What to Look for When Building Your Team
Keji Mustapha– Head of Network and Brand at Connect Ventures–a VC firm that is singularly focused on founders who are obsessed with innovating and solving hard problems at scale, they are the go to firm; “Where Product Founders Fit” had a chat with our founder, Gillian Davis, to discuss the importance of implementing a generalist strategy for team building and first-time founders. Keji seeks to add value to her investment companies, growing their capabilities far beyond those they had when they arrived, while at the same time connecting founders to one another to create a community of growth.
Keji’s advice for first-time founders looking to scale their companies from pre-seed to seed and beyond is to focus on behaviours and recruit early-hires with skillsets all across the board. She believes that the best hires are people who literally love the idea of being able to handle anything–generalists. As a first time founder, you want those people because everyone is going to be moving all the time at least within the first couple of years. You need people who are highly adaptable and excited at the thought of not having any sort of fixed idea of what their role looks like within the company. When recruiting, look at the competition and specifically the second in command of that competition, it is more than likely that this second in command is doing the majority of the heavy lifting and you should recruit them if possible, or tap into their network to find like-minded new hires.
When looking for these general, broadly skilled people it is important to start thinking about hiring against your values rather than just looking for generalist personalities. The reality is that as a leader of a developing company, you are not thinking about values day to day because you are caught up thinking about the product and your customers. You're worried about product-market fit and growing your audience.
Values are vital to maintaining drive within the organization and giving employees the incentive to work, collaborate, and innovate. Company values are reflected in your behaviours, as the way that you behave will set a precedent for how your team should behave. Values need to be there in order to grow a culture that is scalable and sustainable. It is necessary to have values so that you can take that original vision - the larger story and narrative that your company lives by, that you live by, and bring it to life. People need to have the right headspace, and put time into creating these values and thinking through them, so the company can experience optimal growth. Apple’s mantra, “Think Different” applies to their value set: that disruptively and together, its team will make a positive difference in society leaning on the diversity of people within the organization to create adventurous and revolutionary products together.
Mustapha is a massive advocate for self-development and she lives by the Japanese “kaizen principle” which entails constant and continuous self-improvement. She believes that it is incredibly important to get clear on your intentions and where you are going by seeking professional help. Specifically, the role and transition from founder to CEO is a tricky one and as a leader, it is important to find experts to help you get where you want to go. If you want to be the best version of yourself, you should take on external support and advice.
A successful company will be one where there is a supportive environment where peers can fail, where they can take time to think, talk and collaborate. Your team has to be able to experiment, to have an environment where they can take risks. If there is no risk being taken, there is no innovation, and the company won’t have the competitive advantage of having been curious enough to lean into uncertainty and the potential of the unknown. Build your team with key players who are not afraid to take risks and in the early stages of scaling, make sure that they are “Jack of All Trades” characters who can balance, adapt, and wear all of the necessary hats you require to support your fledgling company as it reshuffles and prepare for take off.
If you’re interested in developing your leadership style in these uncertain times, you might be interested in talking to us about some of our remote offerings.
At OverTime Leader we provide executive leadership and management advisory for technology-enabled businesses and teams. If you are looking to spark a people-powered change in your business our team has a toolbox full of ways to help you get started.
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