There’s an old adage about if you want to see what matters, just follow the money. But with startups, capital is a lagging indicator of success. If you want to really figure out the future, you follow the talent. Where do the smartest people want to work? What problems are interesting them? What companies are they joining?
From an investment perspective, the ability to recruit talent is a key sign of promising founders. Since we invest in seed stage companies, there’s often only a small team (or no team beyond the founders). But there are signs to look for, such as (A) do their former coworkers want to work with them again and (B) asking about their hiring plan. And don’t fall back on the crutch that hiring is hard because you didn’t go to Stanford or work at Facebook. Shyp made a key hire before their seed round had even…
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