HubSpot is well known for its expertise in inbound marketing. Its founders, Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah, quite literally wrote the book: Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs. (Highly recommended!)
Tech innovation from a successful software firm is not surprising. What is both novel and exciting is to find nuanced human insight and empathy from such a firm. That’s exactly what HubSpot offers with its Prison Break campaign.
Smashing stereotypes
Do you believe the following?
Young entrepreneurs are the people who belong at startups.
Middle-aged, big company employees have nothing to offer a hot startup.
Lots of people might agree, but HubSpot doesn’t. They are actively recruiting experienced software engineers from big companies—and paying a bonus for every year of experience. Instead of painting all seasoned employees from big firms with the same tired, indiscriminate brush (over-the-hill, underproductive, entitled…), HubSpot recognizes that:
- experience counts
- good people work at big firms
- the best are frustrated by bureaucracy and could thrive in a different setting
In a recent Boston Globe article, HubSpot explained their reasons for targeting this new (older) cohort to Scott Kirsner: “The challenge we face in recruiting,’’ said Shah, “is finding people with a lot of flight hours, who have deployed big systems. And that tends to be people who’ve spent five, 10, or 15 years at bigger companies.’’
While hotshot young developers might offer remarkable talent, they simply haven’t gone the distance or been part of something big. And HubSpot is planning to be something big.
Growing the pie
The talent war for young software developers can be a zero-sum game, often with a revolving door. By focusing on companies with a larger (1,000+) workforce, Shah maintains “we can bring new blood into the start-up community, without having to fight other start-ups for the best people.”
As for that revolving door? They needn’t worry. For the second year in a row, Boston Business Journal named HubSpot the Best Place to Work. The Boston Globe ranked it 4th among best small companies to work for in its most recent ranking.
Inclusive and empathic
HubSpot has crafted a remarkable pitch to seasoned developers based on an empathic understanding of the people they want to attract. It speaks of “you” as “one of us.”
..I’d like to think that experience makes us better developers. Just because the company or environment you are or in sort of sucks doesn’t mean you do. You might still be awesome. If so, I want to pull you into startups.
So often, the tone at hot shops, while colloquial and friendly, contains more than a hint of snark and ego. The underlying message is: Aren’t we Cool and Wonderful? Let Us decide if you’re Worthy.
Instead, HubSpot offers things likely to be extremely appealing to the people they wish to attract. Enticements include:
- You get to release early and often
- You can still pay the mortgage or rent
- You get to work with other exceptional developers
- You get a bonus for “time served” at a big company
They get it
HubSpot not only gets software and inbound marketing. They get people, too. That’s a wickedly powerful combination. Stay tuned: I predict great things from them.
