Do You Know When to Make Your First Hire?

Based on Jason Calacanis's startup checklist.

The core question

When can you justify paying someone to do jobs you're currently doing as co-founders?

Before you hire, work through these three questions:

How much would it cost to have someone else do this? Is the cost justifiable given your runway?
Will the quality stay consistent without my constant input? If the work requires you to be deeply involved regardless, hiring doesn't free you up.
What else could I be working on with this time? The real value of a hire is what it unlocks for you — not just the task it covers.

Open questions worth thinking through

These don't have universal answers, but founders should have a view before hiring:

Is there a benchmark level of revenue you should hit before making your first employee hire?
What percentage of spend is typically set aside for salaries at your stage?
What amount of burn is smart to take on for employee salaries given your runway?
Should founders make their first hire before or after raising funding?

The underlying principle

Hiring too early is a common mistake. Early hires are expensive, hard to manage well, and add coordination overhead at a stage when speed matters most. The bar should be: I cannot do what I need to do without this person, and the cost is clearly justified by what it frees up.

See Which Positions to Hire First for guidance on sequencing once you've decided to hire.