How to Build a Rocket Ship Mid-flight

(A Quick Talk I Gave at a People Ops Offsite)

Where I Came From

Before I joined Blend, I'd worked with companies ranging in size from 3 to 80,000 people. I'd worked with companies that were three people in a coffee shop, companies going through their very awkward teenage years (usually around 150+ employees), founders whose egos sucked all the oxygen out of a room, and and founders who could make every person in their organization feel excited to be there. Over the past decade in tech, I've seen all sorts of things, and I like to think I can spot success patterns and cracks in the infrastructure.

Why I'm Here

What I see at Blend are the key pieces needed for both a company's success and for me to be happy.

These things are:

1. Strong, empathetic leadership

2. Product market fit

3. An incredibly smart and adaptable team that passes the hallway quiz. (If you were to bump into a teammate in the hallway, or at the water cooler, would you stop to talk to them? Or would you run away?)

The Things I Carry

Now that you know why I’m choosing to be here, I want to share some of the things I’ve learned in my (very) cross-functional time at Blend. As our Head of People Ops would say, we’re giving away our legos -- but we’re also melting reinventing, reimagining, and throwing said legos out the window. Working in a high-growth company can feel like both inventing and building a rocket ship while it's already in motion, but I'd like to share some of the things I've learned and carry with me.

Over-communicate. Keep every party up to to date on progress and blockers, even if you think it’s superfluous. 

Have Empathy. Understand where a person is coming from. They might be in a bad mood because someone cut them off in traffic, because they have a headahce, because they hate the rain, because their boss just yelled at them, or 1000000 other reasons. You have no idea what’s going on in someone’s head. Take a step back and think about what could be going on in their head, what external pressures are on them, and why they’re acting that way. Ask them, and listen, and from that place you can build a much stronger path forward.

Advocate For Yourself. This goes both ways. No one can read your mind. No one knows what you want to work on, what you don’t, or what’s going on in your own life or work. You have to advocate for what you want, what you don’t, for your work, and for your worth.

What 'The Voice' Can Teach Us About Closing Candidates

For those living under a rock, The Voice is a damn fantastic reality TV show on NBC. Its premise is standard: undiscovered singing talent gets discovered. What makes the show interesting is the rules it employs within its glittering universe; the goal is not to bring talent down, to mock those who lack it, or to increase ratings by increasing negativity. Instead, contestants are treated as royalty, and judges get on their knees and beg to hire particularly talented candidates for their team. Sound familiar? 

And while your goals as a recruiter might not exactly mirror Adam Levine and Christina Aguilera's, their strategies can be great arsenal to add to your weaponry. Let's take a look at some of these battle tactics.

KNOW YOUR BRAND

Blake Shelton gets country - he has an encyclopedic knowledge of the history of the genre and of important artists, and he knows the subtleties found within specific songs. Given this, he has the right vocabulary to communicate effectively with other members of his ingroup in words, terms, and context they appreciate. If you're recruiting software engineers for a company that makes enterprise networking products, learn about networking. Don't just memorize the the programming languages on a req that was handed off to you - make the effort to learn how those languages interact with each other, why someone might use Scala instead of Go, and what products preceded the ones your company created. Know your brand and do your homework, and you'll be able to speak intelligently and honestly about what you have to offer.

SHOW, DON'T TELL

If you really want a candidate, show it. Get creative. Adam Levine climbs onto chairs and yells - a fine tactic for reality television, though, perhaps slightly less appropriate for an office environment. Instead, be your candidate's advocate. Can your CEO and/or a hiring manager call her directly? Can a team lead discuss upcoming projects, maybe even secret ones?

IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU

Sometimes the judges get too excited, and blurt out something pedestrian like "I really need you on my team, because I need you to teach me." This pitch never works. Even coming from Gwen Stefani, this argument just isn't as compelling as "Andrea, you need me and my team in your life, because we will challenge you, respect you, and teach you about X, Y, and Z." 

WHAT ISN'T A CANDIDATE SAYING OUT LOUD?

Perhaps because Pharrell is a producer, he's particularly attuned at identifying nuances and pinpointing what a contestant isn't verbalizing. This sort of emotional intelligence is imperative to being a good recruiter - what does your candidate really want? Are they singing a country song, but seem to have bits of soul peeking through? Have they been hacking on firmware for a decade, but secretly want to explore the mobile space? 

Think about how Marketing folks target customers - they often build empathy maps for different market segments, and create personas for each. They think about what people are doing outside of their 9 to 5. Outside of the office, what are a candidate or customer's interests, hobbies, hopes, and dreams?

MOMENT OF ZEN

Always pick Pharrell. Do you know how many hits he's created? All of them.