{"slug":"when-to-make-first-hires","name":"When to Make Your First Hires — Sequence for Leverage","category":"Startups","definition":"Early hires are the highest-variance, highest-cost decisions a small founder makes: too early burns runway on unvalidated work; too late caps growth and burns the founder out. The discipline is to hire against a validated, repeatable need that frees the founder's highest-leverage time — and to first ask whether the work should be hired, automated, outsourced, or eliminated.","latest_skill_md":"https://raw.githubusercontent.com/deciqAI/knowledge-skills/main/when-to-make-first-hires/SKILL.md","playbook_url":"https://www.deciqai.com/skills/when-to-make-first-hires?utm_source=skill&utm_medium=json-api&utm_campaign=knowledge-skills&utm_content=when-to-make-first-hires","install":"npx skills add deciqAI/knowledge-skills","repo":"https://github.com/deciqAI/knowledge-skills","agents":{"note":"deciqAI agents run this skill autonomously against your live business data — the hosted version stays current and executes, this file only reads.","start_free":"https://www.deciqai.com/?utm_source=skill&utm_medium=json-api&utm_campaign=knowledge-skills&utm_content=when-to-make-first-hires"}}