Hiring your first startup employees

When should you hire your first employee?

There is no universal right time, but a few signals come up often: the founders spend much of their time on a repetitive task that could be delegated, customers are kept waiting for lack of hands, or a key skill is missing and slowing down the product.

• ✓The need is recurring and lasting, not tied to a one-off peak.
• ✓You can describe the mission and the results expected over six months precisely.
• ✓The role can be funded for long enough, costed with your accountant.
• ✓A founder has the time to welcome, train and manage the person.

Employee, freelancer, intern, apprentice or co-founder?

Before opening a permanent position, ask yourself whether the need justifies an employment contract or whether another form of collaboration fits the situation better.

If the person you are looking for will carry part of the strategy, the right answer may be a co-founder rather than an employee: see our guide to co-founder roles.

Which profiles should you hire first?

Early employees carry considerable weight for what follows, because they shape the culture, the ways of working and often the next hires.

• Someone who frees the founders from their main bottleneck: development, sales, customer support or operations.
• A versatile person, comfortable with uncertainty and able to work without established processes.
• A profile who complements the team rather than a clone of the founders.
• Someone who believes in the problem you are solving, not just in the job.

How do you attract candidates without a big-company budget?

A startup rarely offers the highest salary on the market, but it can offer things large organisations find harder to provide.

• A clear mission, with a visible impact on the product and the customers.
• Autonomy, early responsibility and accelerated learning.
• A share in the equity, for example BSPCE granted with progressive vesting.
• Flexibility: remote work, control over working hours, work-life balance.
• A founding team that is transparent about the financial situation and the risks.

Write an honest job ad: the problem, the stage reached, the mission, the salary range and what makes the role unique. Then publish it on the channels where your candidates look, including EasyCofounder’s startup jobs section.

How do you run the hiring process?

A short, structured process keeps you from losing good candidates and reduces hires made on a mere impression.

1. 1Write the job description: mission, results expected at six months, essential and desirable skills.
2. 2Share the ad through your network, on specialised platforms and with schools.
3. 3Hold a short first conversation to check motivation and expectations.
4. 4Offer a time-limited work sample close to the real job.
5. 5Arrange a meeting with the other co-founder to compare views.
6. 6Take references from former managers or colleagues, with the candidate’s agreement.
7. 7Make a clear written offer and prepare for the person’s arrival.

What are your obligations when you hire?

Becoming an employer comes with formalities whose exact list depends on your situation and on the applicable collective agreement, which is why it pays to get help from an accountant or a payroll specialist. In France, they include:

• ✓The pre-hiring declaration (DPAE) to the Urssaf, the body that collects social security contributions, before the person starts.
• ✓A written employment contract, mandatory in particular for a fixed-term or part-time contract and strongly recommended for a permanent one.
• ✓Enrolment in a company supplementary health insurance scheme (mutuelle).
• ✓Membership of an occupational health service and medical follow-up for the employee.
• ✓Setting up payroll, the staff register and social security declarations.

Also look into any hiring or apprenticeship incentives, whose conditions change regularly, with the official bodies.