A Product Market Fit Show | Startup Podcast for Founders
00:41:09 · AJ Loiacono, Pablo Srugo
[00:41:09] S0: Sure. So now we're a little bit more sophisticated. So we ask everyone to participate in our annual survey for customer support and service. And so the typically head of HR or the head of total rewards or benefits at an organization is doing this review session and you know, filling in our rating. But one of the questions we ask is, can we use you as a reference? And that is extraordinarily important. And then we have another line and says, Would you ever be interested in doing a conference with us? So we have an annual conference for our customers or a panel or, you know, a featured broadcast of some sort. And, you know, you'll get people that are a little bit shy. You'll get people that are like, I would like to do it, but my company is just, they're so difficult. You know, we're a Fortune 500 company, it's very difficult for me to get approval to say anything about anything. But you still get people that do. And so you are being proactive to find the people that are allowed and willing to do it. [00:42:19] S1: So let's shift gears. The other thing that I thought you were doing very well was on the hiring side. You you said you had about 90% retention for employees after four years, which is incredible because there's a lot of turnover in you know, in in tech and all these kind of startups. Um, the key you said was really hiring for mission. So I'm curious on just your hiring approach, especially the first 30, 40, 50 employees, like how did you go about hiring them? What did you do that was that was different, that was unique?
00:42:47 · AJ Loiacono
[00:42:47] S0: So the first 40 or so I was certainly involved with. And if it wasn't me hiring or recruiting that person directly, it was certainly me being involved with a panel of review. Like, hey, tell me why. These hires meant a lot. So we do a meet the new hires meeting uh every Monday here in our company. And I tell this story when I meet the new hires, because I normally see a new class every Monday of 20 or 30 new people. I mean, it's crazy. And when they come in, you know, I tell them the story. Once upon a time, we used to actually take you to dinner. We used to be like, hey, like it was such a huge moment that we hired someone this month. We'd be like, all right, like Linda, we're taking you to dinner. And they'd be like, all right. But then over time that didn't scale. And then we used to call everybody. Like I used to call every you know, person individually, and be like, hey, welcome to the company. I want to introduce myself. That didn't scale well with calendars. So now we do it as a group and it's a meet and greet. They introduce themselves, they ask a question of me, and it could be anything personal, business, experience, et cetera. And you know, it's the whole goal is for me to get to know them a little bit better and for them to get to know me a better. Better. But going back to your question is the piece that we kept finding over and over of people that were just our high performers, like our A players were the people that believed in the mission. Like wholeheartedly. Like, I want to change healthcare. I want to improve healthcare. And I think this is the way to do it. That made all the difference in the world. And I do want to say something is people ask me, like, well, what do you mean by high performer? High performer in my world is I say this all the time. D players see a problem and say nothing. Hopefully, most companies don't have any of those people. C players see something and be like, hey, there's a problem. And they report it to a supervisor or manager. You know, the B players are like, hey, I saw, you know, this problem. You could do A or B to solve for this. Oh, okay. You're giving me some solutions. The A players see something and fix it. And I never knew it even was a problem. And I'm stealing that from President Barack Obama, to be fair. I think that he has said that before. A players for him do that.
00:45:04 · AJ Loiacono, Pablo Srugo
And I couldn't agree more because when you're dealing with complex workflows and a human interaction, it's healthcare. You want people, obviously, that care about the mission, but they're willing to solve, like to go beyond. Like, hey, something is always going to break or fail on the system, but I'm going to fix it. And I think those people, what they all have in common, believe in the mission. [00:45:28] S1: So, I mean, there's kind of two parts to that. I'm curious how you tested for either the A-player side, people who are going to go and just fix things, and then the mission piece. Like, the problem with interviews is they're fakeable, they're gameable, you know, and especially something like mission. Hey, you know, why do you want to work here? Oh my God, it just health is so boring, what you guys are doing. It's, you know, I'm going to transform an industry. I mean, it'd be relatively easy for somebody to fake it, at least in terms of the words they say. How did you learn to test for that in a way that was at least relatively accurate to reality? Yeah. [00:45:57] S0: So in the early days, I will be fair, is we wouldn't bring up the question or ask about it. Like, why did you know? So we're trying to set someone up that is going to mention that they believe in the mission. The second thing that we almost always listen for is someone who relates to a bad experience in healthcare. That could be personal, that could be a family member. And I felt if those two things occurred, we had a high probability of this person's but you wanted it to come out naturally.
