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#113 - Harriet Ball | Building High-Performing Teams in Startups
56 Plays18 days ago
Shownotes
Harriet is the Head of Talent at SuperSeed VC, she’s spent the past 12 years hiring talent across industry leading and household name companies including Uber, Getir, L’Oréal and On Running - and now she’s using her experience to support SS portfolio companies to attract, onboard and retain top talent to their start ups.
Shownotes
00:00 - Intro & Context
04:43 - Challenges in Building Teams in Startups
09:58 - The Role of Founders in Hiring
11:45 - Common Mistakes Founders Make
20:08 - Advice for Candidates in Startups
28:11 - Practical Tips for Founders
29:58 - Building a Strong Company Culture
Links
Guest Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harriet-ball/
Yeliz Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yeliz-castillo/
Yeliz e-mail: yeliz.castillo@pplwise.com
pplwise: https://pplwise.com/
Recommended
Transcript
Startup Salary Challenges and Creativity
00:00:06
Speaker
What would you say like the biggest challenge is overall in doing this? Whether you're in a tech industry or in finance industry or and yeah just generally, what do you think is overall the biggest challenge for companies?
00:00:23
Speaker
Yeah, so from a startup lens, um there are obvious challenges, ah budget constraints. You can't afford to to pay the same kind of salaries as the likes of Google, Meta, et cetera, that they pay for their engineers. But obviously, everybody knows this. um So startups have to get creative. But um create where creativity in startups is is where kind of magic happens. And being able to build a really cool, innovative product, you're taking out to market. There's no reason why.
00:00:52
Speaker
the way that you approach talent should be should be any different.
Creative Hiring Approaches for Startups
00:00:55
Speaker
So um for me, it's kind of getting that that balance um between skill, potential and immediate impact when it comes to to hiring for your startup and so also being able to offer had candidates and being able to offer your team members direct access to the founders and um being able to give them that experience of working so closely with you to bring this mission vision um and your mission and vision to to life and really kind of taking it to the next level. So how um startups should approach talent is different from how bigger organizations should approach talent, um but there are lessons that you can learn from both sides. So
00:01:33
Speaker
and a bigger organization like what i was working for on for example um we really were able to kind of be very specific into the type of profile that you would you would hire and typically when your your organization grows the the the need for the role in the design outputs for a specific position that you're hiring for,
00:01:51
Speaker
require quite a specific niche set of skills um because you're able to have more specialists focusing on a particular area that you that you need to solve. Whereas obviously in startup land, people that you hire have to wear multiple hats and they have to kind of cover a ah broader scope of different things um before you're able to specialise and really bring in specialists ah to to narrow in on one specific area that you're you're trying to solve.
Building High-Performing Startup Teams
00:02:18
Speaker
Hello, everyone. Today I have the lovely Harriet Bohr with me. She is the head of talent of SuperSeedVC. And we have a great topic today for you. And that is how to build high-performing teams in startup environments. Because Harriet has quite extensive experiences in this field, and I'm super, super happy to have you here today. m Great. First of all, I would love to know why this topic is important to you.
00:02:50
Speaker
Yeah, sure. Well, ah first of all, thank you so much for um having me. I'm also super excited to to be here and talk about this topic. um So yeah, I mean, building a high performing team for for any startup is the difference between like winning and just just having a company, in in my opinion. like I think there's um there's so much value that that talent can bring. And whenever I speak to founders um that we've just invested in or we're thinking of investing in, um the the number one thing that they want to do is is build a high performing team. So for me, it's um incredibly important like just to be able to give them the support. But in my role, at least at SuperSeed, how we kind of approach investing is from quite a hands-on lens. So our mission as a VC is to help de-risk their journey from a founder's journey from 0 to 1 million in revenue. But my personal journey is to help them de-risk their hiring
De-Risking Startups with Effective Hiring
00:03:44
Speaker
decisions. So
00:03:45
Speaker
um I kind of can take the experience that I've had from some bigger organizations like Uber, L'Oreal and On Running and I try and apply those to a startup environment and take those learnings and um help give our founders a a leg up into kind of building a really high performing team. so maybe it's a really important topic to get right. And I think if you're you're not focusing on um building a high performing team or not giving it the attention and um the the need that it needs to be, then you're kind of just setting yourself up for a disaster, really. So yeah, that's kind of why it's important to me. um And I'm very passionate about um talent. Obviously, I've been in talent now for nearly 12 years. So it's um
00:04:27
Speaker
It's super important to get this right and to be able to kind of be a part of that journey and that experience for founders to help set them up to have great teams is something that really, um what really drives me. So yeah, that's why I feel it's it's important.
