S6E7 – Mastering SaaS Hiring: How B2B SaaS Founders Can Build High-Performance Teams with Mina Golesorkhi

Building a high-performance team is essential for any business, especially in the B2B SaaS industry. In the latest episode of the “Grow Your B2B SaaS” podcast, Mina Golesorkhi shares her expertise on this topic. Mina has extensive experience, starting as an in-house talent partner and later becoming the head of people and culture. She has worked with over 160 startups across different sectors, helping them hire the right talent. She also co-founded a consulting agency and created Hi Remi.ai, a recruitment solution. In this episode, she explains how to hire the right people to create a high-performance culture.

Defining a High-Performance Team

A high-performance team is not just about talent; it’s about mindset and work ethic. Mina explains that operational excellence comes from having a fast-paced, goal-oriented team. High-performance teams focus on getting the job done efficiently, rather than chasing perfection.

The Critical Role of Hiring

Hiring the right people is crucial for building a high-performance team. While culture is important, it is the individuals who shape that culture. The best hires are not just skilled but also align with the company’s values and goals.

Overcoming Hiring Misconceptions

Many companies make hiring decisions based on well-known brand names. Mina warns against this mistake, emphasizing that past experience at a big company does not always mean a candidate is the right fit. Instead, businesses should focus on specific skills and personality traits needed for success in their unique environment.

Avoiding Common Hiring Mistakes

One major hiring mistake is bringing in someone who is too advanced for the company’s current stage. If a hire is too strategic, they may struggle to adapt to the fast-changing and sometimes chaotic nature of a growing startup. Mina advises hiring individuals who are just a few steps ahead, capable of handling current challenges while contributing to long-term growth.

The Importance of Pre-Hiring Preparation

Before starting the hiring process, businesses should clearly define the competencies and traits they need. Mina stresses the importance of structured hiring, including scorecards and predefined evaluation criteria. This ensures that every new hire is the right fit for the role and company culture.

The Role of AI in Hiring

AI is transforming recruitment by automating repetitive tasks and improving efficiency. However, Mina believes that hiring should always include a human touch, especially for critical roles. AI can enhance the process, but recruiters should focus on building relationships and personalizing the experience to attract top talent.

Developing a Recruitment Strategy

Recruiters should be actively involved in business decisions. Mina suggests aligning hiring strategies with business goals to ensure the right people are brought into the company. Rather than just filling positions, the focus should be on hiring individuals who will drive growth and innovation.

Conclusion and Key Takeaways

Mina’s key advice is to hire slowly and fire quickly. Businesses should take their time to assess candidates thoroughly but be prepared to address mismatches swiftly. Founders should invest in building strong management teams and prioritize hiring strategies that foster long-term success.

Connect with Mina Golesorkhi

For more insights, connect with Mina on LinkedIn. She also recommends reading “Who: The A Method for Hiring” and exploring Hi Remi.ai for a more effective recruitment process.

Final Thoughts

This episode provides valuable lessons for B2B SaaS founders looking to build high-performance teams. By focusing on effective hiring strategies and leveraging both human expertise and technology, businesses can position themselves for sustained growth and success.

Key Timecodes

• (0:00) – Building a High-Performance Team with Mina Golesorkhi
• (0:46) – Introduction to Mina Golesorkhi
• (1:21) – Defining a High-Performance Team
• (2:18) – The Importance of Hiring in Building a High-Performance Team
• (3:53) – Key Factors to Consider When Hiring
• (4:15) – Misconceptions SaaS Founders Have About Hiring
• (5:25) – Hiring for Company Stage Fit
• (6:59) – Avoiding Bias in Hiring
• (7:10) – Techniques to Remove Bias in the Hiring Process
• (8:07) – Starting with Clear Goals for Hiring
• (8:52) – Common Hiring Mistakes SaaS Companies Make
• (10:12) – Challenges in Management Hiring
• (11:44) – Utilizing Interim Management and Consulting
• (12:06) – Video Game Analogy for Hiring Stages
• (13:04) – Implementing a Comprehensive Hiring Process
• (14:14) – Importance of Scorecards in Hiring
• (15:23) – Empowering Hiring Managers
• (16:35) – Closing the Candidate
• (17:44) – Freeing Up Founders’ Time Through Hiring
• (18:55) – Identifying the Genius Zone
• (19:49) – Letting Go When Hiring
• (20:34) – Safety in Delegation
• (20:48) – Corporate Beliefs in Hiring
• (22:10) – Challenges and Obstacles in Hiring
• (22:26) – The Time-Consuming Nature of Hiring
• (23:38) – Outbound Recruitment and Headhunting
• (24:12) – Future of Hiring with AI
• (24:57) – Leveraging AI for Efficiency
• (26:08) – Bringing Human Touch to AI-Driven Processes
• (26:40) – Future Risks and Opportunities in Hiring
• (28:02) – Involving Recruitment as a Business Partner
• (30:19) – Best Advice on Hiring
• (31:36) – Advice for Growing a B2B SaaS
• (32:25) – Importance of Management in Scaling
• (34:09) – Summary and Closing Remarks

