The best candidates never go looking for a job.  Opportunity finds them.  Most firms and sites like Linkedin and Indeed pander to the passive job seeker.  We work in-network.  Our first outreach is always backchannel: who’s the best person you have ever worked with? Who aced your first product? What rockstar became your backbone?  Multiple signals start to point to the best people.  

 

Now that we are 8 billion people, how do we find one another?  We start with a philosophical distinction: that there is a difference between connection versus connections.  Both matter, but to over index on either means you will either be risking an unknown hire or relying on the available marketplace to find your Rembrandt.  Hiring your first head of product, or looking for the right person to drive your go-to-market strategy shouldn’t mean sending in-mails.  Start with people you know! 

 

There’s always a shortlist of the very best people.  Knowing where these people live, and what makes them respond, is the first and most important signal.  The best candidates will see themselves as future founders.  They should already be thinking like an entrepreneur.  And never be looking for a job.