"No. No, you do not. The best engineers make more than your entire payroll. They have opinions on tech debt and timelines. They have remote jobs, if they want them. They don't go "oh, well, this is your third company, so I guess I'll defer to you on all product decisions". They care about comp, a trait you consider disqualifying. They can care about work-life balance, because they're not desperate enough to feel the need not to. And however successful your company has been so far, they have other options they like better."
"You're not stupid. If I asked you, point blank, "do you actually think the best engineers in the world would give your company a second thought," I bet you could say "well, no, obviously not". But you don't act like it. You lock in the same set of criteria as every other startup. Experience at early stage. Highly independent. In-office in the Bay Area. Not too "salary motivated". Don't even apply if you want a 40h/week job - we work hard and play hard. Four months later, you haven't found a good founding engineer. Do you know how long four months is in the life of a young startup? That's an eternity, and you've spent it in stasis."
Many companies claim they want only the best engineers while simultaneously setting criteria that top engineers will not accept. Top engineers command higher pay, have strong opinions on technical decisions, often prefer remote work, and can avoid standard interview processes. Startups frequently impose undifferentiated requirements—early-stage experience, Bay Area in-office presence, low salary expectations, extreme hours—that reduce candidate competitiveness. Treating hiring as a one-sided negotiation and using generic baselines leads to prolonged vacancies that cripple early-stage companies. Employers must recognize market realities and adjust compensation, flexibility, and process to attract and retain higher-quality engineering talent.
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