Lerner: Working at a successful startup doesn't prove you caused its success
Matt Lerner · Matt Lerner: How to Hire Growth Leaders and Teams and Why in a World of AI | E1159 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings · May 31, 2024 · at 38:42
Matt Lerner, founder of SYSTM and former PayPal growth leader, discusses common pitfalls founders make when evaluating candidates for early growth roles.
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“I think the biggest mistake early on in hiring is just being, you know, dazzled by the names on a CV and where you've worked in the past and what you've done. And I think I already said I have very little use for experience. And if you worked for a successful company in this space, it doesn't mean you knew how to cause that success. It just means you worked there.”
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More from Matt Lerner
Lerner: A startup's founder must serve as its first head of growth
“So I really believe very strongly that your first head of growth is your founder, and their first hires, I wouldn't start by hiring somebody senior.”
Lerner: PayPal wasted hundreds of millions on unused marketing and products
“They spent hundreds of millions of dollars on marketing campaigns, building products that, frankly, nobody ever used”
Lerner: Revenue is the wrong North Star metric for early-stage startups
“The biggest mistake with North Star, and it's a very reasonable one, is they choose their North Star as revenue, or profits.”
Lerner: PayPal's best growth hires had zero marketing or product background
“The best, I'll say categorically, the best growth people I hired and managed in my time at PayPal had no marketing experience, had no product experience at all.”