---
title: "Hire your first engineers"
description: "A four-step playbook for a non-technical founder to define, interview for and onboard the first engineering hires without relying on gut feel."
url: https://lidvizion.ai/guides/hire-your-first-engineers/
site: Lid Vizion
index: https://lidvizion.ai/llms.txt
---

[Field guides](https://lidvizion.ai/guides/) 4 steps

# Hire your first engineers

A four-step playbook for a non-technical founder to define, interview for and onboard the first engineering hires without relying on gut feel.

For: Founders and CEOs hiring their first one to three engineers, often without a technical co-founder.

The first engineers shape the codebase, the culture and the speed of everything after them, and they are hard to assess if you are not technical yourself. These four steps define the roles from the work ahead, run a structured and fair process, bring in technical judgement where it matters, and set the new team up to deliver.

## Step 1 — Define the work, then the role

**Goal:** Hire for the next twelve months of work, not a generic title.

1. List what must be built, run and maintained over the next year.
2. Decide which work needs an in-house engineer and which can stay with a vendor or tool.
3. Write the must-have skills for the first hire and what can wait for later hires.
4. Agree the level, budget range and who the engineer reports to.

**You finish with:** A short role brief based on the actual work ahead.

## Step 2 — Build a structured process

**Goal:** Assess every candidate on the same evidence.

1. Write a scorecard with the must-have skills and how each will be checked.
2. Use the same questions and a short, realistic work exercise for every candidate.
3. Keep the exercise brief and relevant, and be clear about how long it takes.
4. Decide who interviews for what, so no area is assessed twice or missed.

**You finish with:** A scorecard, question set and exercise used for every candidate.

## Step 3 — Bring in technical judgement

**Goal:** Get a reliable view of technical skill you cannot assess yourself.

1. Ask an experienced engineer or technical advisor to run or review the technical stages.
2. Have them review the exercise and talk through the candidate’s decisions.
3. Check references with questions tied to the scorecard.
4. Make the final decision as a group, against the scorecard, not on impressions.

**You finish with:** A documented decision for each finalist.

## Step 4 — Onboard for early delivery

**Goal:** Help the first hires deliver and own the system.

1. Prepare access to code, cloud accounts and tools before day one.
2. Set a first small project that ships something real within the first weeks.
3. Agree how work is planned, reviewed and released.
4. Review progress together at thirty and ninety days.

**You finish with:** An onboarding plan with a first shipped project and review points.

## Common pitfalls

- Hiring for a title instead of the work ahead.
- Unstructured interviews that change from candidate to candidate.
- Long unpaid exercises that put strong candidates off.
- No technical reviewer when the founder cannot assess the code.

Want a hand getting started?

## Fractional CTO

Senior technical ownership for companies that need direction and execution without immediately adding a full-time CTO.

[See how it works](https://lidvizion.ai/services/fractional-cto/) [Talk this playbook through](https://lidvizion.ai/contact/?need=fractional-cto&from=%2Fguides%2Fhire-your-first-engineers%2F#write)

## See it as a workflow

- [Hiring the first engineering team](https://lidvizion.ai/use-cases/hiring-the-first-engineering-team/): Leadership Define the roles, interview process and first-quarter plan for a company’s first in-house engineers, so hires start productive and the founder stops being the only technical judge.

## More guides like this

- [Prepare for technical due diligence](https://lidvizion.ai/guides/prepare-for-technical-due-diligence/)
- [Present a technology roadmap to the board](https://lidvizion.ai/guides/present-a-technology-roadmap-to-the-board/)

## Related answers

- [How is a fractional CTO engagement usually priced?](https://lidvizion.ai/answers/how-is-a-fractional-cto-engagement-priced/)
- [What is the difference between a fractional CTO and a technology consultant?](https://lidvizion.ai/answers/fractional-cto-vs-technology-consultant/)

Bring the messy version

## One workflow. A better way to run it.

Show us the tools, the handoffs, and the part that keeps slowing your team down.

[Let’s map your workflow](https://lidvizion.ai/contact/) · [Read our approach](https://lidvizion.ai/approach/)