Dover

After 5 years at Dover, I've discovered the biggest problem with startup hiring: Founders are one foot in, one foot out. They post job descriptions but aren't REALLY committed to actually hiring. They're hoping the "perfect" candidate will magically appear. This wishy-washiness creates the entire inefficient recruiting market. But the moment a founder TRULY commits, the economics change. Suddenly paying $10K/month for a dedicated recruiter makes more sense than paying $30K per hire to agencies. At the end of the day, the hardest part of hiring isn't finding candidates. It's deciding you're actually going to commit.

We tried to help a startup hire engineers, and when they chose to end the partnership, they sent us this unexpected email: Not the type of message you typically get when ending a business relationship. What happened here is a powerful reminder: Sometimes recruiting fails even when your team is doing everything right. This CPO worked with Noah, one of our Recruiting Partners, for months. Despite exhausting every angle: - Testing different messaging - Consulting industry experts - Iterating on outreach strategies - Optimizing role presentation Nothing worked. Cold sourcing just wasn't effective for their company at their current scale and brand awareness. But instead of blaming us, they recognized the real issue. "𝘐'𝘮 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘧𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘯𝘰𝘸 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘯 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘢 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘣𝘭𝘦𝘮 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 [𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘢𝘯𝘺] (𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘪𝘳𝘳𝘰𝘳𝘴 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘯𝘨𝘦𝘴 𝘸𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘴𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘶𝘵𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘴 𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘭)." Takeaway: Even when recruiting fails, having the right partner makes all the difference.

After helping 500+ startups hire their ideal candidates, this is the biggest hiring mistake I see founders make: No end date in sight. You post a job. Start interviewing candidates. But never commit to when you'll actually make the hire. This creates a recruiting black hole: - Candidates lose interest and take other offers - Your team burns out from endless interview cycles - Top talent assumes you're not serious I see this constantly with early-stage founders. They'll say "we're looking for someone" but have no urgency to actually close anyone. Meanwhile, companies that hire well set aggressive timelines and stick to them. The difference: One approach treats hiring like a real business priority. The other treats it like a nice-to-have that can drag on indefinitely. Lesson: Set a hire date. Hit it or kill the search.

@alexandr_wang has managed to build one of the best talent brands out there right now proud to have Scale as a long-time @DoverHq customer

We (@doverhq) had a blast hosting the Seed/Series A Founder Meetup at #nyctechweek last week! This was the first time NYC tech week felt real –– met lots of legit founders coming from all over the US/internationally. Thanks to @shravvmehtaa and @secureframe for co-sponsoring!