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Start-ups: How do I attract talent to a startup?
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Sam McAfee, Technology Product Leadership answered:

The very best talent are attracted to opportunities to do something awesome with other people that they admire and respect. In building a team, it is important to be very careful about your first hires, because it is they (and what you are doing) that will attract the next.

While the recruiting process is sort of a sales process, I disagree with the idea that you will need to "sell" your vision to talent. People judge you (and your organization) by your actions, and that means you need a good vision that practically sells itself. If you are not able to convince people to join you because the opportunity is just so awesome, you may need to think about doing something else.

You will also need to build a company, a team, a culture that makes the best talent want to work there. This means having an actual structure that enables creativity and innovation, working on only focused projects with clear objectives, having an open communication and feedback process.

Money does matter, and you need to compensate great talent fairly. It is better to pay a lot for a few very senior people than an army of remote or junior contributors. This is a fatal mistake I have seen many startups make. In the end you are building a company, and companies are made of people. That should take the lion's share of both your attention and your money.

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