball and then we would
you know grow our talent so people would start out they
would have a minimal impact on the business as time went on we
(14:57):
would bring them up to the big leagues, more customer facing
bigger deals with their salesperson, more important code
of their coder, bigger projects if they're implementation so on
and so. Forth.
OK, my next right and my research brought up this one,
which was that a new employee and a new grad would bring fresh
perspectives and innovation. True.
I I don't know if I agree with that.
Oh, why? I don't know.
(15:19):
I think some employees would sometimes bring up an idea that
they might have, but a lot of the times they would be more
like, well, what do you want me to do?
OK, you know what I mean. Hold on, hold on hold.
On what? This is all.
Tell me what you want me to do and I'll do it.
Yeah. Well, this is dependent on the
kind of here people you're hiring and for what role you're
hiring. So I would definitely say.
I just don't think necessarily because they're new graduate,
(15:40):
they're gonna bring up fresh perspectives and innovative
ideas. The third thing?
There is that. Do they exist in a culture where
they believe they can bring up ideas?
Right. OK.
So if you've built a culture where, hey, you're new here,
shut up. Listen to us.
I know everything or whatever you're saying is stupid.
I had scenarios where sales repsbrought things to me.
OK. Now, sometimes they were pretty
(16:01):
dumb because it's like they wereliterally not in the market and
there were reasons why we did stuff.
Yeah, I think I think back on how we used to do a morning
scrum meeting and that we used to be like this 15 minute
meeting we do every morning to kind of like just a standing
meeting. What are you doing?
What are you stuck on? What do you need help with?
You know, that kind of thing. And I remember we had new
(16:23):
employees and you know who you are who would push on that being
like what we do, this is a wasteof our time.
I'm like, no, we're doing this because everybody needs to have
the day get going, get set and we're in.
And it was really important. Then overtime, they're like, Oh
yeah, I see it. I see why we do this to maybe to
their dismay. So I guess it's like kind of
complicated, but I, I think but and, but I've had good ideas
(16:45):
come from it too. I've had genuine ideas come from
that, because when you can standwhen you're not in the business
all the time, you can see it with a different.
Lens. So I would just say mileage may
vary on these fresh perspectivesand innovation.
I would actually say that young grads aren't good for that as
much as somebody who's been in the market for five or six
years, OK, because they have exposure to other systems and
(17:06):
other companies and other like ways of doing things that's more
valuable than coming like hot out of.
School OK, so next piece is I definitely think this is true
technology adoption, so more willing to take on try new
technology and I think this is areally big opportunity with AI.
If you can, if you can get a newgrad with a piece of AI that
they're using to help them do their job.
(17:27):
I think you are going to get some real productive value out
of those people. And I think they'll be more
likely to just use the AI you know, to now, which is a little
scary at times too, because I'vedefinitely had I lied me and
tell me things that were incorrect.
So, so able to question the AI and think think critically about
it. But if you can get an employee
(17:47):
at a lower cost that can also beaugmented with an AI tool, that
might be the sweet spot. Yeah, I mentioned this a couple
of weeks ago when I talked aboutwhat's Google looking for.
They get millions of applicants and they're looking for people
that show AI proficiency with a variety of tools and also
showing that they that they they've they've tried it.
(18:09):
Like if you set up a little ecommerce story of something
going that's like highly appealing to Google.
Yeah, that makes sense to me. And for the same reasons you
said, there's like a base level proficiency and knowledge, even
if you're reasonably fresh grad,you've like tried some of this
stuff and can talk about it and kind of understand how to use
it, maybe teach me something about it that's like, yeah, I
would say that natural curiosityis what you're looking for in
(18:29):
addition to the productivity improvements through.
Through it. So those are like the the pros
of new new hires. The thing is, I'm so biased here
because we did this new hiring. Yeah, like we always alright.
So let's, let's talk about the flip side though, let's talk
about the cons of the new graduate hires and, and kind of
one of those, and I, this, this first one, I'm going to put some
(18:50):
numbers in front of you is like,you know, like just overall
performance. And I got a, I'm going to quote
this. The most frequently cited
reasons for why these hires didn't work out were a lack of
motivation or initiative, 50%, poor communication skills, 39%.
Yeah. And I would agree with that
because. The first one is a bad hire.
(19:11):
Yeah. And this is probably your hiring
process. Yeah, that is not working well
if you're. Yeah.
I think an important thing for afounder to hear here is that if
you have high turnover, it's a failure of your hiring process.
