Stop Making Sector Experience a Hiring Requirement
When hiring for any SaaS role, too many CEOs insist on finding candidates with direct sector experience. That’s often a mistake. It’s far more important to hire the most skilled person for the role, whether that’s sales, marketing, CS, or dev even if it means looking outside your specific sector. Here’s why:
Unicorns are hard to find. When you require both strong sector experience and elite ability, you’re looking for a unicorn. That’s someone who’s not only great at what you need but also already working in your niche. Chances are, that person is thriving at a competitor and not looking to move.
Take an Account Executive role: if you prioritize sector experience, you may end up with someone who knows your world but isn’t the best seller in the pool. It’s unrealistic to optimize for both. Since sector knowledge is easier to teach than sales ability, prioritize skill and potential.
Unicorn hunting delays hiring. Waiting for a unicorn drags out your hiring process. Meanwhile, the seat stays empty, hurting your team and business. Speed matters, and over-filtering slows you down, especially when hiring front facing talent like CS reps and AE’s.
Unicorns are hard to fire. You spent months searching. If they underperform, you may hang on too long, not because they’re performing, but because you’re trying to justify the effort it took to hire them.
Outsiders bring fresh perspective. Candidates from adjacent sectors often approach problems differently and those fresh takes can be a competitive advantage, especially if your rivals are stuck in groupthink.
Hiring someone who’s “been there, done that” in your exact space can sometimes lead to rigid thinking. They may be too married to “how things are done” in the sector and less likely to innovate. On the flip side, outsiders may ask basic (but valuable) questions and challenge long-held assumptions.
Your domain is not THAT complex. Most SaaS sectors aren’t that complicated. A smart marketer or salesperson can pick up the lingo and customer pain points quickly. Yet, companies act like their domain is rocket science. That mindset limits your hiring pool unnecessarily.
The best candidates may be looking for something new. Top performers are often more interested in new roles and breaking out of their prior sectors, especially if they’re in a legacy SaaS industry. A hyper-qualified candidate may prefer to stretch into a new vertical rather than do more of the same. Hiring for talent over sector can also help you attract people with a growth mindset.
There’s plenty of great talent out there, but very few unicorns. Hire the best person for the job even if they haven’t worked in your exact niche (though yes, they should be in SaaS). Talented people ramp quickly, and in the long run, you’ll be glad you chose skill over fit. Forget the unicorn, hire the best athlete.
Thank you for reading. Visit us at blossomstreetventures.com for more articles and SaaS data. Email the author at sammy@blossomstreetventures.com.
