Olof Mathé, founder and CEO of Mixmax, outlines key metrics and milestones for when early-stage SaaS companies should transition from generalist hires to specialized executives.
0:00 / 0:14exact quote · 14.3s
720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“If you're a SaaS company and a decent economics and you're north of a million dollar ARR, that's probably one way of looking at it. If you have more than eight direct reports, it's probably, you know, attempt to make the move from a generalist hire to a more specialized hire.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading:
filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard
(the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Olof Mathé
Insight
Mathé: A new executive must exponentially improve their function within 90 days
“Another core litmus test is have they made the function exponentially better within 90 days? And if you have any hesitation about that question at 90 days, it's probably not the right person.”
Olof MathéJan 25, 2019▶ 20:4020VC: The 3 Stages of Denial For Founders When Scaling, Why You Will Likely Be Unable To Hire Through Your Network & The Interview Question All Founders Must Ask with Olof Mathé, Founder & CEO @ Mixmax
Opinion
Mathé: Silicon Valley operates on a rigid company-building and funding monoculture
“And what strikes me here is while we have this adoration of entrepreneurship, the way we're supposed to build companies is like a monoculture. There's traditionally like one way to build a company, one way to fund your company, One way to do things X, Y, and Z…”
Olof MathéJan 25, 2019▶ 25:4120VC: The 3 Stages of Denial For Founders When Scaling, Why You Will Likely Be Unable To Hire Through Your Network & The Interview Question All Founders Must Ask with Olof Mathé, Founder & CEO @ Mixmax
Insight
Mathé: Vast startup literature covers PMF, but neglects scaling leadership
“There's all, they're like libraries written about product market fit and very little written about scaling and in particular building out a senior team.”
Olof MathéJan 25, 2019▶ 5:0920VC: The 3 Stages of Denial For Founders When Scaling, Why You Will Likely Be Unable To Hire Through Your Network & The Interview Question All Founders Must Ask with Olof Mathé, Founder & CEO @ Mixmax
Insight
Mathé: Founders face three stages of denial in executive hiring
“If I look at my own 20 18, I think as a founder, I definitely went through kind of three stages of denial in terms of hiring senior folks on the team. And so the first thing I think you say as a founder is, you know, Hey, I don't think we need this role right …”
Olof MathéJan 25, 2019▶ 5:1920VC: The 3 Stages of Denial For Founders When Scaling, Why You Will Likely Be Unable To Hire Through Your Network & The Interview Question All Founders Must Ask with Olof Mathé, Founder & CEO @ Mixmax
Insight
Mathé: Executive hiring is already overdue once you hit product-market fit
“Once you have product market fit, which is an entirely different topic, probably worth its own episode, assuming you do, the answer is it's probably too late already, and you should have hired them yesterday.”
Olof MathéJan 25, 2019▶ 6:1920VC: The 3 Stages of Denial For Founders When Scaling, Why You Will Likely Be Unable To Hire Through Your Network & The Interview Question All Founders Must Ask with Olof Mathé, Founder & CEO @ Mixmax
Insight
Mathé: The true cost of delaying executive hires is founder opportunity cost
“What senior leaders on the team do for you as a founder is that they free up your time. And so the real cost to you is opportunity cost.”
Olof MathéJan 25, 2019▶ 7:3820VC: The 3 Stages of Denial For Founders When Scaling, Why You Will Likely Be Unable To Hire Through Your Network & The Interview Question All Founders Must Ask with Olof Mathé, Founder & CEO @ Mixmax
Made with StarZero
Turn any episode into a week of clips.
This entire site, over 1,200 episodes transcribed, diarized, checked and made playable,
runs on the StarZero media pipeline. Drop in your own episode and the podcast clipper finds the
moments worth sharing, cuts them, captions them, and reframes them for every feed.
We use essential cookies to make the site work. With your permission we
also use analytics cookies (Google Analytics and Mixpanel) to understand
usage and improve StarZero. See our Cookie Policy.