HubSpot is a hot startup in Cambridge, Massachusetts with ~160 employees as of this writing. Many, including HubSpot CEO Brian Halligan, credit much of HubSpot’s success to its effective hiring practices. So, how does hiring work?
Hiring Mantra
Hiring at HubSpot is an extremely quantitative affair. Data is collected about candidates at every stage of the game and only the absolute best scoring candidates make the final cut. Candidates are interviewed by many people at the company including several VP level employees and often the CEO.
The Rubric for Engineers
There are 6 qualities that all Engineers must have to be offered a position
- Add energy to the team
- No assholes
- Like the product (I.e. motivated by making a difference)
- Can not be silo’d into one technology or language
- Pass a short programming test
- Ask questions (i.e. Why are we making this?)
The Difference Between Good and Great
I asked Yoav Shapira, the VP of Engineering at HubSpot about the hiring rubric. He said that the difference between a good engineer and a great engineer is the tendency to ask high-level questions. “Great software developers don’t just build to spec. They will ask why are we building this? Is this the best and most efficient way to do this?”
Photography by dprevite