Transcription

[00:00:00.230] – Mina Golesorkhi

Having a high performance team is a culture, but having the right people builds the culture. Having the right person who is capable of achieving their goals, but also has the right mindset, the right traits in that case. Hiring for fancy logos, I would say. So lots of founders are looking for indicators where someone has a track record or is capable of doing a certain job, and they take fancy logos as the main indicator for that. If If you give it away right now to the wrong person, it will go wrong. You have to find someone who can give you the safety, and ideally, that comes with competence, with the right skillset, someone who is good in communication but also knows what to do.

[00:00:46.880] – Joran

Today, we’re going to talk about how to build a high performance team. My guest is Mina Golesorkhi. Mina started her career as an in-house talent partner, moved up to head of people and culture before becoming manager partner and co founder at a consulting head handling agency. Over the last four years, she has worked with more than 160 startups across four different sectors, where she helps to hire the right people to build a high performance team. Next to leading the consultancy, she’s the founder of Hi Remi.ai, and sourcing solution that makes a life of recruiter a lot easier as it automates the entire process for them. Welcome to the show, Mina.

[00:01:20.290] – Mina Golesorkhi

Thanks for having me.

[00:01:21.810] – Joran

We’re going to dive right in. That’s how we do this show. We’re going to talk about how to build a high performance team. Let’s just start with a super basic question. What would you define as a high performance team?

[00:01:33.610] – Mina Golesorkhi

It’s a pretty good question because there are lots of different definitions on the market. I would say if you have a competent team that strives for operational excellence without chasing for perfection, I think you have a quite good team, but if they are also high performing, they need work ethic and they need the right personality and growth mindset. Having a team that is striving for operational excellence, that has work ethic, who is also moving fast-paced, there is no other way than achieving your goals.

[00:02:02.910] – Joran

Yeah. In short, it’s almost like just getting shit done.

[00:02:06.300] – Mina Golesorkhi

Exactly. Yeah, that’s a short.

[00:02:08.660] – Joran

We’re focusing on B2B SaaS founders, right? How important is hiring when it comes to building a high performance team? How important is hiring in this sense?

[00:02:18.040] – Mina Golesorkhi

It’s the most important thing. Having a high performance team is a culture, but having the right people builds the culture. Having the right person who is capable of achieving their goals, but also has the right mindset, the right traits in that case. That’s the key to get the high-performing team in place. I would say it’s the most important thing.

[00:02:39.480] – Joran

It sounds super easy when we talk about it, but if you do the hiring, what are things you need to look for or keep in mind?

[00:02:47.080] – Mina Golesorkhi

I think there are two important things to consider. It sounds easy in theory, but it’s hard because you need someone who is technically capable of doing the things that you need. You need someone that can You have the job done, but also you need someone who fits into your environment and who fits from a personality and from their traits into your culture, into the environment that you want to build. Because if you have someone who is technically capable, but who doesn’t culturally fit or their personality doesn’t fit into your environment, then first of all, it’s not fun. It’s frustrating. As a founder, I’m embracing the whole journey. You want to build a product, you want to achieve some goals, but also you want to have fun doing it. All of that is if you have on a contradictory someone who is fun, has the right mindset, etc, but doesn’t have the capabilities of achieving the goals or getting the job done, it’s difficult, too. I think balancing these two components, that’s the most important thing.

