Why Join a Tech Scale Up?

🔥 Hiring in 2025 is forcing startups to rethink how they grow. 🧠 Multi-skilled builders are scarce. Reskill your team from within. ⚡ Break roles into projects instead of chasing perfect hires. 📉 Costs are rising. Budget for the real price of employment. 🌈 Inclusive, flexible cultures beat high salaries in attracting talent. Survival isn’t about speed. It’s about strategy. The founders who adapt their hiring playbook now will be the ones still scaling in 2026. What’s one change you’ve made to your hiring strategy this year? #earlystagefounder #talentstrategy

Do you know the number one reason candidates choose one startup over another? 👉 The Founder(s). No amount of branding, marketing spin, shiny USPs, or a cutting-edge tech stack can replace a real conversation with the person who started it all. I’ve lost count of the number of times the deciding factor at the offer stage has simply been: “I spoke with the founder, and that made all the difference.” Moving roles is one of the biggest life decisions people make. If a founder can’t put aside 30–60 minutes to answer final questions and address concerns, then candidates are right to ask: “Is this the right place for me?” Yes, a founder’s time is scarce, especially at different stages of growth, but those conversations at the beginning and end of the process are what set you apart. They build trust, belief, and commitment in a way nothing else can. 🚀

When you're building at an early-stage, it’s tempting to hold out for the resume that signals prestige. Big names. Major scale stories. 🦄 companies on the resume. But that “perfect fit” mindset often comes with hidden costs: stretched teams, missed revenue, lost momentum. What if instead you focused on: • Non-negotiables vs. nice-to-haves • Transferable skills & learning velocity • Urgency & speed without compromising outcomes We dive into this and more in our new blog: Why Early-Stage Founders Struggle With the “Perfect Fit” Trap. We walk through a 5-step framework to help founders decide where to flex and how to hire faster without compromising. If you’ve been wrestling with a hiring delay or wondering how to spot high potential when pedigree is thin—this is for you. 👉 https://lnkd.in/egifEvji Special thanks to LeeRon Yahalomi, Leily M., and Kelsey Mooney and for sharing your story! #Hiring #StartupCulture #Leadership #SaaS #Recruitment Captivate Talent

The Importance of Employer Brand During Scale 🌟 Startups often obsess about their product brand. But what about their employer brand? As you scale, TALENT is your biggest competitive advantage. Top candidates aren’t just evaluating your funding round—they’re evaluating your culture, vision, and leadership. Here’s what high-growth startups should prioritize in their hiring process: 1️⃣ Storytelling – Share why your mission matters and how employees directly impact it. 2️⃣ Candidate experience – A slow or disorganized process turns great talent away. 3️⃣ Transparency – Be upfront about challenges as well as opportunities. Authenticity attracts the right people. We’ve helped early-stage clients land top talent by elevating their careers page, showcasing employee stories, and tightening interview feedback loops. 💡 Remember: Scaling is a two-way street—you’re assessing candidates, but they’re also assessing you. How do you currently showcase your startup’s culture to candidates?

Work is evolving—on both sides of the table. - For talent: Flexibility, freedom, and growth are redefining career choices. - For startups: Fractional hiring is unlocking top-tier skills without the full-time cost. The future of work is agile, efficient, and built around balance. #FutureOfWork #FractionalHiring #WorkLifeBalance #StartupCulture #CareerGrowth #SmartHiring #HRTrends #WorkplaceInnovation #FlexibleWork #TalentAcquisition

What Startups Can Learn from Enterprise Hiring (and vice versa) Hiring isn’t one-size-fits-all. But there’s plenty startups and enterprises can learn from each other to build stronger, smarter teams. 🔹 Startups can learn from enterprises: Build structured hiring workflows Prioritize long-term culture-fit Invest in employer branding early Use data-driven decisions for scaling 🔹 Enterprises can learn from startups: Hire for potential, not just pedigree Move fast to secure top talent Be open to hybrid roles and flexibility Focus on passion and agility over rigid roles 📌 Whether you're a startup or an enterprise, hiring today requires adaptability, strategy, and human connection. 📣 At Bravens, we specialize in bridging the hiring gap, no matter your company size. Let's build better teams together. 💼 Ready to transform your hiring strategy? DM us or visit https://lnkd.in/dczZDgue to get started! 📲 𝗙𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗼𝘄 𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗷𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘆 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝗶𝗻𝘀𝗽𝗶𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝗱𝗮𝗶𝗹𝘆 𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗰𝗸 𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗧𝘄𝗶𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗿: https://x.com/bravensinc #HiringStrategies #TalentAcquisition #FutureOfWork #EmployerBranding #WorkforceTransformation #RecruitmentInnovation #BusinessGrowth #Leadership #HiringExcellence #HRLeadership #StartupCulture #EnterpriseHiring #AgileWorkforce #TeamBuilding #Bravens