00:04:42
Speaker
Yeah. And from your experiences, obviously you had experiences in other companies before and obviously now you're diving in into a complete different industry almost. And also like the way I guess you experience building high performance teams as well from like a different perspective. yeah What would you say like the biggest challenges overall in doing this? Whether.
00:05:03
Speaker
you're in a tech industry or in finance industry or just generally, what do you think is overall the biggest challenge for companies?
Balancing Skills and Mission Alignment in Hiring
00:05:14
Speaker
Yeah, so from a startup lens, um there are obvious challenges, ah budget constraints. You can't afford to to pay the same kind of salaries as the likes of Google, Meta, et cetera, that they pay for their engineers. But obviously, everybody knows this. um So startups have to get creative. But um create where creativity in startups is is where kind of magic happens. And being able to build a really cool, innovative product, you're kind of taking out to market. There's no reason why.
00:05:42
Speaker
the way that you approach talent should be should be any different. So um for me, it's kind of getting that that balance um between skill, potential and immediate impact when it comes to to hiring for your startup and also being able to offer candidates and being able to offer your team members direct access to the founders and being able to give them that experience of working so closely with you to bring this mission vision um and your mission and vision to to life and really kind of taking it to the next level. So how um startups should approach talent is different from how bigger organizations should approach talent, um but there are lessons that you can learn from both sides. So
00:06:23
Speaker
and a bigger organization like what i was working for on for example um we really were able to kind of be very specific into the type of profile that you would you would hire and typically when your your organization grows that the need for the wrong design outputs for a specific position that you're hiring for,
00:06:41
Speaker
require quite a specific niche set of skills um because you're able to have more specialists focusing on a particular area that you that you need to solve. Whereas obviously in startup land, people that you hire have to wear multiple hats and they have to kind of cover a broader scope of different things um before you're able to specialize and and really bring in specialists ah to to narrow in on one specific area that you're you're trying to solve. so Both of those kind of have the different challenges. um But when it comes to ah small organizations, like finding people who are generalists at the early stages is obviously beneficial because they can not only kind of solve hopefully the immediate problem, but their wider skill set that you're either attracted and you've been able to hire for will hopefully unlock ah the role and unlock like how this role can grow and evolve in the future.
00:07:32
Speaker
as well so i'm thinking like okay what is the problem we're looking to solve today and then how can this person's wider skill sets evolve as the role evolves and enroll as the as the team evolves so um when we're looking for for talent for startups i think looking at the skill versus energy versus um the the dynamism and like the the ambition of the specific calendar that you're looking to bring on board is is something that you can really focus in on. And I've seen a lot of examples where ah startups have have found somebody who brings a lot of energy and is really, really aligned to the mission and the vision that you're you're trying to to portray.
Mission-Driven Hiring in Niche Industries
00:08:11
Speaker
um or you're trying to solve with with your startup and kind of potentially um taking that and overlooked maybe they're lacking a specific skill or they haven't developed a specific skill to the level that you maybe were hoping for but the energy and um the entrepreneurial spirit of that specific candidate to go out and find a way to solve that problem um or find a way to upskill themselves I think is is something that Startups can have that opportunity to do, um as opposed to a bigger business where they're less risk-averse and they're less willing to take a bet on a candidate that doesn't quite meet all of the criteria. And also in a startup, you often your um your choice of candidates is is somewhat limited, specifically also if your ah business that you're operating within is potentially in a really deep tech or very niche industry,
00:08:57
Speaker
Your startup talent pool is is typically and a little bit smaller than you would expect for um then you would get sorry for a larger organization. So I think well ah founders and um what founders can do and what early stage teams can do is really focusing in on like why what you're doing is important and why the problem that you're solving is is also a problem that should be worked on and and is an important problem because ambitious people really like um solving difficult problems and so be able to talk about your mission and the vision and like what problem you're solving to attract people who are um attract what attract people who find that interesting.