[00:03:53.200] – Joran

Yeah, it’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey, as they say. I can definitely embrace that being a SaaS founder myself. It’s a long journey, so you might as well have fun and do it with fun people. There’s a lot of opinions about hiring. What are some of the biggest misconceptions SaaS founders have when it comes to hiring effectively?

[00:04:15.490] – Mina Golesorkhi

Hiring for fancy logos, I would say. Lots of founders are looking for indicators where someone has a track record or is capable of doing a certain job. They take fancy logos as The main indicator for that. But the problem is with that, that let’s say you’re looking for a great designer. Just because someone has been working in Apple doesn’t make them a great designer. Just because someone has been working at Airbnb, it’s also not a great designer. You have to look at whom you need and what competences you need and then assess them. Sometimes you get easily biased. I’ve seen companies who have hired people from MBB, big consulting companies or Big Four, thinking they can do anything or they’re super analytical, but they don’t get the job done because they didn’t assess them for the competencies that they actually need for their job. I think hiring for fancy logos, it can help, but you have to assess the candidates just as critical as you would assess any other candidates in a market.

[00:05:16.000] – Joran

Is it an advice to look at as a SaaS where you are? Are you more early-staged and definitely not hire people who only did strategic things?

[00:05:25.200] – Mina Golesorkhi

You’re hiring a key position. The most important thing is to find someone who is of doing the job, but also you’re looking for someone who fits into your environment. If I would be an early-stage company, I wouldn’t look into a company that maybe sounds fancy logo-wise, but it’s 10 stages ahead. That wouldn’t fit. You’re looking for someone who has the track record in bringing my company to the next two levels, next level and maybe the level after that. But if you’re looking for someone or you hire someone who is 10 steps ahead, they might not fit into your structure, they might not know what is the actual job to be done, maybe the process are too chaotic or otherwise, maybe if you’re looking for someone who hasn’t built the structures you need, they might lack the knowledge. There’s a lot of other things that you need to consider. Let’s say you’re looking for a performance marketer or something, and then you have a North Star company in this segment. So you say a company XYZ is really great in paid marketing, and then I hire any paid marketer from this company, and they must That’s a bias.

[00:06:31.660] – Mina Golesorkhi

Maybe there is one person who has built the structure and brought these best practices into this company and made their business function really great, but all the others are not capable of doing it or are not as skilled as this person. It’s super important to assess candidates individually and not only take some biases or some stereotypes as the only indicator for their success or competence.

[00:06:59.330] – Joran

Maybe I’m diving Going too deep, but any examples or things we could do to take a bias away? Should we have them do an assignment? Should we dive more in their expertise? What would you recommend here?

[00:07:10.720] – Mina Golesorkhi

100%. There are different ways how you assess technically a candidate can come in different variations. You can assess them with a business case, you can assess them with sharing. What I love to do is project walkthroughs, which you can do in a call. You can give them an Excel sheet, give them some data, let them work on it, or you can take a look at their portfolio, you can let them design or analyze something. There are different ways depending on what skill you want to assess. You can let them assess, but also there are skills you can observe, like communication skills. You can let them talk, you can ask them about something and based on how they structure themselves, how they structure the information and how they communicate, that’s also a skill that is relevant for lots jobs as well. You need a list of competencies and then you have to assess them and you have to be very strict about it.

[00:08:07.630] – Joran

I love it. When you start with a clear goal, what are you actually looking for, it’s also a lot easier to find what you’re looking for.

[00:08:14.540] – Mina Golesorkhi

Exactly.

[00:08:15.190] – Joran

To give an example, when I was head of customer success at Leadfeater, what we did with the customer assessment is we always had them create an assignment, and you had the most interesting assignments, really good ones towards the really poor ones. You couldn’t see it on the CV who was actually going to give a good one or not. It’s a really nice one to weed out, I guess, the bad ones or the bad fits, I guess, in that sense. When we talk more about hiring, what are some What are the common mistakes SaaS companies make, and especially, I guess, which hinders them to grow faster, which everybody wants?

