Why small teams
Most of our product squads are five to seven people. We hire slowly, deliberately, and we promote from within. The headcount-growth curve we run is roughly half the industry average for our stage. The trade-off is throughput; the benefit is quality and ownership.
Our location post covers the talent strategy that makes this work in Chennai specifically.
What we look for in early hires
Three traits, in order: judgment, ownership, craft. Judgment because senior individual contributors carry decisions that affect the whole product. Ownership because we run small teams and a passive hire is a drag. Craft because the customers care, even when they do not say it.
We do not screen on years of experience. The most-senior engineer on our payroll engine has fewer years in the industry than the most-junior person on our infra team. Both are excellent.
The four-step engineering loop
Phone screen. Two-hour take-home (we mean it on the cap; the rules are documented). System design. Bar raiser. Each step has a structured kit; calibration happens at the bar-raiser stage.
Hire/no-hire is not put to a vote. The bar raiser owns the call, with input from the loop. Single 'no hire' from a structured interview triggers a re-interview, not a debate.