Hiring Process

Hiring is the most consequential thing we do. A great hire multiplies the team. A wrong hire is expensive and painful for everyone - including the person we hired. We'd rather take longer to fill a role than fill it with the wrong person.

What we're looking for

We don't have a single profile. Each role is different. But across every hire, we're looking for a few things:

Ownership over tasks. We want people who care about outcomes, not just outputs. Someone who closes a ticket without asking whether it actually solves the customer's problem is less valuable to us than someone who ships slower but follows through.

Genuine curiosity. Our industry (server-side tracking, privacy-first data, mobile attribution) moves fast. People who are intellectually curious and enjoy learning new things do better here than people who rely on what they've done before.

Comfort with ambiguity. We're an early-stage company. Job descriptions are approximate. Priorities shift. We need people who can function well without perfect information and are comfortable making calls under uncertainty.

Direct communication. We're remote and async-heavy. People who communicate clearly in writing, give honest feedback, and say what they mean are far easier to work with than people who communicate vaguely or avoid conflict.

And of course a fit to our PEARL Framework

The process

1. Intro call (30 min)

One of the founders or the hiring manager. The goal is to understand why you're interested in Hardal and the role, and give you honest context about what the job is actually like. This isn't a filter - it's a conversation.

2. Take-home task

We give a short task relevant to the role. We design it to be done in 2–4 hours, not a weekend project. We pay for tasks that require significant time. We use the task to understand how you think and communicate, not just whether you got the answer right.

3. Deep-dive interview (60 min)

We go through the task together, ask about past work in detail, and explore how you approach problems. We're not trying to catch you out. We're trying to understand how you work.

4. Team interview (30 min)

A conversation with someone you'd work closely with. They're looking at culture fit - will you work well together, communicate well, and share enough of our values to build something good with us.

5. Reference checks

We speak to people who've worked with you directly, not just the references you provide. We ask specific questions about how you operate.

6. Offer

If we're aligned, we move quickly. We try to give a clear, transparent offer - including equity details and what the numbers actually mean.

How we make the decision

We use a simple rule: only hire if you're genuinely excited about the person. "They're fine" or "they'll probably work out" is not a good enough bar. Every person we hire changes the culture of the team.

After the final interview, the hiring manager writes a brief summary and we discuss. We're explicit about what we're uncertain about. If the uncertainty is significant, we address it before moving forward.

What makes us reject candidates

• Vague, generic answers that don't reflect real experience
• Inability to take or give direct feedback
• Expecting to be told what to do
• Misalignment on what privacy means (we've met people who think privacy is a sales angle, not a principle)
• No genuine curiosity about the space

A note on diversity

We want a team that reflects the diversity of our customers. A homogeneous team has blind spots. We're aware of this and actively work to expand our hiring pipeline - especially for technical roles.

If you think our process has unnecessary barriers, tell us.