How to pick your startup’s core dream team before starting out
One thing every entrepreneur needs to know before starting up is that the stability and sustainability of a new company rests solely on the efforts of a strong team. Irrespective of how strong your product or idea is, your founding team has the power to take your company to success or failure. What’s more, venture capitalists usually look for a solid team to fund instead of just a smart business plan as the latter may vary with changing market conditions and opportunities.
Image : shutterstock
So before you start out, use these tips to ensure you have the right founding team:
Don’t start with too many executive roles
When you have the vision to start and grow your business to success, you need more functional roles than executive ones. You need people dedicated to perform a particular task. Even in the case of a co-founder, get someone who can multitask in a functional role as well. This will pay you great dividends.
Experience matters
It has lately become a trend to start a new business without much experience. Although the startup culture promotes on-the-job learning and this might be the first time you are a founder, don’t surround yourself with inexperienced people. Ensure you bring in experience, adding value to the different roles in your startup.
Hire people you like and not those who are like you
You need individuals who complement you and your skills, not people who have the same skills as you. Look for diverse personalities, talents and people with varying levels of experience to build your dream team. When these varied skills and experiences cross ways, you will have a strong team you can count on.
Also, before hiring people, ensure that you get along with them as you’ll be spending a lot of time with them.
Keep an eye out for people who have failed
People who have experienced and recovered from failure are one-step ahead of those who have never failed. Failure acts as a source of insight, and those have learnt from their failures and risen again have a personality that suits a startup.
Include generalists
Along with hiring the core specialist team, hire generalists who can work outside of their roles as well. Generalists have a natural talent for doing many things. Your new startup can benefit from their skills to working well in a particular role and the capability to cross into other roles whenever required.
Nothing can substitute passion
As the head of a new startup, you may not be able to pay a premium to acquire the top talent in the industry. However, making sure that your team shares your passion about your ideas will take your startup a long way.
A portion of their non-monetary compensation should be imbibing the belief that they are changing the world with through your startup. Whatever your business is—be it e-commerce, hospitality or technology—the first step towards creating a great company is fostering a great team.