00:09:37
Speaker
um
Founders' Role in Hiring and Candidate Evaluation
00:09:38
Speaker
ah will kind of and unlock on different kind of level of talent for you and ah unlock different talent pools for you, as well as and instead of, sorry, just having somebody really focusing in on um this specific skill needs solving this specific niche person. Sorry, I'm going to stop because I feel like I'm rambling. um but ah yeah ah You can edit some of that out.
00:10:01
Speaker
No, absolutely. and And everything you said, I think and the first thing you said as well, the founders have to be really in front of you know the whole hiring process, I think is very crucial because yeah and one, I think it it's the direct source of the vision and the mission of the company. And so it's really about, you know, convincing people to what you believe in and what you want to build and, you know, needing the help of those candidates or the pull of talent that you're trying to approach and is ah super difficult, I think, when when, you know, you're in an early stage, and but then also very, very important um to really then reach the success, right?
00:10:44
Speaker
m and and I actually do have also like we did just the the strong opinion that that founders should be more involved, especially in the beginning, they usually are anyway, and yeah in in in the higher. What would you say are um the three things like you already mentioned? like it's It's the entrepreneur, and god I never can say this word.
00:11:05
Speaker
entrepreneurial spirit. Yeah. and um And I guess the energy and the mindset, I guess as well, right? To to be able to, you know, wear multiple hats and be open to maybe do things that are not in your job description, you know, in ah in in that kind of environment. And what would you say are like the mistakes that founders maybe do make when they are in the stage and trying to find that pool of talent?
00:11:35
Speaker
yeah like Sorry, what were you going to say? he calls him like What would you say are the mistakes that they do? Yeah. So um when it comes to to kind of looking for great talent for your for your startup, like I think founders ah can be kind of brand blind is what I try and say, where they're really focusing on people who've like come from these big organizations that maybe um have really great experience working better or uber just to kind of throw my own experience out of the bus um and thinking that that would immediately translate to um what they're trying to build and in some instances yes it can but it really just depends on the
00:12:17
Speaker
the type of candidate they are. Like, did
The Importance of Structured Interviews
00:12:19
Speaker
this person join this company at a high growth stage part of their their own organization's journey? Or are they um typically someone that's been in more legacy industries or big in more legacy companies that are at a later stage and then maybe don't have that kind of scrappiness that you need to have to be successful in a startup? So I think that I've seen it a couple of times um where people really kind of lean in on trying to find that um that legacy experience. but
00:12:48
Speaker
and is' all of timing sorry Recruiting is all about timing right and getting the timing right. and That doesn't just go like in timing, trying to time the the recruitment market in terms of when a candidate will be on the market. But also thinking about like when at what period of time was this candidate in this company at? Is that a time where they were solving problems that would resonate with the problems that we're trying to solve here? um And I think kind of overlooking that and just being, like I said, brand blind um and just going for somebody just because they they have that brand on their CV and not spending enough time really digging into like what their role was at the time, the problems that they were solving.
00:13:25
Speaker
And I think this also leads back to um not paying enough time and attention in on your ah your actual interviewing experience and the way that you interview these candidates and like how you structure your interview process and find this information out throughout the candidates interview lifecycle. So and I think like in a startup, the desire to want to move really quickly is obviously for obvious reasons, there's a desire to want to do that. but Investing time up front and really scoping out the the requirements of the role like what is the problem that we're trying to solve um what specific skills and experience do we really need and kind of taking away from like, oh, I really this person from Google has applied this this has to be the perfect cancer.
00:14:10
Speaker
Instead of like focusing on on on that maybe more like the vanity things of taking someone for a really big business to work in your smaller stage start up and really focusing in on okay what problems is it solved and how does that relate to the problems that we're we're going through all what we're trying to solve here with this specific higher so.