[00:08:52.880] – Mina Golesorkhi

At a certain stage, companies start to build their first management or line management. The most common mistake here is that they hire someone who is too strategic or too far away from them. Let’s say you’re, I don’t know, 30 or 50 employees, and you have to hire your first head of or someone who is owning a business unit the first mid to long term strategy and making sure that this vision is being executed among the departments. Then they think that, again, they chase fancy logos or think someone 10 steps ahead can bring them 10 steps ahead. You might find someone who has been in a company that is, I don’t know, 400 employees or 4,000 employees, and they’re five funding rounds ahead. The problem with that is that A head of in such a company or a director in such a company is solving very different problems. Also their day-to-day business is so different to what you actually need right now. In most cases, in smaller companies, Where you are in a certain stage where you have to work very close with the founding team, you’re still working on the vision, you’re working on building the structures, professionalizing the organization.

[00:10:12.100] – Mina Golesorkhi

There is a lot of chaos, ambiguity. Bringing in someone who is super strategic at this point is huge mistake because then you have someone who is managing, but you don’t have someone who is actually leading the people, coaching them, and helping them win this culture change to become this more professional version. I think the best way is to find someone who is maybe two or three steps ahead who knows how to up-level your business unit or how to up-level the processes and team at the current state, but it’s not too far away and can handle the day-to-day business and chaos you’re still in. Or I’m being some companies also struggle with finding these people because depending on what niche or complex problem you’re solving, it can be really hard to find the right person at this point. I’m a huge believer in interim management or consulting because sometimes it’s better to get this know-how that you’re missing from someone who has been there, done that. Usually, you don’t need this knowledge all the time. You need to get the job done. You need the skills and competencies for the current setup. But then you need someone who is showing you what are learnings that you can avoid by not making the mistakes and guiding you the way or showing you what processes you need as a next step without making it over complicated or without over engineering the whole structure and set up.

[00:11:44.290] – Mina Golesorkhi

If you can’t find the right person at this point, it’s even better to develop your current leadership team and bring in the missing knowledge as a consultant or as an interning manager or as a sparring partner just to make sure that you can up level and you Don’t miss out on the learnings, but you don’t overengineer and build this whole overhead.

[00:12:06.500] – Joran

I think it’s a really good example. You can treat it like a video game where you go through all these levels. If you skip too many levels, you miss crucial information that you can’t actually know what to do in the next level. So you need to find people who did the certain levels and not indeed skip them. But the consultants or the interim people could help you to get through certain levels. Then you can hire the person you’re looking, for example. Are you struggling to find a cost-effective and scalable marketing channel? Check out where it is. We help you to have other people recommend your SaaS, and you would only pay them when they deliver you paid clients, making it a very cost-effective and scalable marketing channel. Want to learn more? Go to getreadytis. Com. I guess people think now we want to start getting started with hiring, or we might are doing things wrong. If you take things from scratch and you would implement a hiring process to find the right people, what processes, tools, frameworks, or anything would you use?

[00:13:04.610] – Mina Golesorkhi

There are only three jobs to get done. First, you have to identify what you need. Then you have to assess the candidate and sell in your pipeline. Then you have to close the candidate. That’s the three steps that you need to do. If you master the basics here, it’s an absolute game changer. What most companies don’t get right, and we talked before about it, is that they skip the scorecards, they skip what they need, they jump into, I need someone with three years of experience or this fancy title. But the job to be done is not about the title. It’s about the goals, the objectives, or my vision for this department, and what do I want to get done? Once you make it is clear, the whole hiring process becomes so much easier because you can actually build a list of competencies on what skills and what personality traits do I actually need from this person. Here, I’m not talking about years of experience because that’s a huge misconception. It’s not about the years that make the seniority, it’s the intensity of doing something and the experience. A certain experience, a certain learning, maybe a certain pain builds this knowledge.

[00:14:14.870] – Mina Golesorkhi

Once you have been through that, the next time you solve this problem, you will be much more efficient, you will be much faster, and you will do it more professional in an ideal world. You’re looking for this track record, you’re looking for someone who has the competency to do that. You build this list, you identify what do I really need, and you have to be super concrete about it. The more time you take into this pre-work, the faster you will be in the process. The the more efficient you will be in the process and the better your quality of well-being. That’s the first step. I think it’s the most important thing. I really recommend this method book because it has a whole structure on how you can build scorecards, how you can make sure that they have a certain quality, and makes the founding team or hiring managers think about why they need this role and what it has to solve. Then I think what is really important is to empower your hiring management team. You need people who know how to ask questions, analyze answers, and how to double-check if they’re not sure. Sometimes you are not sure about a certain competency.

