On September 29, 2014, in an impromptu moment, I decided to tweet out a series about the importance of new hires.  Since then, I’ve received enough positive feedback about the series that I thought it best to take a moment and capture those thoughts in a long form post.

New Hires Matter

Every new hire brings with them multiple gifts to the team: new talent, fresh perspective, boundless energy, and validation.  The new hire, in turn, receives from the team a new mission, friends, challenge, and of course, validation.  It has all the potential of a positive feedback loop of challenge & reward, if the new hire & team approach it properly.

Every new hire is a gift, as is every new opportunity.

At Wealthfront, I’m grateful for everyone who takes the leap and joins the mission.  Silicon Valley is an incredibly competitive market for top talent in engineering, design & research.  Every person who makes the decision to invest the next stage of their career with the company is making a tremendous statement about their believe in the team, the company & the mission.

If you continue to hire world-class talent, every new hire brings new skills and lessons to the team, and the energy to prove them out.m  In turn, the best new hires come in expecting to learn and grow. They join, not just to do their best work, but to do it as a team.

As CEO, every new hire feels like both a tremendous gift, and a serious responsibility.

When I started at Wealthfront, the company had just 17 full-time employees.  It will end 2014 with just over 60.  Every new employee bets on the company, and the company bets on them.  It’s one of the most human and yet often overlooked aspects of technology careers at startup companies.