00:45:57 · AJ Loiacono, Pablo Srugo
[00:45:57] S0: So in the early days, I will be fair, is we wouldn't bring up the question or ask about it. Like, why did you know? So we're trying to set someone up that is going to mention that they believe in the mission. The second thing that we almost always listen for is someone who relates to a bad experience in healthcare. That could be personal, that could be a family member. And I felt if those two things occurred, we had a high probability of this person's but you wanted it to come out naturally. [00:46:27] S1: You're talking normal conversation. At some point, they say something like that. [00:46:30] S0: Can't ask. Just avoid it. They have to bring it up. And if they bring it up and the other end to this logic string is, and they shared something personal. Like I have witnessed how bad healthcare is. Let me tell you why. Odds are this is personal. They want to fix it. They don't want anyone to experience what they or their family or their loved one or dependent went through. Then we have a winner, most likely. Not always, but very, very high probability. And almost every single person, you know, that I go back to that are still with us, you know, from our first year, these are the people that absolutely demonstrated these characteristics. [00:47:15] S1: What about the other half of that equation? In other words, somebody who cares, who had a personal experience, they believe in the mission, but isn't an A player. Like, how do you tell those two apart? Somebody who's going to find problems and just fix them for you.
00:47:15 · Pablo Srugo, AJ Loiacono
[00:47:15] S1: What about the other half of that equation? In other words, somebody who cares, who had a personal experience, they believe in the mission, but isn't an A player. Like, how do you tell those two apart? Somebody who's going to find problems and just fix them for you. [00:47:25] S0: So I want to say some of the a player characteristic year is going to be trial by fire. I want to be fair. You put someone in a firefight, and then someone just goes into the bunker and curls up into a fetal position. And so people are like, I'm with you. Like, how can I help you? Like, you know, there's the enemy. How do we win? And so I will be fair. I do not have a test for who is an A player in the interview process, but I will say there's a strong correlation going back to people that believe in, you know, I often say, like, if you're a brilliant person, you can you can do anything. Honestly, you've got the world is yours for the taking. So if you have someone who's super talented, but they're talking about this personal experience and an appreciation for your mission and business model, we're gonna go places. You know, and I just go back to that there's that high correlation between adoption and being a zealot on the mission and just being an A player because every day they're going in the back of their mind, how do I prevent people from experiencing this, this, this horrible healthcare experience?
00:48:40 · Pablo Srugo, AJ Loiacono
[00:48:40] S1: I mean, one of the things is when somebody believes in the mission or at least in the impact of what they're doing, they don't stop thinking about it. Right. I always I always thought about how do you, especially now that remote is is you know such a big thing, and even like the sort of work that people do is not mechanical. And yet it's it's e it's too, I don't really believe that hours don't matter, but I don't believe hours matter. And my reconciliation of it all was it's just mind share. It's not so much like how when do you sit in front of the computer, when do you get up? It's when you go home, when you're watching TV, when you're doing other things, at some point, obviously you're not thinking. But how often are you just like you're like, oh, that thing? And then you come back the next day and you've you actually improve from the day before, the weekend before, right? Because you're on it. And I mean, that just makes all the difference. [00:49:25] S0: No, I I couldn't agree more. I I think people that believe in emission and it's personally impacted them some part about it is to your point, it's ever present. They're thinking about how can I fix it? How can I do better? And I see it. I I see it, you know, not just in you know what I'll call the breakfix category, but proactive on new product development, new feature sets. You know, again, going back to how do I make a patient's life better?