00:14:29
Speaker
That is one of the the biggest things that i I see and I think a lot of that comes from like, you know, founders are super busy. Like they have so many things going on at any point in the um in their day that ah it can be kind of put on the backseat thinking about like, Approaching your interviewing process in a more structured way and I'm not saying like you need an hours and hours and hours plotting everything out but you do need to have a um interviewing kind of machine which will help you um identify the relevant traits in each calendar that you're looking to hire and will also help you really scope out the role. not just thinking, okay, this team feels under-resourced, maybe let's just hire, um but really being intentional about the hires that you make and being very intentional about how you interview as well. So those two things for sure. And then I think another thing I would just say is um assessing for motivation. And I think that founders can quite often
00:15:26
Speaker
um can overlook motivation or like not picking certain things that kind of a candidate will reveal during an interview process or not kind of like digging into more like what motivates them. so Obviously, you can ask the obvious questions around like how do you work in an unstructured environment? How you know did you work somewhere where you have to be scrappy um to try and hear what a candidate would say, but you know any candidate who's prepared for an interview could probably have an answer for that.
00:15:55
Speaker
But what I think is really interesting is to dig into like true, deep motivations um behind this, this candidate and like doing that by like asking questions about like, what's motivated them in the past and like listening out to what they say. um And they and listening, listening out to how they answer specific questions. So, you know, if you take them a candidate back to like their past role and ask them like what happened with a specific scenario, let's just say, and hearing about how a candidate frames what the problem was and and how it was solved will tell you about what intrinsically motivates that candidate. um And there's actually a really good book to to read on this. So um it's called Motivation-Based Hiring by Carol Quinn.
00:16:36
Speaker
um So we definitely recommend checking that out. And I think that in the book, essentially, her ethos is saying that there is a direct correlation between the high performers that she hired into teams and into businesses before in the past, based purely on how motivated this candidate was.
Aligning Candidate Motivation with Startup Goals
00:16:52
Speaker
And it really helps you kind of like work through a way to like dig into how to really assess what motivates that person. Not specifically motivating that person to be in a startup, but just motivating that person overall and really helping you kind of dig into that. And I think.
00:17:08
Speaker
Being able to reveal that through a candidate um and through kind of the right kind of questions that you ask to dig into like what truly motivates them will reveal a lot about their traits. And I say a lot in to my founders, like you want to focus on traits that you're looking to hire for as well.
00:17:25
Speaker
So traits that would align well with the value and the mission and the vision that you're looking to create and the culture also that you're looking to cultivate within the business, but also specific traits that would work and complement very nicely for this role. So for example, like in ah in a bigger organization, it's very easy to say, all you know ah this isn't my role, remit, someone else will have to focus on this for you, but then What you really want to look for are the people that put their hands up and say, I will solve this problem for you, even if it's not within my um role scope. Because those are the kind of players that you need um in a startup. Someone who can like get their hands dirty and get stuck in, regardless of whether it technically falls within their role arena or not. So um yeah, just kind of wrap it all up. That's probably some of the core things that I say and try and encourage our founders to look for when they're interviewing for their teams.
00:18:16
Speaker
Yeah. ah You made some awesome points. I think one of the biggest and very important points for me are really the fact that you said in the beginning that um founders which should really, really focus on hiring um and and yeah like the questions they add.
00:18:33
Speaker
um and not just go for, you know, blindly, like almost like a bias of looking at the CV and the companies they've been and yeah because that doesn't necessarily say much,
Candidate Considerations in Joining Startups
00:18:42
Speaker
right? Because I start up in an established company, there are like worlds in between of, you know, how things work, how fast things are or slow things are, the decisions that have been made. So and I totally agree. I think there is like a general, um,
00:18:57
Speaker
A bias almost where you know you look at someone's CV and and to be fair, I guess I do the same sometimes, you know where I look at CV and someone's Korean, I'm like, wow, like they have been and they must have done X, Y, Z in my head. And then sometimes you talk to them and then they do just like ah and like ah like a small part of what I thought they do.
00:19:17
Speaker
m So I think it's really about getting to know the person and not necessarily just getting hooked by the companies they worked for, but then really try to dig into the experiences they had and and the situations they've been. So I think that's a really good learning. And from a candidate's perspective, maybe, what would you say are the things that a candidate should look into um when talking to founders or, you know, like a very early startup because ah there's also the other side, right? Where I sometimes, and I, as well, where I talk to candidates and they're like, oh, I don't know. I'm going to be one of the first people and they're very unsure about it. Like in your experience, what would be your um top tips for them to so look for or ask?
