Scott Dietzen says recruiting is the underrated skill that separates good startup CEOs from great ones during hypergrowth. He hires hungry people with a chip on their shoulder, gives early hires a vote but not a veto on future hiring, and moves fast when a leader isn't working out.
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In your experience, what's an underrated skill that separates good startup CEOs from great ones during periods of hypergrowth? I think the critical thing is just recruiting. It's all about the leadership team you build as a, as a CEO that's running all the individual functions underneath. Now, I tend to favor up and comers, people that have a chip on their shoulder that have, you know, had success but maybe haven't been proven out in the big job yet. And so they've got that supreme hunger, that extra gear in terms of how hard they're going to work to be successful. I worry about complacency. You know, people that come in that are a little too comfortable tend not to put the extra energy and drive in that you need because it's so hard to grow a company. You know, when my, my kids are growth spurts, they, they need to sleep a lot and eat a lot because growth is just an amazing amount of work. You've got to try to stay ahead of it too. You know, there are going to be leaders that are great at scale that will start to hit limitations. And so you need to be able to hire bosses for those early hires. You really want to involve them in that process, get their buy in so that, you know, you don't alienate them. They get a vote for sure, but not a veto. As you're trying to scale the team. And I would say be really careful not to get behind. You know, it's, it's so easy to defer making changes when you're in the CEO role. You know, I like to push myself as soon as my bit flips that somebody, you know, either isn't filling the function well or needs to have more, you know, a boss because they're going to hit their scale. I want to do that sooner rather than later because you can get behind. You know, somebody departs or somebody else isn't successful and then you're trying to do multiple executive searches at once. And I find I can really only do one good one at a time. You know, remember your, your role is, is not to defend your team, it's to make your, your team better. Not everyone can make an elite team. And so you've really gotta be aggressive in making sure that you've got the best, bringing everything together.