About one in three of our new hires this year came through referrals at Simbe, equally spread across commercial, engineering, operational, and corporate roles. To put this in context, most companies don’t hit this level: benchmarks suggest anywhere from 15-25% in smaller firms, and only a few (≈4%) reach 30-50%. Referrals aren’t just a faster way to hire. They reflect something deeper: that employees trust and love Simbe enough to bring in people they value most. And that’s not without risk. Referring a friend or former colleague means putting your own credibility on the line - if the hire doesn’t work out or the culture disappoints, it can lead to awkward situations. Yet our team continues to open their networks with confidence. For me, that’s one of the strongest indicators of a healthy culture and high trust in our company. #Startups #ScalingTeams #TalentAcquisition

📌 Welp, let’s say it — early-stage hiring is nuts. If you’re a start-up (regardless of being pre-seed, Series A, etc.), hiring in the first years is is crucial, can be terrifying, and above all else, is chaos. 📊 Recent founder data says: 78% claim their first 10 hires directly impact product-market fit (no pressure). 65% say bad hires were their biggest early-stage faceplant. Startup-specific figures: A 2024 report said that for specific roles, they received an average of 460 applicants per position😲 (this used to be crazy, now I'm hearing they can hit this number in a few hours in 2025). Some founders are looking for fancy resumes with stellar backgrounds. Others want partners who can share the load like: ✅ Generalists who can wear five hats and can handle massive amounts of ambiguity. ✅ People who actually care about the mission (not just the comp) ✅ Fast, founder-led recruiting — not 6 rounds and a take-home assignment from hell Most get to a point where they are looking to scale - add 10+ employees in a short period of time, or projected massive hiring in 6 months to a year. Founder-led recruiting, referrals, and job boards can only get them so far, and it'll drown time with 250+ applications in a matter of hours. So, do they outsource (Agency, RPO), or do they bring someone internal who can source, screen, interview (while building infrastructure)? Honestly? It’s nuts. It's high-stakes. And it's fun as hell. Get it right early, and you're golden. Miss? You're rebuilding. Shout-Out to a few of these start-ups that are doing awesome Ashby - Series D (2025) Together AI - Series B (2025) OpenAI - Record breaking funding closed this year CoinTracker This is just to name a few - you can drop your thoughts, shoutouts, or your own start up experiences - I'd love to hear them. #Startups #EarlyStageHiring #Scaling #Founders #TechRecruiting #talentacquisition #strategy #staffing #management #innovation

Hiring is often called the lifeblood of a business, but many of the biggest risks don’t come from finding talent, they come from how we approach hiring itself. A recent report highlights where early-stage founders trip up most often: 80% of turnover comes from bad hires. 23% of startup failures are linked directly to poor team building. And when you zoom in, the mistakes aren’t always obvious: 1. Hiring too late and then rushing. Roles are left open until the pain is unbearable, then filled in a hurry. The result? Compromise. 2. Chasing resumes, not outcomes. Founders often focus on credentials or big company logos instead of asking, “Can this person actually solve our problems today?” 3. Cloning the founder. It’s tempting to hire people just like yourself, but that often means the team all thinks the same and misses better ideas. The numbers tell us this is more than just “hiring mistakes”. It’s about timing, mindset, and building for tomorrow, not just today. The reports clearly highlight that hiring is done in a rush invites problems later. #hiring #hiringmistakes #startups #placements

Recruiting at VC-backed startups is broken (we would know - we used to run it) After years leading recruiting inside VC-backed startups and now 2 years running thrively, here’s the truth: Most companies don’t have a recruiting problem. They have a process problem. ❌ Roles stay open for months ❌ The ATS becomes a mess ❌ Headcount plans change and everyone panics ❌ And worst of all? Candidates just aren’t excited to move We built Thrively to fix this. Not with fancy dashboards or fluffy decks but with a done-for-you, embedded recruiting model that moves at operator speed. And when headcount shifts? We let you reallocate searches. Because that’s just how startups work. If this sounds familiar, let's talk. Or just follow along. We’re sharing everything we’ve learned building Thrively from the inside out. #recruiting #founders #engineering #keepthriving