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In the early stage of a startup, hiring senior people is usually a mistake. You just want people that get stuff done.

Sam Altman

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Sam Altman
Age: 39
Born: 1985
Born: April 22
Entrepreneur
Chicago
Illinois
Samuel H. Altman
Samuel Altman
Senior
Early
Usually
Stage
Mistake
Stuff
Done
People
Hiring

More quotes by Sam Altman

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You certainly don't need to have everything figured out in the path from here to world domination.
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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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If you don't need it yourself, and you're building something that someone else needs, realize you're at a big disadvantage.
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You don't need to make the structure complicated, in fact you shouldn't. All you need is for every employee to know who their manager is.
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If it works out, you're going to be working on this for 10 years.
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If you pivot, do it fully and with conviction. The worst thing is to try to do a bit of the old and the new-it's hard to kill your babies.
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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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Growth solves (nearly) all problems
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The most important thing is that there is clear reporting structure and everyone knows what it is.
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You need to figure out what the 2 or 3 most important things are, and then just do those.
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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.
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Most of the best hires that I've made in my entire life have never done that thing before.
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Founders are usually very stingy with equity to employees and very generous with equity to investors. I think this is totally backwards.
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Another way of looking at this, is that the best companies are almost always mission oriented.
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Remember that the idea will expand, and become more ambitious as you go.
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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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It's easy to move fast or be obsessed with quality, but the trick is you have to do both at a startup.
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Most things are not as risky as they seem.
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Move fast. Speed is one of your main advantages over large companies.
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One of the biggest advantages that start ups have is execution speed and you have to have this relentless operating rhythm.
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