00:20:07
Speaker
Yeah, I think um for this, like i and i i I kind of coach ah people to on this a lot, like obviously friends and people who reach out like, how do you assess an opportunity as a candidate? and i think that's so um Excuse me sorry, something that you can feel like one sided but I think ah when you're interviewing but there's such an opportunity for candidates to to really kind of deeply understand like what they're what it is that they're walking into and not be afraid to dig, dig deep and ask a lot of specific questions but it's kind of like knowing the right questions to ask.
00:20:41
Speaker
um Excuse me, sorry. So I think um if you're a candidate evaluating an opportunity, and like one of the best things about moving into VC is is really, um I've been able to learn like, how to evaluate companies a bit better. um And I think that taking that approach to evaluating an opportunity as a candidate is is quite interesting so first of all is like number one for me is obviously unbiased but understanding like the team so who the team are, what are the backgrounds of the founders, um are they specialists in in what they're building, have they got um industry knowledge expertise, are they former founders themselves, this is their first gig doing it, like shaping and understanding like who the founders are, um ultimately they're the ones setting the mission the vision and the values and they are the ones who are going to be attracting the first 10 ten members. sorry and We can talk about the first 10 hires maybe a bit later on. but um If you want to be really early in the team, you you're going to be working very closely with these founders. and
00:21:38
Speaker
um getting to know them as well. And something about how they work and how they operate, I think is is very important. Because while still, obviously, yes, they're going to be your managers, but in a small team, you're going to be working basically as their right-hand person. um So really kind of deeply understanding them, um their skill sets, their experience, and like what is driving them to do this, and their reason why. And that's something that we ask, um we try and dig out of, a health sorry, something we try and get out early stage founders that we're we're considering investing in is like, what is the reason
Challenges and Realities of Startup Life
00:22:09
Speaker
why? Like, why are they building this? Why is this important to them? um Intrinsically, what is that reason? So really trying to understand what that is and see like how that aligns with um what you're looking for in an opportunity.
00:22:21
Speaker
I think also as a candidate, that like being very clear with yourself on what it is that you're really looking for. Moving to a startup is like jumping on a rocket ship. like There is no such thing as work-life balance typically, although of course you know we can figure that out. But generally, you're in the deep end, you're in the trenches, you're solving problems, you'll be pulled from pillars of post, you'll be asked to do things maybe you have never done before.
00:22:45
Speaker
um So do you have the energy for that opportunity? I think that kind of goes back to what I was saying about assessing true intrinsic motivation and from a founder's point of view, and then also from a candidate's point of view, like a lot of people who worked in maybe bigger organizations,
00:23:01
Speaker
think that they want to go and work in a startup, but the the reality um of startup life is it can be really exciting and really fun and really, um you know, a really fast pace. And if you're looking for that, then then great, but it can also be really hard, right? There'll be days when you've got like eight eight weeks left to run away, or maybe in a bit more, but um New days when things don't go well, um and because you're in a smaller team, the ripple impact of that will be much higher. So and I really understand and know yourself about what it is that you you really are looking for in an opportunity um and the type of environment that you want to work in as well.
00:23:36
Speaker
um I'd also say another thing that we look at as investors obviously is the market. So what is the the market for this product? Do you really think this product is solving a problem? Who will they be selling to? um what kind of Does this fill a dark desire and a burning need in the market that um no other competitor is doing? Or is there something unique about their product? So really deeply understanding that. um piece and really understanding the the team, the market, and then of course, as I said just now, the the product. So what is the product? What is it solving? What is it like today? What is it going to be in the future? Do they have the team in place and the technical know-how to really kind of accelerate and grow the product and and really make it um even better than it is today? And do they have, what's the kind of timelines to do that? What is their next steps? And being very clear with the founders on like, okay, what
00:24:26
Speaker
um Where are we at today? Where do we think we'll be in six months? Where do you think we'll be in 12 months? Because the best founders that I work with have a very clear roadmap of their product and and where they're going with it. And um for you as as a candidate to very clearly evaluate that. And if a founder can't clearly evaluate the next six months, 12 months, 18 months, whatever, um I would have a ah red flag about that. so That's kind of the the key things I would look for if I were a candidate. So think like an investor, because in the ultimate day at the end of the day, you're investing your time in this. um So you've got to decide whether it's worthwhile for you to invest your time um in this opportunity and whether it's something that is really going to tick the boxes that you're looking for in your next opportunity.
