This is the second in a series of posts resulting from the Austin Technology Council’s CEO Summit, its first in ten years.  About 100 invitees gathered in the Four Seasons hotel for a packed day concluding with a reception.  Pictured above are two Georgia Tech graduates flanking Melissa Simpler, CEO of Affinegy, which has more than 7 Million users on its home networking platform.  On the left is Kyle Cox, Managing Director of Post Oak Ventures, and on the right is Stuart Rench, co-founder of Ihiji, an ATI company also addressing the home automation market.

The topic of today’s post is the session on building and recruiting from the startup talent pool in Austin.  I believe you will find their comments to be insightful for Austin but also for Atlanta and other tech centers.

Joel Trammel, CEO of CacheIQ, moderated a panel including:

Sarah Smith, Director of Online Operations for Facebook in Austin; Mark McClain, CEO of Sailpoint Technologies, an enterprise software company representing in this case the grizzled veterans of the software industry (like myself), and John Arrow, CEO of Mutual Mobile, the largest mobile consultancy in US.

Facebook has about 140 employees in Austin and is recruiting at all levels.  85% are under 30. SailPoint, on the other hand, is 85% over 30, looks for more experience with established connections, and mainly recruits by tapping networks built over the years in a series of companies. Mutual Mobile with 150 employees in the US and India is looking for 50 more but believes it has exhausted the mobile engineer pool in Austin.  80% of its hiring is out of state.

Austin itself is a powerful attractor versus the Bay Area with its lower cost of living and very different lifestyle.  (Arrow did mention that downtown Austin apartments are getting pricey, however.)  It’s also easy to give University of Texas alums an excuse to return to the city. 

On the topic of experience, Trammel made an interesting observation: are you getting 20 years experience or 1 year 20 times over?  There’s a big difference.

Arrow says he tries to find really smart, well rounded people with a desire to learn and trains them in mobile technologies.  He noted that a month in the mobile business is like a year in most others.

Smith looks for an entrepreneurial mindset and intellectual curiosity.  Excellent written and verbal communication skills are paramount.  Facebook has an extremely high bar and tolerates “no jerks.”  She does look for people, however, who do show confidence in the first interview and are therefore likely to perform in a culture where they can’t be micromanaged.

McClain, of course, thrives on hiring experience in the enterprise world.

There was a general discussion around the notion that all companies have similar benefits (although options in some may be realized more near term than in others) and that attracting talent boils down to culture.  Really engaging with people from the first interview and maintaining that engagement throughout their employment are critical. Employees need to be continually reminded that they are respected and valued.

These companies tend to rely heavily on their interviews to make hiring decisions, and some do not even do background checks.  One mentioned that ignoring a negative reference was a mistake made and not to be repeated.

I noted one question about compensation.  Given the lack of state income tax in Texas and other low COL factors, the prevailing wages can be less than in high cost areas like the Valley or NYC.  An exception, however, is that sales compensation seems to be more geared to national norms no matter where someone is located.

The net is that Austin looks to be an importer of talent for its tech industry for some time to come.  As you have seen from this panel, the range of skills needed covers the gamut from sizzling Consumer Internet sectors to traditional enterprise to mobile and even to semiconductor and other hard sciences.