Expert workshop session delivered at IECT Summer School for Entrepreneurs on August 23, 2023, by Fiona Nielsen. Fiona is a serial entrepreneur with lots of experience in hiring, leading and laying off people as part of her startup journey. In this presentation Fiona shares practical down to earth tips and examples on how to build a great team at your startup. Topics include breakdowns of how to: - Get great people on board - Always improve your leadership - Invest in good culture from the start For example "1. Get great people on board" Attract the right people to apply/express interest Describe the role you are looking for and be specific about making the title reflect the job, e.g. “co-founder” or “marketing intern” Always include the mission and vision of the company. Don’t fluff it. Consider why anyone would work for you - beyond being paid a salary. Great candidates have a choice of where to work, they will choose a place where they find meaning, feel motivated and challenged, and feel welcome.

1. Things I never knew
I never knew
about building great teams
Fiona Nielsen - August 2023

2. The recipe is simple
Great teams = Great people
Great leadership
Great work culture

3. Let’s break down
the essentials
1. Get great people on board
2. Always improve your leadership
3. Invest in good culture from the start
These are all a summary of good advice,
but how do you actually DO it?
Is there a recipe?

4. 1. Get great people on board
● Know what you are looking for
● Attract the right people to apply/express interest
● Interview skills to identify the candidate is right
These principles apply for every recruitment from interns to
consultants to board advisors!

5. 1. Get great people on board
● Know what you are looking for
This requires self-reflection and ability to
imagine the future. Both as a founder and as a
company.
What am I/are we good at? What will we need to
be good at to succeed? What kind of skills or
experience would be able to succeed at this?
What kind of personal skills would be needed?

6. 1. Get great people on board
● Know what you are looking for
Helpful tools may be:
● to draw a table of required
skills/experience and which are covered
by the current team
● to sketch the future org chart for the
company

7. 1. Get great people on board
● Attract the right people to apply/express interest
Describe the role you are looking for and be specific about making the title
reflect the job, e.g. “co-founder” or “marketing intern”
Always include the mission and vision of the company. Don’t fluff it.
Consider why anyone would work for you - beyond being paid a salary.
Great candidates have a choice of where to work, they will choose a place
where they find meaning, feel motivated and challenged, and feel welcome.

8. 1. Get great people on board
● Attract the right people to apply/express interest
Describe the role you are looking for and be specific about making the title
reflect the job, e.g. “co-founder” or “marketing intern”
Always include the mission and vision of the company. Don’t fluff it.
Consider why anyone would work for you - beyond being paid a salary.
Great candidates have a choice of where to work, they will choose a place
where they find meaning, feel motivated and challenged, and feel welcome.

9. 1. Get great people on board
● Attract the right people to apply/express interest
Helpful tools may be:
● Websites targeting startup enthusiasts, e.g. workinstartups.com
● Comparing job descriptions from other companies
● ChatGPT/LLMs to help you draft your job spec (always sense-check)
● Once you scale up your recruitment activities, consider using a software tool to
manage your recruitment pipeline (and next scale up after that is to hire HR)

10. 1. Get great people on board
● Attract the right people to apply/express interest
Helpful tools may be:
● Websites targeting startup enthusiasts, e.g. workinstartups.com
● Comparing job descriptions from other companies
● ChatGPT/LLMs to help you draft your job spec (always sense-check)
● Once you scale up your recruitment activities, consider using a software tool to
manage your recruitment pipeline (and next scale up after that is to hire HR)
Top tip
Recruitment agency George James
do NED/advisor searches for free!
Top tip
Use your network to advertise
both online and offline!

11. 1. Get great people on board
● Interview skills to identify the candidate is right
You may have heard the advice: “Hire A players!”
I do not believe in A players… An “A player” from a big corporate
may be anything than an A player in your startup.
Great outcome is a combination of
● The right skills for the job
● The right direction and support at the right time, i.e. good
leadership skills
● The right work culture

12. However

13. 1. Get great people on board
● Interview skills to identify the candidate is right
You can learn great interviewing skills from digging into materials and books on how
to “hire A players”. I can recommend the book Topgrading for anyone interested.
TLDR; Here are my key takeaways:
● Define the skills and behaviour you are looking for and ask for past experience.
E.g. “Tell me about a time where you kept a cool head under stress”
● Never ask for “what would you do if?”
● Always take references, ask them about how the candidate did
● Scale the length and depth of your interview process with the seniority of the role

14. 1. Get great people on board
● Interview skills to identify the candidate is right
Make sure you filter for candidate-startup-fit!
Time for a scary startup story!

