One of my must-read authors is Rex Woodbury of Daybreak. His article on the importance of impact and mission to talent attraction in startups caught my eye. I’ll shamelessly reproduce a couple of paragraphs:
“Startups are a lot of work. Many of the best founders and operators I know work constantly; their work is their calling. For people who join startups, it’s a lot easier to put in that work when you believe in the mission. As a result, young talent is flocking to mission-driven startups.
One rule-of-thumb in startups (and life): always follow the talent. And talent is migrating to “impactful” companies. In the words of one early-20s worker I spoke to: “If I’m gonna be a part of capitalism—and I don’t really have a choice—I might as well work for a company that I feel good working for.”
People want to work for companies with missions they believe in. The companies that attract the best talent this decade will be those that make life tangibly better for people.”
But what if you aren’t lucky enough to be working for a company that is changing the world? Back to Rex:
“Recently, I sat on a plane next to a woman who told me she works for a B2B SaaS company—“You know, making the world better one CRM at a time,” she joked darkly.”
Now, don’t get me wrong – that CRM platform you’re developing may be the next best thing. But, they can be really hard miles working in organisations that think they are “tech startup” smart but are really just sales driven companies with leaders who don’t embrace, or can’t see, the real opportunities that making good technology decisions in the early stage period affords.
And yes, early stage startup is tough, long hours, juggling many tasks, wearing several hats, but you do have advantages – although they often go overlooked due to time and revenue pressures.
For example, It’s all to easy to think of your first tech hires as code robots to be kept hidden away, fed energy drinks on a regular basis, driven to work many hours and occasionally let out to get some sunshine. Best to keep the interactions with them short, don’t want to distract them with minor details like strategy or purpose:
- “Why is that feature late – you said you’d pushed it yesterday – client x will be fuming”
- “What do you mean we can’t handle that volume of requests – what are you doing over there”
- “Just build AI tools – we have to cut our technology costs somehow and AI is it – isn’t it – everyone’s doing it…”
So what’s my point? Well it’s this. Even if you aren’t working in an organisation that is changing the world – there are many things you can still do in your own organisation to change that world, and make your people’s lives better. Treating your technology team as humans is a good place to start. And guess what – you still might attract great talent – because, you know, word gets around.