I have mentioned before that one of the scariest things I have had to do in the last three years of running scrubadoo is hire our first employee.

Our first employee, Frank, is our web developer and he has worked out better than I could have imagined.

We have now started the search for our second employee.  This person will take over a lot of the daily work that I do and hopefully free up my time to focus on sales & growth.

This go round is just as scary as the first.  Much like with Frank, I am not worried about the performance of any future employees, I am more worried about the added pressure.   The more people we bring on, the more people I am responsible for.

As an entrepreneur, and especially a solopreneur, if your company fails only you are directly effected. I am ultimately comfortable in my ability to bounce back from any failure, but it is an entirely different story when you become responsible for the livelihoods of others.

There is no real way to describe this feeling.  On the flip side, only by bringing new people into the fold can you grow a company.  Through growth you can build stability and provide more jobs.

All you can do up front is make sure the people you bring on understand the inherent risk of working for a start up.  That and work your ass off to make sure you don’t fail.