[00:15:23.990] – Mina Golesorkhi

We had this interview, and maybe you go out and say, I still don’t know how to recruit people. Then the follow-up question is needed. You have to dig in as many times as you have to until you really understand, does this person bring in this skill that I’m looking for or not? If you’re not sure, you have to dig deeper. If the person has the right skill, great. If the person doesn’t have the right skillset, then you have to think of, if you want to develop this person in this skill, or if it’s not the right fit, it’s important to be strict, to have a very structured recruitment process. Honestly, I think there is no too early stage to do that or start structuring your recruitment process. Even if you don’t have a recruiter, even if you are a solo founder, it’s super important to structure your recruitment process from early on and make sure that you have a process where you assess competencies, that you find the right person. Then you have to close. You have to think of, what do the people want from me? Not only from a financial perspective, but also, how do you the goals, the challenge that I can provide fits in their personal goals.

[00:16:35.280] – Mina Golesorkhi

I, as a person, as an individual, I’m striving for a certain career. I’m striving for certain learnings that I want to accomplish. I have personal goals, and it’s super important that this personal goals that I’m having as an employee fit into what the company can provide, what the company is looking or striving for. Making sure that you write out the statement, you make it what’s in for them, and close the candidates once you have assessed them or while you’re assessing them.

[00:17:06.770] – Joran

Yeah, because the more concrete you are, the more information you provide, the better the leads are in this case, the people who apply to your role become the better, I guess, the process afterwards.

[00:17:17.990] – Mina Golesorkhi

Exactly.

[00:17:19.030] – Joran

At SaaS Talk founder membership Retreat in Barcelona, we spent some time together. We also had a couple of founders who were struggling to replace them in a way, I guess, to free up a of their time, which I guess super tricky, right? What competences are needed for that? How can SaaS founders hire people that could free up their time where they’re not 100% sure what they’re actually looking for?

[00:17:44.410] – Mina Golesorkhi

Yeah, In most cases, the early stages, maybe the first funding stages or until you make your first million, you’re just a small team working on it. Because at this time, you need people wearing multiple hats. To be honest, there is no right hire at this point. So There is not one strategic hire or not one person that you need. You need a personality or maybe a trade to bring in the company, or you have to find your own genius zone. Depending on what your company needs, you have to define, Okay, what is my main priority right now? What do I have to get done to get into my next level to accomplish my goal? And what’s my genius zone? What is something that I’m really good at and that I want to work on? What’s holding me back? Then you have to think of, how can get rid of what’s holding me back by giving it to someone which is their genius zone. So maybe it’s customer support, maybe it’s sales operations. Depending on if you’re a good manager, maybe you don’t need a CEO, but need someone who is technically someone who can be an expert in what they’re doing, marketing, sales, whatever, and get the job done in the things that are holding your back.

[00:18:55.840] – Mina Golesorkhi

Or maybe you’re a great marketer and you just hate sales. Maybe you need someone to get into the sales part and take it away from you. You’re a genius in marketing, and there’s another genius in sales. It really depends on what stage you are and what you want to get done and what you’re good at, and then you get rid of what is holding you back from that.

[00:19:17.130] – Joran

Yeah, maybe a genius zone is almost what do you like the most as a SaaS founder, right? You’re at your happy level. Exactly. Yeah. I spoke to Jamie from Cybersmart on the weekend. He explained in his podcast episode, I’m happy to give away, task away. If I know that person is going to be better in that thing than myself, then it’s super easy for me to let go. But if they’re not, then I’m always staying involved. Is it something you see a lot as well, where if they’re not genius enough in your words, then the founder still always mingles with their tasks?

[00:19:49.580] – Mina Golesorkhi

Absolutely. From different perspectives. I’ve been doing interior management myself multiple times, and I could see that whenever it wasn’t about the competency itself, It was about giving the founder this safety feeling of, You can let go. I will take care of it. Nothing will go wrong. Then they’re happy to give this part away. If they feel like HR or sales are something that is super important and high priority right now for the company, and even if I don’t like it, if I give it away right now to the wrong person, it will go wrong. You have to find someone who can give you the safety, and ideally, that comes with competence, with the right skill set, someone who is good in communication but also knows what to do.

