How to get great programmers for your startup

While working in Dane Maxwell's roundtable group, one of the topics that has come up is getting great talent, and knowing ahead of time rather than taking so many chances.

Dane Maxwell says to give them a task that should take a couple days, so you can get to know how they work before making a larger commitment.

Here's an example of how I am vetting talent for a health care startup. This particular idea is not the primary one for the startup, but it can be useful. Given that, I'm not worried about sharing it here. This is the content of the email I am using:

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Hi Joe,

I've decided to try something fun and different to filter candidates
for the startup. I'll give you a programming task that is somewhat
involved. Upon acceptance, you let me know how long it took, we pay
you for it (let me know your standard rate), then we talk some more.

Here's the challenge:

Use public government data (I will provide links below), create a web
page which allows the visitor to enter a zip code.
1. On a google map, show the nursing homes for that zip code, using
the google API to add points on the map.
2. When a user clicks on one, show the following data in the google
info bubble.
a. Name, address, phone
b. The government 5 star rating value (from a dataset I'll
provide a link to)
c. A link that says "X Complaint Deficiencies". When the link is
clicked, show a table below the map with any deficiencies for that
facility and if/when that deficiency has been resolved.

Constraints:
1. Use Ruby on Rails for the front end, or create a Java based REST
service to make an ajax call in an html only page.
2. Import the data into a MySQL or Postgre database.
3. Keep it simple.

Here are links to the datasets needed for the challenge:

1. Nursing Home Complaint Deficiencies:
http://data.medicare.gov/dataset/Nursing-Home-Compare-Complaint-Deficiency/nsyy-ktee
2. Nursing Home Compare Provider Ratings:
http://data.medicare.gov/dataset/Nursing-Home-Compare-Provider-Ratings/mufm-vy8d
3. Nursing Home General Information:
http://data.medicare.gov/dataset/Nursing-Home-Compare-General-Information/dg6a-rxvx

Fields needed:

1. All data sets use a provider ID, so key on that for all the data.
2. In the Provider Ratings table, there are star ratings for Overall,
Health Inspections, Nurse Staffing, Quality Measures, and RN Only. Go
ahead and show all these above the deficiency table with other general
info.
3. For the deficiency data, use the Deficiency Category, the
Deficiency, Scope, and Level of Harm in the table

Not all facilities will have deficiencies.

If you need any guidance, just let me know. This will test how well
we can work together, as well as your proficiency level in some of the
programming areas we are looking for.

Thanks,

Chris Pritchard

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Getting the developer excited about doing this task can involve different methods. The startup I am getting talent for has funding, so it's ok to spend some of that to make sure our people can handle the type of work we need to get done. Other startup ideas might simply use the idea itself and an offer of equity. I'm a great developer, so I have too many equity offers to count. Given that, your mileage may vary with those types of offers.

I'll add a post later that goes into the details of locating leads :)

Good Luck!

How Dane Maxwell Will Make Me (and you) Millions

Today, the Dane Maxwell Software Business Round-table started. It's a diverse group of about 30 people who will work at a current, or new software based business startup over the next six months. The goal is to have a site with ten paying customers by the end of that time. Using the concepts of the Lean Startup movement, we're going to contact people in our selected market and gather ideas from them, "three or four layers deep, where the gold is."

It started off with an email with a payment link to cover our end of the deal. Let me tell you, I have simply been waiting impatiently for this link since Dane started talking about it. From what I could tell from other members, there's a general consensus that it was the easiest $500 (per month) we have ever spent.

After that, we were invited to a private chat area where the fireworks started right away. These folks wasted no time. I've never been a big fan of chat rooms, but this one was full of synergistic buzz. Everyone was brainstorming ideas and offering assistance and resources. Dane has done well to setup a supportive group of people that are vested in each other's success.

It's just a fact, but the first month will whittle away the folks that don't perform. It's our job to get our market, solicit ideas and needs from potential customers and find that gold nugget idea lying deep in the details. It's kinda like pivoting a few times before you even get started. However, the bar will be high and we gotta perform to stay in the game.

So, our job for today:

1. Know, and report our personality types (via https://www.enneagraminstitute.com). I am a 7/8 and proud of that :). It will help us work together as a team and let Dane know how to best work with us.
2. We attended the first of our daily Q&A sessions with Dane in our chat room. It was also the first time I've seen 25 or so people try to add stuff to a google doc at one time, so that was worth the price of admission alone.
3. We're reading chapter three of Breakthough Advertising by Eugene M. Schwartz. Dane says this book will make a few of us millionaires, so I'm reading it.
4. We're posting our daily progress for all to see (even if we didn't have any). To keep track of our progress we answer these questions: 1. How many hours did you work. 2. What did you accomplish? 3. What problems did you encounter? 4. What questions do you have of me (Dane)?
5. Dane urged us all to at least practice talking to some people in various markets, even if we have not selected one.