00:25:08
Speaker
Yeah, totally agree. I also always say like, I think you have to be the the type of person to work in a setup. I don't think everyone could do that. And it's also knowing yourself and m like establishing for yourself, okay, am I this person? Can I wear different hats? Am I okay with not having structure? And am I okay with, you know, waking up to different problems and decisions every day that are completely the opposite of what we discussed yesterday, for example, right? Like this dynamic come change is really something that you can get used to for sure, but I think you have to be the person for it. and
00:25:45
Speaker
ah yeah there's right Sorry. yes carol This is you know kind of image of working in a startup you know is like kind of jet set life almost. Do you know what I mean? But I think it's really important for people to assess whether they are the type of person. And it's totally fine if you're not, but if you're a person who needs structure and need to know every day you know what you wake up to and you do the same thing or you know what you have to do or what you're doing, then and
00:26:16
Speaker
maybe that's not really your environment yet. you know yeah and Because I feel, especially in the early stages, everything is very hectic and it's different and it can be chaotic. It can be also organized, don't get me wrong. I think after seeing startups that are organized for the fact that they've been in a ah in an early stage or m just in the growth phase as well.
00:26:37
Speaker
but It still comes with the chaos and it still comes with with a very dynamic and change at the time. Yeah, exactly. Going back to the founders, um what would you say are, like apart from the talent specifically or the candidates that they have to kind of look into, what else do you think they really need to dive into in order to build a high-effective team?
Establishing Values and Culture in Startups
00:27:03
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. So I think um there's a couple of key things here that I think can quite easily be overlooked, especially when there's a lot of other things going on, but will really help set you up for success um for when your team goes beyond 10 to 20 and to 50, etc, etc.
00:27:18
Speaker
I'm kind of getting a good interviewing and telling machine worrying in the early tires and and kind of following some kind of structure when it comes to you recruiting is super important. Even if those highs are from your your network I still think that there's an opportunity here to put some framework in place and just knowing that the first ten hires that you make will um basically set.
00:27:41
Speaker
up the type of company that you'll ultimately build. So at some point in your ah founder journey, you'll switch from building a product to to really building a team um that probably will come a little bit later on in in your hiring journey. But at the earliest stages, and this is the mission that I try to have for my for my role and what I try and do with our founders is really set them up with the building blocks of what great talent looks like at the earliest stages. And we're talking pre-seed and seed stage that will ultimately help them attract better talent in the future. So I'm Knowing that the first 10 hires kind of sets you up for for the future. I think one thing that can be quite significantly overlooked um initially at the early stages is creating a ah kind of understanding the type of values and type of culture that you want to create.
00:28:25
Speaker
and think what um it's so easy to say, oh, you know, we're entrepreneurial, we are um curious curious, we are this, we are that. But I think what really smart founders do is connect the dots between the mission, your um your overall mission, your vision for where your startup is going, and then the kind of connecting those two things with the the values and the type of way of working that you um you want to encourage and the behaviors that you want to encourage when you're when you're building your startup. So Working with the people, maybe if you already have a couple of employees, like working with those people to understand like what is it that you love about working here um already, and it only has you only need a couple of people to it so you get the answers there. And then along with your founder, kind taking that information and and building um values that amplify the type of ah culture and the type of traits that you want to attract to to this to your company.
00:29:17
Speaker
And then um kind of having them written down and making sure that they, again, relate back to the mission and vision and then talking about them and getting the word out there about like what it is that you're you're creating. Because top talent will be attracted ultimately to the mission and the vision and the problem that you're trying to solve. But what will also attract them is the type of culture that you're you're trying to create or the type of what it's like to work there, basically.