[00:20:34.110] – Joran

I think that’s a really good word, giving you the safety that things are going to be okay and that they’re going to take care of whatever comes on their path. What is one corporate belief in hiring that you completely disagree with?

[00:20:48.310] – Mina Golesorkhi

I think, first of all, personality hires. I believe that just hiring someone for personality, if they are not capable of getting the job done, That’s really hard. I think that having great-minded people is important, but they have to be capable of doing things. Otherwise, you have to go through a lot of learnings. If you have time and resources to put into learnings, that’s great. But I’m a huge fan of finding people that are actually bringing the right skillset that can get the job done. Maybe there are small gaps to close, but not a huge gap. Another thing I want to bring up is personality tests. There are lots of 16 personalities on that is super popular in the founding scene, which are just scientific and not really proven to correlate anyhow to a high performance or better culture. Maybe it’s the business psychology student, talking out of me, but definitely not a fan of it. I think you should be more science-based about it and you should make sure that you get the right person from a mindset and from a trade-wise. But if you to assess it, you shouldn’t do it with markets or putting random tests where they fill in some questions, how they want to be perceived, but not how they actually feel about it.

[00:22:10.740] – Mina Golesorkhi

So that’s the hard thing about it.

[00:22:12.770] – Joran

Yeah, nice. We might make it sound super easy on a podcast to talk about hiring and to do things right, but what are some of the common challenges, obstacles you faced while hiring, and how did you overcome those?

[00:22:26.940] – Mina Golesorkhi

It takes a lot of time. As I said, My biggest work is actually pre-work. It’s who am I looking for, what do I need to get done, and what skill sets do I need? But once I got this right, I need to fill in the pipeline with the right people. You don’t want to waste time with interviews and candidates that are just not the right fit. Especially, I’m biased. I’m coming from a hat hunting industry as well. We do active sourcing a lot. We do hat hunting a lot, which means that we actually approach candidates which are not open in a market, which are passive candidates, and then try to convince them. If they are not a fit, that’s a shame. It takes a lot of time into research, which is also the reason why it builds Hyrami. Most of the recruiters, not only in my business, but also which I’ve talked to, spend hours in building company target lists, into researching past employers, and targeting candidates that are actually fit in terms of track record, which have proven indicators on they have the right skillset or maybe they have gone for an experience or learning curve which has empowered them to become the right fit now for the company.

[00:23:38.750] – Mina Golesorkhi

This is super time consuming. That’s what we are trying also to solve with Ramy by automating this process and leaving the recruiter with a list of candidates they can directly approach. That’s the biggest challenge I can see right now.

[00:23:53.590] – Joran

To make it maybe a bit promotional question, because what you do is you’re not just helping recruiting recruiters to source the applicants which are coming in, but you’re actually finding people based on company. You’re doing called outbound recruitment where you find the quality leads, which are people in your case.

[00:24:12.840] – Mina Golesorkhi

Exactly. At the end, you will have to assess them, but we are enriching our data and shortlisting the candidates based on company data such as funding stages, revenue, but also information that we gather and scrape from company sites. That’s something that that recruiters usually have to do manually until they get to the same quality, and we are automating this and making it way faster for them.

[00:24:39.140] – Joran

To come back to what you said before, you’re finding people at the right stage who are to do the steps you need them to do. When we look a bit more towards the future of hiring, how do you see the future of hiring? I guess with the rise of AI, any other trends happening?

[00:24:57.220] – Mina Golesorkhi

It’s a funny situation right now. It’s Job descriptions are written by AI. Candidates write application with AI. Cvs are screened by AI, and then you have interviews prepared by AI and assessed by AI. I feel like I’m not sure who’s hiring who at the moment. At the current stage, I would say it’s super important to bring the human touch to this process. Ai is super helpful to get all this manual and repetitive work out of this process, so you’re more efficient, you don’t spend so much resources. Processing doing data or doing dummy work. But I believe that if you’re looking for really great hires, I’m not talking about blue color or high volume, but I’m talking about key roles that you need to hire, it’s a lot about the human touch, the communication, but also the closing part of it. At this point, you’re actually freeing up-time for both hiring manager and recruiters to focus on building the best experience on the right people and maybe being even more personal by skipping all this manual, repetitive tasks in between. I think that there is a lot of potential for the market and lots of things are happening right now.

