When building quickly, hiring a reliable team is vital for early-stage startups. In this episode of Build Mode, Isabelle Johannessen interviews Isaiah Granet, CEO and co-founder of Bland, a voice AI company that advanced from pre-seed to Series B in 10 months. Their team grew to 75, and Granet shares strategies for discovering hidden talent in unexpected places.
With a founding team just out of college, Bland’s initial hires were chosen for passion rather than credentials. Granet shares that they found their founding engineer, who had limited tech experience but showed great passion by saying he loved shipping code, through his GitHub account.
Following that hire, Bland started focusing on individuals with strong passions and a scrappy attitude like the company itself. From philosophy majors to beekeepers, Bland built a team with people outside the standard tech scene. Granet emphasizes that an obsession with any interest is valuable, even if it’s not on a resume.
As the company expanded, Bland’s leaders learned how to maintain team motivation and satisfaction. Granet details how they established a fair pay structure and ensured early hires understood their equity in the episode.
This hiring approach does have its drawbacks—scrappy talent might lack experience, requiring adjustment time for their roles. Granet mentions that if employees aren’t delivering results, they’re expected to work long hours at the office. Scaling this hiring method is challenging, particularly with Bland’s rapid growth, necessitating the co-founders’ active involvement to ensure high performance.
The founding team is crucial for an early-stage startup’s success. Bland’s unconventional hiring approach and rapid growth underscore the importance of discovering a talent-acquisition strategy that works. Granet advises startup founders to trust their instincts in hiring.
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Hosted by Isabelle Johannessen, Build Mode is produced and edited by Maggie Nye, with Morgan Little leading Audience Development. Thanks to the Foundry and Cheddar video teams.