It is not a failure necessarily of those people.
It's it's a failure of the hiring process to evaluate those
people. And then it could also be a
(19:32):
failure of your onboarding, how well you bring somebody on to
your organization that includes buy in into the mission and
stuff, but literally also like what are they doing?
What systems do they have aroundthem so they can utilize?
So how do they do their job and how do you keep them out of
trouble with those systems? As well.
So kind of on that point, the, the next point I want to bring
up is, is kind of like the, the,the high turnover risk of job
(19:54):
hopping. You know, you're young, you just
graduated, you don't know what you want to do.
And I don't know if I'm passionate about this and like
that's a real thing. But the risk is, is that we
talked about moldability and trainability, but you have to
mold them and you have to train them.
So you're gonna invest a lot of time in them.
And then there is the risk of a job hopping OHS.
This just wasn't for me. They spent six months, of which
(20:14):
you probably spent a month or two training.
So which means you probably didn't get a ton out of that
relationship. Of of course, this is the
inherent risk, the market risk, if you will, of hiring.
You hire someone, it cannot workout, even though you put all
this time into them. I, I agree that that is a real
(20:36):
thing. I think what it is too, is that
in a startup, I think you have to reinforce with people
repeatedly, especially in their early days, that they're on a
path to something that it's, youknow, you could use gamification
if you want, if it's an easy term for you, but you want to
like kind of gamify their role at the company.
What are your objectives here? What are you trying to do?
(20:56):
What do you want to grow into home?
By the way, if you do really well at this, here's where the
company is going, we're hoping to have five more sales reps on
a specific team that does this. I could see you leading that
team if you do really well with this overtime, if you prove to
us you can do those things, likeyou have to give them the field
a glimpse into this hopeful future, this path.
And then especially in the starter, cause really hard to do
(21:18):
that when you're just such a horizontal organization.
And by that I mean like, you know, like a bank.
We got like 6 levels above. You grid the grid.
You know where it's like the triangle, right, where it gets
really narrow and at the top of the CEO and there's like levels
of senior management, middle management.
You're not gonna have middle managers, Earl, you shouldn't
anyway. And in a small startup.
So I think it's kind of like oneof those things where you need
to give them insight and and also that can include like title
(21:40):
progression. Yeah, it might be like a
director role might be what it'scalled later, MVP role, whatever
it's called later, whatever you're comfortable with, but
like something that gives them an idea where they're going.
Yep. Alright.
And they're more likely to say, sorry, that's that's all just
retention. Benefit, no problem.
So that those are the cons of the, you know, new grad.
Let's let's flip over to the experienced employee, the career
employee. We've talked a little bit about
(22:00):
this. Let's talk about the pros of
those hiring somebody who's a career employee.
First one immediate impact. Yeah, they can work right away.
They know. How to come in they can pretty
much like if like I think of thesales perspective if you were to
hire somebody that had worked inpublic safety and we could
bring. Them in like they experienced
coder like. Why wouldn't an experienced
coder be immediately valuable? Exactly right.
(22:22):
Yeah, they can come in and they're writing code.
I heard. First first day.
This has been bounced around a lot in the past few weeks, but
have you heard about like these $100 million bonus packages for
coders for AI tools with AI? Researchers.
And you're gonna have to be pretty good to be getting.
I think I'm in that category. Well, shit, for $100 million
(22:43):
maybe I could figure this. Out and apparently they they pay
it out over like a few years, soit's not like a check day.
One Toronto podcast internship was putting up $100 million
bonus. I'm pretty sure we'll see
anyway. You know that, OK, so go back
for not giving out $100 million?So you don't have 100 really
actually quite a success if you want to get a really good
(23:03):
person, $100 million. So experienced employees,
another Pro is hopefully you're bringing somebody in that
they're, you're not having to train them.
They're they're more independent, autonomous and and
essentially bring in some leadership because they know
what they're what you're trying to.
Achieve that sort of stuff, which includes the two edged
(23:25):
sword of that yeah. So yeah, they might know how to
lead but I leadership styles mayvary and I also worried that
people who come in who came in in those roles, if they were
going to lead that they would like they learned to lead at
another organization that they learned that in another culture.
(23:46):
You better hope that that culture is reasonably aligned to
your values or you're going to have problems.
