Our Truths of Hiring

Last week, in a meeting with some of our investors, I was delighted when they mentioned how they liked the way we identify and foster junior talent at Origin. I'd love to say that approach was based on a deliberate and thought out plan, but back in 2015, when we were a young company setting out with limited resources, young talent was our only option! 

Turns out, that approach has been tremendously successful. It allowed us to identify potential in junior talent and then gave us the time to scale them into business leaders within our company. Seeing people develop and reach their potential is one of the most rewarding parts of my job. Not only has it brought me great personal satisfaction – it’s been great for Origin, too. 

Trust the team 

Having both started our careers on trading desks, Raja and I have a similar approach to how we want to identify, hire and nurture junior talent.

A core part of this involves giving juniors a lot of responsibility early, just as we were given as young traders. In our experience, juniors tend to relish the challenge when they are asked to step up and take ownership of tasks which they wouldn't normally be given so soon in their careers. 

Of course, things might be uncomfortable for both them and us during that steep growth phase – but it’s not long before you take stock as a team, look back, and see how far you've come. That’s hugely satisfying for me and, I hope, for the people we’ve hired.  

Learning from our team

Many senior members of the team today started here as graduates or juniors, and we’re so proud of how they've grown. Each brings their own unique set of qualities to the Origin mix, so extracting generalities about why we hired them in the first place is a difficult task. 

But following the chat I had with our investors last week, I spent some time thinking if there were wider themes that we’ve picked up over the years from the hires we’ve made. Here are some of the learnings that we’ve found over the years: 

1. A culture of excellence

There's a concept called the “10x developer”, whereby the right hire has a 10x impact versus a regular developer. We've been fortunate to work with some of these unicorns over the years, and they have, undoubtedly, been our secret weapons in the competitive market where we operate. Having studied Computer Science at Imperial College, I'm a little biased, but the close ties we’ve forged with the Department of Computer has allowed us to make many fantastic junior hires from there. These individuals, thanks in no small part to the grounding they received from that institution, have brought us nothing but excellence. 

2. Cultural fit = technical ability

When it comes to hiring, we've learned the hard way that outstanding technical ability on its own is never enough. The caricature of the technical wunderkid, with terrible communication skills and low EQ, does not have a place at Origin. That’s because we weigh cultural fit equally to technical ability. If we get this part of hiring right, the day-to-day business runs more smoothly and everyone is happier. I like the analogy of Origin being a highly performing sports team, the better the players can work together, the better the performance.

3. High bandwidth interactions

A founder friend once told me that you need to hire "individuals with whom you can have high bandwidth interactions". I love that. The Origin team is, effectively, a network, constantly sending and receiving data during the day (and sometimes night!) via calls, Slack, email and in-person. The speed the information travels throughout the organisation has a huge impact on our ability to execute. But it’s the quality of the information, of those interactions, which truly takes us to the next level. 

4. Empowering the people

This is one of our core values and we need people who thrive when taking on big challenges. As mentioned, we bestow a lot of responsibility (sometimes too much) from the get-go to stretch newcomers. It isn’t quite “you sink or swim” – but it’s something like “you and I are going to work out how to make you swim in the deep end very quickly!” 

5. "Did they impress you?"

This is my central truth when it comes to hiring. It’s a simple question I ask all of our team after they’ve conducted an interview with a new hire in our debriefs. Obviously, the candidate has to first pass all of our interview stages with flying colours, but it's this question which I've found over the years to be the best indicator of whether someone is going to be an Origin superstar. Often the conversation goes something like this: 

Me: "Did she impress you?"

Engineer: "I liked her and she was good. I think we should hire her."

Me: "Ok… but… did she impress you?"

Engineer: "Well, she was better than the other candidates we've interviewed over the last few months. She’s the best we've seen in a while."

Me: "Yes… but… did she impress you?"

Engineer: "Well, she's  junior, so that's not a fair comparison as I'm a senior!"

And why does being ‘impressed’ matter so much? Because being impressed is the gut feeling you get when someone displays a raw pursuit of excellence. You can impress me as a graduate with little technical knowledge – it's got nothing to do with your seniority. And I’m pleased to say, throughout my years building this great company with Raja, I’ve been lucky enough to have that gut feeling a good few times. I believe it’s one of the main reasons we’re still here and enjoying the growth and success that we are today, 

Simple truths 

Last week on the blog, we talked about how we try to ensure that our Documentation onboarding process remains as simple as possible. Our hiring process is similar. 

It relies heavily on some simple truths whereby we trust our instincts to hire brilliant people and empower them to create a team that shares high bandwidth interactions and builds a strong culture. Sounds simple – it’s not, it’s hard – but it is worth it.