Over the past few years I've watched several startups hire into their executive teams. One thing that stands out to me is that to successfully join a startup as an executive you have to believe that you are the kind of person who can change the trajectory and outcome of the company.
That's because startups are "default dead." We might draw it like this:
The black line is survival. The blue line is the default trajectory; the green line is what's possible with the right hire. Maybe it's escape velocity.
I’ve met lots of people who want to wait and see if something is going to be successful before committing themselves to it. But this is exactly wrong for a startup. You need to commit yourself to it before it is going to be successful, and then be the reason it becomes successful.
Hungry, passionate, crazy, foolish -- these are the words that people use to describe this quality. If you're hiring an executive at your early stage startup, and you realize the candidate is trying to figure out if the company will be successful before signing on, they're probably not the right hire.
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