Elaine Wherry's guest appearances

Elaine Wherry

Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders

YUI Theater

National Center for Women & Information Technology

Village Global's Venture Stories

Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Video Series

Julia Hartz

Michelle Zatlyn

Clara Shih

Heidi Roizen

Reid Hoffman

Eric Ries

Annie Kadavy

Rashmi Sinha

Akshay Kothari

Steve Blank

Marc Andreessen

Mark Pincus

Kevin Hartz

Balaji Srinivasan

Anne Wojcicki

OwlTail

Elaine Wherry (@elainewherry) joins Erik on this episode to give us the playbook for recruiting for your startup. Elaine was co-founder of Meebo and is now investing at Edelweiss VC (https://www.edelweiss.vc) alongside co-founder Lee Jacobs (https://www.leejacobs.co).Elaine explains her superpower — being able to build quantitative systems around qualitative characteristics. She talks about how to evaluate candidates with your team and the way she uses TaskRabbit workers to calibrate her team’s assessment of a candidate. Elaine discusses why work simulations are so important in hiring and breaks down how you create a good simulation. She explains why she asks behavioral questions exclusively in interviews. She tells founders that it's okay (and ideal) if they are spending more than half of their time recruiting. Elaine points out that an employee’s experience on the first day is the best predictor of the length of their tenure.She talks about the “recruiter honeypot” that she set up — a fake profile on LinkedIn of a Javascript programmer. She looked at how recruiters approached it in order to potentially hire those recruiters to her company.She also addresses some of the biggest misconceptions about recruiting and talks through how to deal with some of the thorniest aspects of managing people, including annual reviews, compensation, and having difficult conversations.Quotes From This Episode“The test of a work simulation is that any smart, well-intentioned person should fail that simulation.”“[When interviewing someone] within the first five minutes, you have a tendency to have a reaction. It’s easy to fall into first impressions, but it’s your job to challenge that first response.”“If people just want to get their review to find out whether they got their raise or their bonus, that isn’t going to be a great conversation, so my goal is to de-couple that.”“People always seem to care more about where they stand in the organization than they do about where they stand outside the organization.”Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. Colin Campbell is our audio engineer and the show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Elaine Wherry (@elainewherry) joins Erik on this episode to give us the playbook for recruiting for your startup. Elaine was co-founder of Meebo and is now investing at Edelweiss VC (<a href="https://www.edelweiss.vc" rel="noopener nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.edelweiss.vc</a>) alongside co-founder Lee Jacobs (<a href="https://www.leejacobs.co" rel="noopener nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.leejacobs.co</a>). Elaine explains her superpower — being able to build quantitative systems around qualitative characteristics. She talks about how to evaluate candidates with your team and the way she uses TaskRabbit workers to calibrate her team’s assessment of a candidate. Elaine discusses why work simulations are so important in hiring and breaks down how you create a good simulation. She explains why she asks behavioral questions exclusively in interviews. She tells founders that it's okay (and ideal) if they are spending more than half of their time recruiting. Elaine points out that an employee’s experience on the first day is the best predictor of the length of their tenure. She talks about the “recruiter honeypot” that she set up — a fake profile on LinkedIn of a Javascript programmer. She looked at how recruiters approached it in order to potentially hire those recruiters to her company. She also addresses some of the biggest misconceptions about recruiting and talks through how to deal with some of the thorniest aspects of managing people, including annual reviews, compensation, and having difficult conversations. Quotes From This Episode “The test of a work simulation is that any smart, well-intentioned person should fail that simulation.” “[When interviewing someone] within the first five minutes, you have a tendency to have a reaction. It’s easy to fall into first impressions, but it’s your job to challenge that first response.” “If people just want to get their review to find out whether they got their raise or their bonus, that isn’t going to be a great conversation, so my goal is to de-couple that.” “People always seem to care more about where they stand in the organization than they do about where they stand outside the organization.” Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at <a href="http://villageglobal.vc" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">villageglobal.vc</a> or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. Colin Campbell is our audio engineer and the show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

A Playbook For Recruiting and Hiring with Elaine Wherry

Roles expand and shift at a breakneck pace in a high-growth startup, says Meebo co-founder Elaine Wherry. Interns find themselves in charge of massive, mission-critical projects. Engineers are suddenly tasked with hiring and managing multiple teams. Wherry shares her insights on how to thrive in a rapidly expanding technology venture, drawing on the heady years between developing Meebo’s initial instant messaging platform in 2005 and landing the company at Google seven years later.

Elaine Wherry (Meebo) - Climbing the Ladder

Roles expand and shift at a breakneck pace in a high-growth startup, says Meebo co-founder Elaine Wherry. Interns find themselves in charge of massive, mission-critical projects. Engineers are suddenly tasked with hiring and managing multiple teams. Wherry shares her insights on how to thrive in a rapidly expanding technology venture, drawing on the heady years between developing Meebo’s initial instant messaging platform in 2005 and landing the company at Google seven years later. 

Roles expand and shift at a breakneck pace in a high-growth startup, says Meebo co-founder Elaine Wherry. Interns find themselves in charge of massive, mission-critical projects. Engineers are suddenly tasked with hiring and managing multiple teams. Wherry shares her insights on how to thrive in a rapidly expanding technology venture, drawing on the heady years between developing Meebo’s initial instant messaging platform in 2005 and landing the company at Google seven years later.

Interview with Elaine Wherry