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Ask HN: As a startup do you employ good people over passionate ones?

10 points by keosariel ↗ HN
I and my team have been working on a platform for weeks now and we need to employ more developers. It's confusing to employ either the good ones or the ones who are really interested in what we are doing i.e they would still work even if they aren't on payroll

10 comments

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staz
"good" can mean a lot of things. did you mean more competent?

> the ones who are really interested in what we are doing i.e they would still work even if they aren't on payroll

do you mean the one that aren't competent enough to get interesting job that are paid?

keosariel
Currently I have several developers on ground and we can’t afford to pay every one of them. Though I have not employed them yet, But they’re all good, though some are better that the others, but right now I love to have co-workers who really love and are interested in what we do, not just building the stuff, buh also contributing to not only the code buh the idea behind the whole project and also wants to see that it succeeds
romanhn
I would hire the latter 100%, even if their technical skills are somewhat behind. They are the ones most likely to fill in any gaps they have and then some. The obvious exception is those that are all about passion, but do not add meaningful value of their own.
beforeolives
What do you mean by good? Are you talking about personality and character, or maybe technically good, or something else?

Anyway, here's what you shouldn't do:

- reduce people down to 2 dimensions that are hard to quantify

- assume that those dimensions are mutually exclusive and you somehow have to pick only one of them

- hire people, expect them to do extra work for free and call this passion

keosariel
“Good” meaning a developer with great skills

Thanks

runawaybottle
Part of being a professional is you do the best job possible regardless of whatever factor. Just hire a professional.
tubularhells
Don't ever employ enthusiast developers. They will leave with the next change of wind.

Hire the quiet ones that just want to do a good job.

dave_sid
I suppose I wouldn’t employ someone to wire my house just because they were passionate about it. I’d want to know that they will do it right.
ayushinigam1999
As a startup, I think it's important to employ passionate people because passionate ones could be turned into good ones but not the other way around.