Anmol Chetan

One thing I ve been learning while building my startup is that finding skilled talent and convincing them to join an unproven mission are two very different things.

In the early stages, competing with big tech compensation packages is impossible, but building a solid core team requires more than just offering equity.

I ve started focusing on attracting early collaborators through other means:

• Sharing our long-term vision, core values, and transparent company culture upfront.

• Offering extreme workplace autonomy and complete ownership over key modules.

• Identifying ambitious talent looking for rapid career growth rather than established corporate comfort.

• Involving early candidates in product discussions to see how we problem-solve together.

• Building relationships with open-source contributors who already care about our niche.

When someone says a product feels confusing, that feedback is useful but hard to act on without more context. I think asking them to walk through what they were trying to do could reveal more than asking which feature they want.

For those who talk to users regularly, what follow-up question helps you get from this is confusing to something you can actually improve?