Because I think about this, there was, you know, I know I've
seen in other companies where, yeah, they make an acquisition,
for example. And the way that company was
managed was so different from like the originally the inquiry
or acquirer that that tension inmanagement style basically ends
(24:11):
up being like all the senior managers are like, oh, and they
have to reset the culture to be more aligned with the big the
acquirer. Company, yeah.
So then my next point is kind ofkind of on that as well as like
the idea of like knowledge transfer.
So like best practices that worked well in other roles that
they had, they're able to bring those in and probably articulate
them very effectively and how you can think out there.
(24:33):
And I think that is a real thing.
There's two ways to do that. There's this is how we did it
here and that's right, or this is how we did it there.
And I think that could be something we consider, right, is
really different. Yeah.
It's really how dogmatic is thisperson exactly.
So much of this is on an individual level, right?
Can they handle being in a new company and we don't do all the
(24:54):
things they think are super great, right?
That's a huge, that's a huge obstacle.
This last piece I think really ties into the sales side is
their network and their relationships, whether it be
like a network with potential clients or a network with
potential like suppliers and vendors and that sort of stuff.
Like on both ends of the business if you can find
(25:15):
somebody that has good relationships with potential.
Clients. Potential vendors that actually.
So the network is half the battle, right?
All right, you a salesperson? A good salesperson is 2 things.
They are who they know. Yeah.
And they are how much they hustle.
Yeah. OK.
That second, please. I'm always nervous with somebody
older sales people have the tendency to bounce, do that
(25:39):
career hopping thing that you alluded to.
Yeah, because they get burnt outof the product they're selling
or whatever. They just kind of get to a point
where they're just less motivated.
They it's hard to be as energetic as you were as a 25
year old when you're 35 and you have two kids and you're just
trying to pay the mortgage. You feel like, you know, just,
it just feels real different. OK.
And so I, I kind of think that like, yeah, that can be really
(26:02):
good. It can be.
It can also be. Again, it comes back to the
hiring process, you know, like can you, can you sniff this
stuff out in the hiring? Tell you what, you gotta be a
damn good HR department and a really good manager if you can
identify a salesperson who's a good seller who's also like
actually secretly burnt out and hoping to just sort of sit on
their Rolodex. Yeah, you know.
(26:22):
So the other thing, the other thing that happens when you have
a big Rolodex is you lean on it really hard.
And if those leads don't materialize, you're not as
motivated. Go out and get.
New ones, right? Right.
So I mean like some of this can be helped through AI tools that
are gonna generate leads for you, like think through Apollo
or something or from an SDR who usually gets.
(26:43):
So that's like you're talking about an account executive.
There's like 3 levels of sales people.
We talked about this before. SDR is the lowest level.
They booked meetings and find opportunities.
The account executive does the demo, goes on site, does the
thing. Sometimes there's a senior at
being the third level who does the closing, right?
Come in. I see you can be if you, if
they're the middle one or higher, they can be supported
(27:06):
and enabled to be successful. But I, I, I it's such a pain to
get sales people to prospect. Yeah, that I worry about it
quite a bit. OK, So now I want to talk about
the cons of hiring experienced people.
So I'm going to RIP through these pretty quick because I
think we've kind of covered someof this, but obviously they're
more expensive, They're going tohave a higher salary, They have
(27:28):
job before. They need a big salary and they
probably need benefits and they probably need all the other
things. Yeah, yeah.
Second one is they're gonna be more resistant to change.
Like they probably liked the waythey've done things in the past.
If you throw something completely disruptive,
innovative at them, they might be more.
Resistant to do it yourself. Put yourself in those shoes for
a second. What would you your ideal
(27:49):
scenario as a new employee and who's been working for a while
at a new company is that you cango in doing the same level of
effort, getting paid more exactly.
That's exactly the way you want.So with that in mind, it's
inherently misaligned with new initiatives, new systems, new
process, things you have to learn, tools you have to learn.
That's why it's related. I'm just gonna go back to sales
people. That's why it's so damn hard to
(28:10):
get sales people to do anything new.
Yeah, right. Because once you kind of get
there's like a natural inertia to sales, you can just get like
a decent level. And keep doing what you're
doing. Absolutely it worked.
Before it's gonna work again. So the next one is cultural fit
challenges, which I think is really tough in a startup
because culture is so important that if you bring somebody in
that's like been in other cultures for a long time and you
(28:31):
are completely different, it maybe awkward.
You know, it may be difficult for them to fit into that
culture and be part of the. Team, again, this is another
thing. We were so young that I was
worried about having someone older.
