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Companies that I've been very involved with, that have had a very bad first hire in the first 3 or so employees never recover from it.

Sam Altman

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Sam Altman
Age: 39
Born: 1985
Born: April 22
Entrepreneur
Chicago
Illinois
Samuel H. Altman
Samuel Altman
Involved
Team
Company
Firsts
Recover
First
Employees
Never
Hire
Employee
Companies

More quotes by Sam Altman

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In addition to relentlessly resourceful, you want a tough and a calm cofounder.
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You want to sound crazy, but you want to actually be right.
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What being a founder means, is signing up for this years long grind on execution - and you can't outsource this.
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You only get points when you make something the market wants. So if you work really hard on the wrong things, no one will care.
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Most startups are not nearly focussed enough. They work hard...maybe, but they don't work hard on the right things.
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The single word that matters most I think to keep the company productive as it grows is alignment.
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The startups that do well are the ones that are working all the time.
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The second part of how to hire: try not to.
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The cost of getting an early hire wrong is really high.
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You have to save the vision speeches for when the company is winning. When you're not winning, you just have to get momentum back.
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As you grow, it feels hopelessly corporate but it really is worth putting in place these compensation bands.
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Be suspicious of any work that is not building product or getting customers. It's easy to get sucked into an infrastructure rewrite death spiral.
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You're saying no ninety-seven times out of a hundred, and most founders find they have to make a very conscious effort to do this.
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Whatever the founder cares about, whatever the founders think are the key goals, that's going to be what the whole company focusses on.
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In the beginning of a company, there is no management and this actually works really well.
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You also want to fire people who a) create office politics, and b) who are persistently negative.
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Before product/market fit, your only job that matters is to build a great product.
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If you want something in a deal, just ask for it.
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... but actually it sucks to have a lot of employees, and you should be proud of how few employees you have.
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You need to have a culture where people have very high quality standards in everything the company does, but still move quickly.
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