00:29:41
Speaker
um And I think that really knowing that in the early stages and having maybe a couple of values written down, that they don't have to be extensive, but they also have to be, um again, related back to the mission and vision and the problem that you're solving um to tie it all in together very nicely. And that will really help you attract talent and being able to talk about examples of where people in your, um your company have exemplified those values and those traits to attract more talent. And what I mean by that is the ongoing podcast, talking on LinkedIn, um and know bringing them to life a little bit more um so people can kind of see examples of what you mean by those. So really kind of setting those the building blocks for those values in the early days will really help you attract talent later on and know that these values will change over time um but this is important to help you attract talent and one bad hire as we know not only can cost you an absolute fortune um but can also damage the morale for the rest of the team if you bring somebody on board who maybe doesn't align with those values because for example they have a great CV or and they're immediately available, for example, they can just cause you a lot of problems later on. So overlooking that in the early stages is I think detrimental to the success of your starter and you're only as great as the team that you build. So really embedding that um early on and also embedding that into your hiring processes. So that um doesn't have to slow down your process. I know a lot of founders always say, oh, look, you know, adding another interview step in is going to slow us down. um But
00:31:09
Speaker
What's going to slow you down more is making the wrong decision and and compromising on somebody for um on the cultural fit side of things for maybe that great skills and they're a great experience and damaging team morale et etc etc so the ripple effect is just so huge so and finding a way to implement that into your um interview process and if you know your values and you know what you want to hire against then finding um interview questions or ways to kind of bring those values to life and ask candidates about their past experiences where they would have exemplified those values and those traits because ultimately it is your past experiences and past behaviours that can help
00:31:46
Speaker
predict how someone will behave in
Enhancing Candidate Experience and Employer Branding
00:31:49
Speaker
the future. um So knowing um some great values that you can assess against and ask them direct interview questions about in your interviewing process. That is um one thing I think really can be overlooked. um So really something to to be um to give and focus on. And then also, is is this is the building blocks of your employer brand, right? So this is the the building blocks of what will attract people to your business.
00:32:12
Speaker
But what will also attract people to your business is how you approach talent and how you approach hiring overall. So giving a great candidate experience regardless of outcome is a top priority. And that means moving with pace, um not giving wishy-washy feedback to candidates who have taken the time to apply to your um your business and really kind of helping explain like, okay, maybe it's not a fit.
00:32:34
Speaker
today, but this is someone who's engaged in our talent brand, if they have a good experience with us, they'll likely tell their friends about it. If we do something a bit innovative, they have a different interview process, like, um you know, ah ah you know, I don't know, I was on top of my head, but trying to do something that's maybe outside of the typical norm of a recruitment process, um and just giving people a great experience will help attract more um talent to your business. And that is also going down to the basic things like a job description, like I can't remember how many times in my career where I seen job descriptions and just immediately been turned off by the opportunity, which maybe isn't even a fair reflection of the business or the founders or the opportunity. But the way it's been communicated has been so uninspiring that it just completely switches you off from that company. And like, you know, even just something as simple as that can really turn off top talent.
00:33:23
Speaker
And then one other thing that I've i've saw seen a lot in the past, like particularly when I was at Uber or um kind of the the larger organizations I've worked for is if you're going to do a task in an interview process, um make sure the task is relevant to the role and actually exciting for the person to complete. Because I've had people pull out of interview processes before because they thought that the task wasn't relevant or they didn't think the task was very good or actually very hard. So um being kind of conscious of where you can um make people excited about joining you at every single part of the interviewing process from the job description to the way you deliver the offers, to onboarding, everything. so But for me, that all begins with what are the values that we're looking to create. Because that if you have those nailed down, then everything else can flow um afterwards and it can help really set up the building blocks for your employer brand. um And as your business evolves, those will also evolve over time. so
00:34:18
Speaker
For me that's where it's it's a really great opportunity for founders to put some structure in place early days. so Great. Thank you so much. I think this is super helpful and super insightful. um Everything you said, I think is really connected with each other and they kind of build up on each other. So if you really look into um getting great talent and then you have to check or you have to start with your values, you have to start with your mission, you have to kind of believe in it within yourself and then kind of try to bring it out there and have like the the right mindset and the right tactics, I guess, too to really bring that branding out and and um yeah. convince people and to join the journey with you. So yeah, thank you so much, Harriet. um It was lovely speaking to you and also hearing all your and expertise in this. So yeah, thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. It was great fun.