The First 5 Hires: A Recruiting Roadmap for Seed Startups (January 2026)
Dover
January 19, 2026
•
3 mins
Your first five hires will touch every part of your startup. They'll write the code that defines your product architecture, close the deals that prove your business model, and set the tone for how your team works together. At the seed stage, each person represents 20% of your workforce. Their decisions, work habits, and interactions create patterns that persist long after you scale.
Start by mapping what you need to hit your next milestone against what your founding team can actually do. If you need to ship a working product in three months and neither founder can code, you have an obvious gap. If you've built the product but have no customers, you need someone who can sell.
Look for bottlenecks too.
Many companies hire at least one engineer among their first three hires. If you're building any kind of tech product, this should be your first hire unless you have a technical co-founder who can code full-time.
But a founding engineer is different from engineer number ten. You're not looking for someone who executes tickets and follows existing patterns. You need someone who can make architectural decisions with incomplete information, ship features in days instead of weeks, and own entire product surfaces without guidance.
The best founding engineers optimize for learning speed over code perfection.
Look for past experience at the zero-to-one stage.
Your founding engineer should be excited about finding product-market fit. If they only want to focus on technical problems and never talk to customers, they're wrong for this stage.
Sales vs. Marketing: Which Revenue Function Comes First
The answer starts with your deal size and sales cycle. If you're selling contracts worth $50,000+ that require multiple demos, negotiation, and executive sign-off, you need a salesperson first. Someone has to own the full sales cycle, build relationships, and close deals. Marketing content won't move these buyers without human interaction.
If your product costs less than $10,000 and buyers can sign up with a credit card, marketing comes first. You need inbound leads, content that drives organic traffic, and a funnel that converts visitors into trial users. A salesperson calling small-ticket buyers who expect self-service will feel out of place.
One more factor: founder skill set. If you can sell but can't write or run ads, hire marketing. If you're good at content but terrible at closing deals, hire sales. Your first go-to-market hire should fill the gap you can't cover yourself while you focus on product and fundraising.
Setting Up Your Hiring Infrastructure from Day One
Most founders wait until they're scheduling interviews to think about process. By then, you're already behind. Building basic hiring infrastructure before you need it lets you move fast when you find good candidates instead of scrambling to figure out next steps.
Start with a simple applicant tracking system. You need somewhere to collect applications, store resumes, and track where each candidate stands. Spreadsheets work until you're juggling ten active candidates across three roles. Then you lose track of who you emailed back, who's waiting on feedback, and which resume belonged to the person you actually liked.
Your interview process should be defined before you post the job. Decide upfront how many interview rounds you'll run, who needs to meet each candidate, and what you're assessing at each stage. A typical early-stage process includes a screening call, a technical or functional evaluation, and a team fit conversation. Write down the questions you'll ask. This keeps you consistent across candidates so you can actually compare them fairly.
The Role of a Free ATS in Managing Your First 5 Hires
A free ATS solves the coordination problems that waste your time during early hiring. When you're managing five candidates for your first engineering role, email threads and spreadsheets feel manageable. When you're hiring for three roles at once and each has ten candidates at different stages, you need a single place to see who's waiting on feedback, who needs to be scheduled, and who went cold.
The features that matter most are simple: visibility into where candidates stand.
When to Bring in External Recruiting Support
Common Seed Stage Hiring Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
Building Dover into Your Seed Stage Recruiting Roadmap
Frequently Asked Questions
Final Thoughts on Getting Early Hiring Right
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