An Open Letter to Web3 Founders From A Talent Acquisition Leader

Let's say I join your company tomorrow as the new Talent Acquisition Leader. You hand me a big ugly spreadsheet of roles to fill, and I wave a magic wand and get them all filled, every one of them, on time and on budget. I'd bet everyone would say "Luke. you did an amazing job!" You'd be happy right?

You’re happy. The exec team’s happy. The hiring managers are happy. I’ve done the job. The internal service did what it was supposed to.

If I did that and only that, in four years, you are screwed.....

Here’s why

Because while you’ve spent the last few years using talent acquisition as an internal service, your competitors have been pushing further and further out into the talent community.

They’re building reach into University blockchain clubs. Web2.5 companies dabbling with blockchain applications like in ad-tech and ed-tech. Even tangentially aligned communities that touch the space in some way like Rust communities.

And they’re doing this because they understand something that’s still not obvious to most founders:

The Web3 talent ecosystem, particularly the ones who are specifically on your mission, is still small enough that one company can dominate mindshare and become an employer of choice in Web3. You can have a HUGE impact on the overall industry.

Why Should You Care About Being an Employer of Choice?

First, Money.... you become more agile.

When a top engineer’s release is going sideways, or their runway’s dried up, or they’ve had enough of a useless boss, they don’t go shopping around. They come to you. Because they already trust you. You’re the one they’ve been watching. Application quality shoots up. Time to hire goes down. Cost per hire drops. every million-dollars of burn stretches further than your competitor’s.

Second, You export YOUR way of working

Why do you know what a bar raiser is? Why do you talk about leadership principles even if you’ve never worked at Amazon? Because Amazon exported its culture. The employers of choice in Web2 defined how the whole industry operated and still does.

Web3 is still open. You could do the same. But you can’t if you think recruitment is just filling jobs.

Okay fancy pants, how do we achieve this?

ONE: TA, DevRel and Marketing are speaking to the same people.

Marketing wants users. DevRel wants builders. TA wants hires. Same people.

It's the same community and you're paying for three siloed teams to reach them.

That’s inefficient.

They’re all pointing at the same audience. They should be aligned. They should know each other’s goals. They should be sharing data.

Your ATS probably has more high-value contacts in it than your CRM, and your head of marketing doesn’t even know. If you’re not sharing that, you’re criminally wasteful.

Once you realise the overlap, you can start triaging contacts properly. Maybe someone’s not right for your cryptography role. Cool. But maybe they’re a great beta user. Or maybe they should be added to the community newsletter. Or they’re perfect for an open source bounty next month.

TWO - TA needs two distinct work streams

If you’re a founder reading this, here’s the split you need to be thinking about for TA

Your function has two work-streams.

The first is internal. Hiring excellent people, at speed, on budget, who will deliver. Most founders get this part.

The second is external. TA as a growth lever. This is the part everyone underestimates.

This isn’t wishy-washy brand talk. I’m talking actual business impact. TA converting candidates to builders, customers, and brand advocates.

When your candidate screening process includes your own tech, every candidate becomes a potential user. They learn your tooling. They get exposure to your product. Even if you don’t hire them, they’ve touched your stack. That’s meaningful.

When you’re ramping up for a big event. ETHDenver, DevCon, whatever, TA can double your marketing reach. I've been to these events, I know the huge workload marketing teams are under. We’re already talking to the same people. Why wouldn’t you use us to carry some of that weight?

THREE : Non-Transactional Outreach

Your TA team dont need an open role to reach out to the community.

Build a talent community newsletter from your ATS. Share product updates. Share your company’s big wins with the 100k+ contacts on your ATS. Drop a quote from your CTO. Share a testnet faucet or early access invite. Keep that network warm. When the timing’s right, those people come back to you.

So founders, ask yourself:

Is my TA team making great hires, on budget, on schedule?

BUT ALSO

Are they pushing our tech, building our reputation, and driving growth?

If no to either, you’re leaving value on the table. You might have the tech. You might have the community. You might even have the funding.

But if you don’t figure this part out, your competitor will.

And then you’ll be left wondering how they pulled ahead.

About the Author

Luke Eaton is a recruitment leader specialising in Web3 and FinTech organisations. He helps high-growth teams scale in a data-driven, cost-efficient way, and provides strategic advisory to some of the best projects in Web3. If you’d like to learn more or work together, feel free to connect with him on LinkedIn.