[00:26:08.830] – Mina Golesorkhi

I’m really excited about that.

[00:26:11.030] – Joran

On LinkedIn, you see now all these videos coming by where a person is applying or an AI avatar is applying to a role and an AI hiring manager is doing it, it’s interesting. Your sentence is really nice. Leverage AI to build the best experience on the right people. I think that’s a really nice one. When we also look at towards the future, what is the biggest risk or opportunities SaaS founders should prepare for when it comes to hiring? You mentioned already being more personal. Any other things they could or should do to stand out?

[00:26:40.910] – Mina Golesorkhi

I think now is the time to bring your recruitment team closer to business. In the past, recruitment has been more a service delivery where you’re doing admin tasks, coordinating things, or preselecting things. But now with AI, all these things getting done by AI, right? But I don’t believe that AI will take over the job of recruiters because now you have the opportunity to step up as a recruiter. I think founders have to involve recruitment into business decisions because at In the moment that you take your recruitment team and make them understand what is your business goal and how important the person are, the people are that you’re hiring and what people you need to get this job done or the overall the vision and the objectives done, at this point, you’re actually winning because now then at this point, you’re giving the accountability and empowering your recruitment team to be a business partner and think from a business perspective rather than just pushing CVs and trying to get some roles filled in. Because it’s not about roles, it’s about finding the right people and putting them into the right seat. That’s something that only works if you include recruitment into business decisions and make them as a business partner in that case.

[00:28:02.420] – Joran

What happens now then once a department says, Hey, we need somebody, it’s often too late or they get something from that department and then they have to start the process. If they were involved sooner, so part of the decision, then they could already prepare for it. Is that what you mean?

[00:28:15.960] – Mina Golesorkhi

Yes.

[00:28:16.280] – Joran

Because I’ve seen it happen a lot where the department is ready or I guess the need is too high, then you go to HR and it’s always HR’s problem because we’re too late in prepping things for them.

[00:28:28.280] – Mina Golesorkhi

Yeah. Also, sometimes they try to get their job done or their goal done, which is to fill a position, but that shouldn’t be their goal. That shouldn’t be their preferred outcome. Their preferred outcome is that an opportunity or a certain gap is close with the best possible skill. Hr should even push back on things and make sure that, Hey, we don’t have the right conditions. We maybe don’t have the right budget or we don’t have the right framework to get this position filled by the actual skill set and the the actual person that we need to. They shouldn’t try to push the boundaries or they shouldn’t try to get someone less qualified or less a fit for their role just to achieve their personal goals as HR recruitment. I think that’s the biggest problem in the market, that recruiters are trying to achieve a certain numbers of hires or they’re trying to fill in a position in a certain time, and they’re left with the conditions here. The problem here is that they’re not involved into the business decisions because if you would give them this accountability, if you would give them the same information about the business, how important it is that the seat is filled with a certain skill set, they would even come to you and say, Hey, we should not hire this person, even if it would mean that I have to search another round.

[00:29:49.270] – Mina Golesorkhi

Maybe it would mean that I don’t get my target or I don’t achieve my target at this point, but it’s not the best for the company at this point. That’s something we are holding back from a because we’re just not involving them into these decisions.

[00:30:03.000] – Joran

Hiring the wrong person costs more than starting the processes all over again.

[00:30:08.160] – Mina Golesorkhi

Exactly.

[00:30:08.370] – Joran

I see. I’m going to ask a fun question. If you had to summarize your best advice on hiring in one or two sentences, what would it be?

[00:30:19.590] – Mina Golesorkhi

I think it’s very common and very known. It’s hire slow and fire fast. Super important. By that, I don’t mean to take a lot of time in the process, but I mean Then prepare yourself a lot and assess as much as you need to make sure that you got the right person and then hire the person. But if you figure out that the person is not the right fit, then maybe you can give them another chance. But you have to be fast in the decision because otherwise, the costs that you’re having are way bigger than letting the people stay in the company.

[00:30:54.190] – Joran

Sometimes you see on social, they say, if you hire them, give them another chance, try to make them the person you want them to be, but you’re saying, if it doesn’t work out, cut your losses and go over again.

