1. How to Contract/Hire for Your
Startup - the Fast Way
Aleksander Vitkin
Facebook.com/Aleksander.Vitkin
Aleksander.Vitkin@gmail.com

2. Introduction
• Who am I?
– Freelancer Marketer and Recruiter since 2009
– Top 5% recruiter on odesk.com
– 28 years old, traveled to 23 countries while working
online
• How did I develop my recruitment process?
• Why recruitment?
– Key to long term business success
– Make or break for any business
– High leverage
– Digital office space

3. Table of Contents
• My Hiring Philosophy
• Where to Get Your Ideal Contractors
• My Fast Recruitment Process
• The Contractor Mindsets
• How to Track Work
• Tasks not Roles
• Success stories: Video
Editors, Sales, Developers

4. Table of Contents
• Who to Recruit and When
• Questions During the Interview
• How to Retain Employees/Contractors
• List of Resources to Learn More

5. My Hiring Philosophy
• “Hire people who don’t need management” – Eben
Pagan
• Past achievements and degrees are barely relevant.
• Everyone is replaceable
• Survival of the fittest
• Huge pool of people to choose from
• “The average cost of a miss hire is over $2M” – Brad
Smart (Author of Top Grading)
• Hire people who would do this alone, without getting
paid…

6. Where to Get Your Ideal Contractors
• The best place to hire:
– Referrals by people who know their stuff
– Interns who have proven themselves
– Outsource websites
• Odesk.com
• Freelancer.com
• Guru.com
• Elance.com

7. My Fast Recruitment Process
Method 1, Quick and Efficient:
- You are the buyer here… CHOICE!
- 100-1000+ hours on odesk
- 4.5 star reviews
- Portfolio full of similar work
- Work-at-home (not agency) preferred
- Family preferred
Step 1. Quick interview:
– Time commitment
– Qualified? (Sales experience? Specific Dev. Questions?)
– Quickly Discuss terms

8. My Fast Recruitment Process
Step 2. Tiny “24 hour” project:
– Does he deliver or make excuses?
– Attention to detail?
– Able to navigate the environment?
– IMPORTANT: Check their work CAREFULLY even
though you present it casually…
 Best candidate out of 4-5 people.

9. My Fast Recruitment Process
Step 3. Choose the best candidate and start him
off on a 1 week project.
Step 4. Hire, repeat process or take the second
best candidate for 1 week trial.

10. My Fast Recruitment Process
Method 2
This is the most effective method I use.
Find people in a community related to your field…
Developer forum/facebook group for example…
1. Hire interns for simple tasks (reply to simple
customer questions, reminder calls, …)
• Students aren’t the best interns
• “24 hour project”
• “1 week project”

11. My Fast Recruitment Process
2. After 1 month, keep the average interns doing
these tasks, promote above average interns to
more complex tasks based on their skills (you’ll
get to know them during their internship).

12. My Fast Recruitment Process
3. After 3 months, if you have about 20 interns
overall, about 3-4 of them will be suitable for
hire.
Hire them as needed based on their skills
based on what you’ve seen them do
successfully for you.
Start paying them for the role they’re doing in
their second level internship…

13. The Contractor Mindsets
• Pusher: You give someone a project, they do
everything in their power to complete it, even
if you don’t reply.
• Responsibility: They own the project and use
their brain to complete it, not just follow
instructions.
• Vision: They love what the company stands
for, the big vision/mission you’re trying to
reach…

14. The Contractor Mindsets
• NOT:
– “I just need a job”
– “My previous employer was an ***hole” (Usually an
underlying issue)
– “I’m doing it for money”
– “What are the benefits”
• YES:
– “Ok, let’s get started”
– “I just love what you’re doing and want to be a part of
it, I’ll do what it takes”
 Employees/contractors can be entrepreneurs as well.

15. How to Track Work
• Odesk.com tracking software or similar…
• Online Google docs, excel sheets
• Weekly/daily calls

16. Tasks not Roles
• When you start out, you’re not hiring “the vice
president for research and development”
• You have a list of tasks you do as the founder
and you want to decrease your work load…
• Find someone who can take over some simple
tasks and help you be more organized and
focused on company growth.

17. Success stories
• Success stories: Video Editors, Sales, IT
• How I hired video editors
• How I hired costumer support/sales agents
• How I hired IT guys
• How I hired designers

18. Who to Recruit and When
• A mistake a lot of startups make is hire marketers
and try to outsource your marketing strategy…
• Your first hire: highly organized, primarily
customer support to decrease the email
mountain
• Developers: don’t hire a dev directly if you don’t
know what you’re doing unless for a SIMPLE
project
• Sales before marketing

19. Questions During the Interview
• Be creative, it depends on the position
• Make sales applicants sweat…
• Ask someone with IT background to ask tech
questions…
• “What do you like about business?”
• “Are you married, do you support a family?”
• “Do you have a stable fast internet
connection?”

20. How to Retain Employees/Contractors
• Just like with customers, it’s much easier to
keep a good employee than find a new one.
• Little celebrations/achievements
• Gamification: “Gamification is the use of game
thinking and game mechanics in non-game
contexts to engage users in solving problems.”
• Celebrate small weekly wins together

21. List of Resources to Learn More
• YouTube: Eben Pagan, “How to Hire People”
• Topgrading – Brad Smart
• Tribal Leadership – Dave Logan
• www.mindvalley.com

23. Thank you for your attention!
Feel free to ask questions…
Contact info:
Facebook.com/Aleksander.Vitkin
Aleksander.Vitkin@Gmail.com
linkedin.com/in/aleksandervitkin