If the Shoe Fits: the Importance of HR from the Start
by Miki SaxonA Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here
Are you one of the many founders who revel in a so-called startup culture that eschews structure and ignorantly confuse process with bureaucracy?
If so, you aren’t doing your company, your people, your investors or yourself any favors.
- In a 2012 post I quoted Paul Graham, co-founder of Y Combinator, regarding the need for financial controls and frugality during good times in order to survive the bad ones.
- The number of leaders, investors, academics and others who have recognized the impact culture has on success is as diverse as it is numerous — ‘culture eats strategy for lunch’ didn’t become a catchphrase by accident.
Now listen to the money.
Robert Siegel, general partner at XSeed Capital and lecturer in organizational behavior at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, makes the case for incorporating viable HR practices from the beginning.
“The single largest issue that causes the most emotional heartache in a startup is people challenges. Every organization has them. If you put best HR practices into place in the earliest days and are doing the right things right, you’ll have fewer and fewer issues and blowups.”
If you want to build a successful company you need a solid base that includes a consciously designed culture based on your values, financial controls/accountability that engender frugality and best HR practices that enhance growth, while protecting the company.
Image credit: HikingArtist