[00:31:05.940] – Mina Golesorkhi

Exactly. I’m a huge fan of giving the chance. Sometimes, it’s just not possible. You can see that there is no way that we can close the gap. But in many cases, there is a way how you can actually develop this person into it. There is a way that you can give them a chance, right? But you have to be clear on expectations from both sides, agree on a plan, both do their homework, and it works out or it doesn’t. You have to be fast in this process because the impact is huge.

[00:31:34.080] – Joran

You can drag it on for a long time.

[00:31:36.400] – Mina Golesorkhi

Yeah.

[00:31:37.430] – Joran

Cool. Let’s go to the rounding up questions. When we talk about growing a B2B SaaS, what advice would you give a SaaS founder who is just starting out and growing to 10K Munchiever current revenue?

[00:31:49.510] – Mina Golesorkhi

Well, at this time, maybe it’s the first hires you make, depending on if you’re bootstrapped or we see backed. But at this point, just make sure that you have the structure right and that You really make sure that you have the right person in terms of mindset and work ethic in your company. I think that’s the key at this stage.

[00:32:08.610] – Joran

Yeah, because in the end, they need to get the work done, need to get the job done, basically.

[00:32:12.870] – Mina Golesorkhi

Yeah.

[00:32:13.950] – Joran

If we’re now past 10K MR, and we’re going to make a huge step towards 10 million ARR. You can chop it up, you can do however you want. What advice would you give a SaaS founder here?

[00:32:25.300] – Mina Golesorkhi

Don’t save on your management line. Make sure that you find the best people for your management, whatever it costs, whatever it means, you just need the right person. Because if you don’t have the right person at this stage in your company who is bringing your vision down to the business units and the departments, then the whole culture will be impacted for generations after that. Having the right management, don’t save on budget, don’t save on anything, just make sure to hire the right person.

[00:32:57.540] – Joran

Nice. Cool. Let me try I’ll just summarize. If you’re looking to build a high performance team, a higher for operational intelligence and a culture fit, create a scorecard on what you need. So what is the job to be done? Create a competence list, be super concrete about it, have a preferred comes. A gap is closed with the best possible skills, so don’t hire for that. Common mistakes, hiring too strategic, purely for personality or for fancy logos, not doing pre-work enough, fully run the process by AI. If we look about best practices, look for the track record. Who has done the journey on the level you’re looking for? So don’t skip too many steps. So think about the gamification here. You need somebody who can get the job done and fit culturally. Have candidates think during a process or have them do an assignment or have a conversation, or have them do something at least where you can test their skills. Leverage consultants or interim people to guide you the way or the processes you need. Have a really clear structured hiring process. Leverage AI to build the best experience on the right people. If you’re looking to replace founder tasks, define your genius zone and then find somebody who can give you a safety feeling when you’re giving something away.

[00:34:09.560] – Joran

Hire slow, fire fast, prepare yourself a lot when hiring, and fire fast because cost become too high to try to make it work. You also mentioned the book, the who a method, so we’re definitely going to link to that. If people want to get in contact with you, Mina, how can they do?

[00:34:27.160] – Mina Golesorkhi

With LinkedIn, that’s the easiest. Follow me on LinkedIn. Let me know if you have any questions. Happy to answer any of them.

[00:34:33.140] – Joran

We’re going to add a link to your LinkedIn profile. We’re going to add a link towards the book, and we’re going to add a link towards Hi, Ramy. People can check that out as well. Thanks for coming on. For people listening on Spotify, we have a poll. Please answer that. Happy to hear what you think of this podcast. And if you haven’t done so, leave us a review so we can boost the algorithms. Thanks again, Mina.

[00:34:56.080] – Mina Golesorkhi

Thank you. Thanks.

[00:34:57.860] – Joran

Thank you for watching this show of the Grow Your B2B SaaS podcast. You made it till the end, so I think we can assume you like this content. If you did, give us a thumbs up, subscribe to the channel. If you like this content, feel free to reach out if you want to sponsor the show. If you have a specific guest in mind, if you have a specific topic you want us to cover, reach out to me on LinkedIn. More than happy to take a look at it. If you want to know more about Reditus, feel free to reach out as well. But for now, have a great day and good luck growing your B2B SaaS..