As it turned out, I found someone in my market for timegears.com right in the chat room. He's got a business that is very similar to our first paying customer. So, it was a great opportunity to practice my value proposition and get my mouth used to saying what we do in a very concise way. Thanks Luke!

By the way, the responses for my four Q's today:

1. 4 hours. 2. Personality test, chat/Q&A, talked with a lead from this very chat group. Read chapter 3 in Breakthrough Marketing, blogged about the roundtable kickoff at startupjerky.com. 3. It's hard to say goodbye to even more sleep, but it will be missed. 4. (insert obligatory wood chuck question here)

Well, I've still got work to do, so I'm done here. I'll have more soon.

The Kung Fu of Dane Maxwell

As a fan of Mixergy, I am no stranger to Dane Maxwell. Just search his name there, and you will see a few awesome examples of his entrepreneur Kung Fu.

Although I have always liked his work, his last interview was ... well, here's what I wrote to Andrew, the founder of Mixergy:

Dane Maxwell's interview correlated one to one with what I have felt

our company has needed to do while developing software. He is very

inspiring, and his process is very repeatable.

This guy knows what he is doing. In his interview, he threw out a teaser of a "roundtable" for building a software product from scratch . . . the right way . . . like he's done a few times already. Here's what he said:

Maybe, just, I’m thinking about starting a software roundtable, to help people actually create a software product even if they don’t have any ideas or anything. So if you go to DaneMaxwell.com you can check out the application to see if you would like to learn how to build software with a group of like ten other people, all building software from scratch.

This was no accident. This really piqued my interest . . . just like he intended. He made the idea sound so fragile that it might just blow away in the wind. It caused me, and about 90 others, to circle around that idea and contact Dane right away, so that the "maybe" part was never an option. Which, in hindsight, I don't think it ever was. Ka-pow, Dane Maxwell pulls no punches.

The part I like, and what prompted me to finally start blogging, was that Dane had not produced anything yet. It was a Lean Startup in my face, aimed right at me. I had to get on board with this guy, no matter the cost. Ka-pow . . . that one snuck up on me.

I know he has not even built the system he's going to use to get his software business roundtable group from point A to B, but, that is the Kung Fu of Dane Maxwell. Yes, he'll be getting my money, and yes, Ka-pow, it's now a cage match!!

I don't know Dane yet (so, I really hope he likes my MS Paint skills), but he's already shown me a lot of things that will empower me to do what needs to be done. Take a look at this interview, and you will see what I mean. He uses his Kung Fu only for good.

See you in the ring.

Johnny Five & Mixergy

There's an old movie called Short Circuit. In it, there's a robot called Johnny Five. He can blaze through books and any other data in no time and still need more. I have always had a thirst for input also. So much so, that at times, I would have no time to "do" anything with it.

There were lots of blogs, articles and such to keep me occupied. Lots of wasted time "learning vital stuff" to do business.

Enter Mixergy. It's the stuff that do'ers thrive on. It's a great mix of motivation and knowledge from many different entrepreneurs who have done something worth talking about. It's easy to relate to them, rather than self help, empty motivation, and esoteric how-to's that can easily flood even the "Johnny Five" brain.

Since I began listening to Mixergy, I have been more focused. The direct, personal, no BS format of the interviews on there constantly remind me what needs to be done.

So, now "Johnny Five is Alive!"

The Double Edge of Knowing Something

OK, so I picked a pretty good profession. I generally get to be creative and get paid at the same time. Since college, I have always worked for someone else. Later, I wanted to create something I could benefit from financially.

Having a day job and branching out from there has been OK. It has been some money on the side and a way to keep my skills sharp. Most of the time, work is good, but at times, it can feel like incarceration. That's especially true when you work in a cubicle that's about the size of a prison cell.

I would say that people who have a skill might start off on their own by looking at what they already know and going from there. It's a good idea. I must be like a lot of people who start out with something they have a passion for, and it turns more into art than a business.

I've gotten better about this, but when working on software, it's very easy to assume I know what someone might like to see, and what their needs are. Also, as the guy writing the software, there is an endless number of features that would help, and they all "should" certainly be included, or else no one would want to use it, right?

For a tech startup, it's pretty cool to be able to save all the money on software development, since I can do all that stuff. On the other hand, if I'm too busy enjoying what I do, it won't just turn into an actual business on it's own.

Hence, the double edge.