15. 1. Get great people on board
● Interview skills to identify the candidate is right
Make sure you filter for candidate-startup-fit!
Time for a scary startup story!
Morale of the story:
Always make sure your candidates understand both
the benefits and risks of working in a startup

16. So you got some good people…
now what?

17. 2. Always improve your leadership
● Set a direction and align incentives
● Prioritise and delegate
● Ask for feedback
This is not a do it once and it is done. This is an ongoing process.
Part of what makes running a company difficult - and fun!

18. 2. Always improve your leadership
● Set a direction and align incentives
How do you get everyone to row in the same direction if they do not
know which direction to go?
Spend time defining and communicating the direction. Make regular
routine of reviewing your long term and short term goals with the team.

19. 2. Always improve your leadership
● Set a direction and align incentives
Make sure your incentive structures are aligned with your business goals
Use an Employee Share Option Scheme (ESOP) to give your team and
advisors a vested interest in the company success.
Always implement vesting schemes for options as well as
for the shareholding of the co-founders
Use cash commission/bonuses for sales people!

20. 2. Always improve your leadership
● Prioritise and delegate
Prioritise: Does your team know what is
top priority to the business?
Delegate: Who does what? Who takes
decisions? Who makes decision on what?
A tool that might help your thinking and
team discussion is a RACI matrix

21. 2. Always improve your leadership
● Ask for feedback
You know you are not perfect.
If you pretend to be perfect or know it all, you risk losing credibility and trust.
● Ask for feedback - make it a habit
● Listen - and check your understanding
● Own your mistakes. Own the performance of the company. Own your learning.
● Share the wins!

22. 3. Invest in good culture from the start
● Invest in your culture
● Give everyone a voice
● Develop leaders
Sometimes you have to let fires burn and leave improvements for later.
Never delay dealing with discontent, disruptive behaviour or indifference

23. 3. Invest in good culture from the start
● Invest in your culture
● Give everyone a voice
● Develop leaders
Sometimes you have to let fires burn and leave improvements for later.
Never delay dealing with discontent, disruptive behaviour or indifference

24. 3. Invest in good culture from the start
● Invest in your culture
● Give everyone a voice
● Develop leaders
Sometimes you have to let fires burn and leave improvements for later.
Never delay dealing with discontent, disruptive behaviour or indifference!

25. 3. Invest in good culture from the start
● Invest in your culture
● No, not ping pong tables…
With your co-founders ask each other what you imagine your company would be like
to work for. Write down concepts you agree on, and hold each other accountable on
occasions where you do not live up to your own aspirations.
Every company is different to work for. Your work culture will depend A LOT on the
founders and the first ~10 hires in your company.
PS. I am in favour of ping pong tables when you can afford it…

26. 3. Invest in good culture from the start
● Give everyone a voice
Great ideas can come from
everywhere, and they do - if you let
them!
Consider having regular AMAs with
your team. How you answer questions
will set the tone and culture for your
company.

27. 3. Invest in good culture from the start
● Develop leaders
Always think long term:
- Not only fix your mistakes,
aim to incorporate the learnings in your culture
- If the CEO is taking the decision today, how can that decision be
delegated next time?
- Who steers the ship when you need a break?
- Give your team the opportunity to grow their responsibilities

28. In summary

29. 1. Get great people on board
● Know what you are looking for
● Attract the right people to apply/express interest
● Interview skills to identify the candidate is right
These principles apply for every recruitment from interns to
consultants to board advisors!

30. 2. Always improve your leadership
● Set a direction and align incentives
● Prioritise and delegate
● Ask for feedback
This is not a do it once and it is done. This is an ongoing process.
Part of what makes running a company difficult - and fun!

31. 3. Invest in good culture from the start
● Invest in your culture
● Give everyone a voice
● Develop leaders
Sometimes you have to let fires burn and leave improvements for later.
Never delay dealing with discontent, disruptive behaviour or indifference

32. Last tip: About business advisers
Everybody has advice
Only you can filter what is relevant and right for your business
Fiona Nielsen
serial entrepreneur in biotech, genomics and data
https://www.linkedin.com/in/fionanielsen/

33. Bonus
slides
See my other presentation of things I never knew I never knew, to learn about
- equity calculations
- co-founder agreements
- sharing equity between founders
- equity for advisers and board