Yeah, because just not necessarily for the young
people, but for that employee. It's hard to relate to anyone
and it weighs on you. If you're going to work, you
(28:52):
can't talk to anybody. It sucks.
So my last colon is overqualification risk.
You bring somebody in, you got them doing something that's
frankly like too easy. You under employ.
Them you under employ them and then you lose them or you know,
they're not contributing, you know, according to their like
salary and and that sort of stuff.
You don't you, just you. Just throw pieces.
(29:13):
They're underemployed. They come in and they're cool
working. Not very much.
Yeah. Or not very hard.
Like what? You, you, you.
You feel every minute you miss when you're paying someone a
gazillion dollars and they're not doing something, they're not
delivering or they're not delivering at the expectation.
Yeah. OK.
So best practice, like let's wrap this up for the, your
(29:34):
listener first thing I, I think it's about balance.
I think it's the right way to dothis.
OK, you, you definitely want young people that you train that
you can mold and you really wanna pick out the good ones.
I think tying in some AI tools to a young new employee could be
a real game changer as far as making them productive.
(29:54):
Understand you're going to have to train them, they're going to
have to mold them. And, and you might, there might
be a risk of some job hopping. They might just decide.
That this isn't for me. Risks exist with all employees.
Exactly, exactly. So you know, it's, it's also one
of those things you think you wanna look at it like role
specific, like are there places where a more experienced person,
(30:15):
is there a role that that personcan fit into versus a young
person? So that's pretty
straightforward. And then of course, you know, do
the skills assessments like sniffing things out in the
interview process to make sure. It's really challenging though.
It's so easy to be like, you have to do this like we we hired
for skill, skills, fashion fit. Yeah, that helped.
There are a lot of frameworks out there.
(30:35):
Have a framework. Do not wing it, you will waste.
Your time now startups have an advantage with new grads in that
there was a recent study found that 61% of undergraduates
thought they would learn more skills and develop quicker in a
smaller business. And on top of this, 77% thought
they would receive earlier responsibility.
And I think that was true with our our.
(30:58):
Higher. You wanna have a Yeah.
You wanna feel so useless, you go through school, you get all
this education. But I wasn't special and
important you are and all these different things.
And then you get there and you're making PowerPoint decks
that don't go anywhere like it'sin a big company, you go to a
startup, you will be probably customer facing in some
capacity, which is about as serious as it gets.
Yeah, so, so another key motivator and a survey of
(31:22):
graduates conducted by give a grad a Go last year.
I don't know what that is, only 11% that's a joke save on the
compensation though side. On the salary side, only 11%
said that an adequate pay would be a big concern to start in a
small. Business what a youthful thing
to think exactly they. Willing to work cheap it sounds
(31:42):
like. Yeah, I'm just willing it wanna
get a job. Yeah, wanna get a job, you know?
Wanna get a job A. Job in the door.
Why don't you wanna get? Going yeah.
Your life otherwise doesn't really feel like it's going.
Yeah. So and I think a a key success
factor for the more experience would be like when you're in a
situation in your business, you just don't have time to hide to
like train and mold and do all that sort of stuff.
(32:04):
Maybe that's when you're lookingfor a more experience person
because you need them to hit theground running and come in and
help, right? You don't have the money though,
like I, I don't I. Don't have the money?
Like that, that kind of feels silly.
And I also think that they come in and they bias your cultures.
Now they can do it in a good way.
And they might have even know how to structure culture in a
way that you enjoy or that you find effective for your working
(32:24):
style. Yeah, but there's a huge amount.
I mean, there's a huge risk either way.
So the hiring people is terriblebecause it's so it's so hard.
You can get it wrong. It's really costly.
Like there we have a sign, a thing in the book.
There are no small bets in HR. Yeah, it's very true.
Like you, It is. It is.
I think it is the hardest part of business.
What? No matter?
Well, for the most part, for 95%of businesses, the hardest thing
(32:47):
they're gonna do is hire and manage and fire people.
Yeah, I think for the most time.Well, hopefully we've given
startups some advice that might help them out to avoid some of
the mistakes that we've made. I don't think we had such a
comprehensive analysis of of whywe were doing things we were
doing them. It was more gut instinct.
But hopefully there's some some pieces there that people could
(33:07):
take away. Good luck folks, God bless.
See you next week. Let's get it rolling.
Big ideas Money folding hustle. Smart dream.
So why turn that grind into a? Joy Ride.
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