Hiring - Aug 31, 2022

Hiring Web3 Developers Doesn’t Have to be as Dramatic as Game of Thrones

🚨 Warning - this blog contains spoilers from old seasons of Game of Thrones. If you are planning on watching, please be advised to skip the references.

Sometimes the world of hiring web3 developers feels a lot like Game of Thrones. Pretend you are the beloved leader, Robb of House Stark, lording over the Winterfell community that you protect and grow. And BAM- next thing you know the Red Wedding happens and you get blindsided by an evil old man and his army that kills everyone in your family right there and then. Yikes.

Save the drama for the television screen! There are some hiring practices that have changed since the shift to web3, and there are a few traps as well. Let Freeflow help connect you with web3 developers for your next project so you can avoid any George R. R. Martin-esque plot lines.

Since you are here, let me share a few of those trends in where and how to hire web3 talent as seen through the eyes of a Game of Thrones stan:

Burn the Old Recruiting Playbook

AngelList, LinkedIn, Indeed, remember those? Forget them. Hiring in web3 takes place on Discord, and many communities have channels dedicated to those seeking work or freelancers. Web3 talent in these servers are often anonymous and only identify as their digital identities. This may all sound very "Faceless Men from the Free City of Braavos”. For those who aren’t GOT fans this means mysterious, and teetering on the edge of being safe and secure or glaringly dangerous.

Well, Freeflow takes the guesswork out of this process. No more posting a job description in a random hiring channel to have your inbox flooded with messages from anonymous developers. The service will create a channel so you can share your project details and developer needs with an admin, and then they will get you connected with the best web3 talent instantly from their network. If you aren’t entirely sure of the technical scope of your project, the admins will collaborate to organize a job description with you to make sure you are covering all of your bases. And let’s not forget the most exciting part, every person in the talent network is vetted for their technical skills, their identity is validated, and their glowing reputation has been confirmed. That way you know exactly whom you are working with and that their capabilities are perfect for your team.

The Union of Web3 Developers and Clients

Picture this, you’re Daenerys Targaryen and you have your 3 dragons and your army of Unsullied to defend you, you have Tyrion Lannister and Varys to advise you, and now you actually have to work together. What could go wrong? Well if you have watched GOT you know that even the best friendships have a precarious balance in order for a happy ending. And that is similar to hiring web3 freelancers. Creating the right work agreement, organizing a payment schedule, choosing a compensation type, and compiling the requirements for the project, can be difficult to do.

This is where Freeflow can step in. Seeing as work in web3 is asynchronous and often global- setting up these agreements is essential to a great working relationship between a freelance developer and client. The service can write up an outline of the check-in cadence, exactly what needs to be completed, the currency you wish you transact with, a payment schedule, and more. Also if need be, mediation is provided by the marketplace if that extra layer of security helps when bringing on a new teammate. Since this is web3, it is not uncommon to pay your freelance developers in equity or percent of mint. But coordinating this kind of agreement with someone over Discord can be complicated and insecure! Luckily the platform can generate those kinds of agreements as well, so you can decide to pay with a percent of mint as well as an ETH amount- whatever floats your boat.

Ensuring Success for the Top Web3 Projects Future

The top web3 projects don’t usually have a defined conclusion. There are roadmaps with steps, kind of like building a minimum viable product and then fleshing it out more and more as you grow and learn about your audience. Having the next phase of your DAO be as seamlessly developed as your first one keeps your community members satisfied. Ensure you don’t progress like the seasons of Game of Thrones, starting with cinematic gold and ending with rushed leaves-a-starbucks-coffee-cup-in-a-scene content (IYKYK).

The best way to hire web3 freelancers is with Freeflow, all talent you connect with are interested in project-based work. So, if the first iteration of a project is on Solana but then you switch to it being on Ethereum, or maybe you decide to add a token or game component, you can easily scale your team up or down at any time.

Rewriting the Books

If you saw Daenerys Targaryen freeing over 8,000 enslaved people and also riding the first dragon to be seen in 150 years you would probably follow her to the ends of the earth too. Being a part of something new and revolutionary arguably doesn’t come by very often. So when it does you can’t help but latch on before it slips away. The world of web3 is like this. It changes the way we understand interactions, the internet, finance, gaming, and identity.

One of these revolutionary main principles of web3 is that it is decentralized. This means there is no single point of power, it is distributed evenly making space for trust. The freelance web3 developer is equal to the founder of the project. This kind of structure allows for all teammates to feel equal ownership and passion for the success of the project. Making the web3 talent you hire even more important.

Hopefully, this helps you navigate some of the pitfalls of hiring web3 freelancers and explain how the startup can make the task significantly easier. As we continue to move into a world of decentralization, understanding how to grow within it is increasingly important. And we are here to help that transition go as smoothly as possible!

And who knows, maybe next time someone asks you “what's the connection between Game of Thrones and hiring web3 developers” you will have a good answer for them. 😉

Citations:

Why Web3 Hiring Is Unique, Morgan Beller [https://www.nfx.com/post/why-web3-hiring-is-unique]

How To Get a Job in Web3, Kevin Dwyer [https://medium.com/ankr-network/how-to-get-a-job-in-web3-b68cfca0387d]

The Future of Work is Not Corporate — It’s DAOs and Crypto Networks, Ben Schecter [https://future.com/the-future-of-work-daos-crypto-networks/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&mkt_tok=MzgyLUpaQi03OTgAAAGCMS2FJcwz1xlqJbE5QyqpLf8V12yZQYSirELuoc46bSz693TEV3WaCh3xfE4vKhdwNF5gn3zLKbWJmD1HHV8VRNKGP8JRcwC-VbarrIAWtg]

Why Decentralization Matters, Chris Dixon [https://onezero.medium.com/why-decentralization-matters-5e3f79f7638e]

Gif Citations:

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