Start-ups usually do not know what they want yet. They know what hurts. So do not ask for a job description. Ask five questions and write it for them. What will this person have finished in 90 days? What are the three must-haves? What would make this hire a mistake? What is the pay range, really? Who decides, and by when? Send the five answers back as the job description. Most founders approve it in one reply.
Why start-up job descriptions go wrong
A founder sends you a list. "Full-stack engineer, also comfortable with design, some marketing, can talk to customers, startup mindset, equity." That is not a job. That is a wish list for three people and a co-founder.
Source against it and you will send five people who each match a third of it. The founder rejects all five, because none of them is the person in their head. Nobody wrote down who that person is.
The five-line intake
1. What will this person have finished in 90 days? Not "own the backend." Something you could point at. "Shipped the billing integration and cut the onboarding bugs by half." Now you know the real job.
2. What are the three must-haves? Make them rank. "Has shipped a payments feature before. Comfortable on a team of four. Can start within a month." Everything else is nice to have.
3. What would make this hire a mistake? Founders answer this fast. "Someone who needs a product manager to tell them what to do." Write it down as a must-not.
4. What is the pay range, really? Start-ups say "competitive, plus equity." Ask for the cash number. Candidates will.
5. Who decides, and by when? In a start-up it is usually the founder, and the "when" is usually "yesterday." Get a real date.
Write it back as the job description
Five short sections: the 90-day result, the three must-haves, the must-nots, the pay and equity, and the process with dates. Send it to the founder: "Here is the job as I understand it. Reply yes or fix anything." A founder will correct a written draft in minutes. They will almost never write one from scratch.
Keep it current
Start-ups change their minds weekly. Before each submittal, confirm the five lines still hold. The job you sourced for on Monday can be a different job by Friday, and a submittal against last week's job description is wasted.
Where M-Tracker fits
The five-line job description is the brief. In M-Tracker, each candidate summary is checked against it before the founder sees it, and the note says in plain words which must-haves are proven and which are missing. When the founder changes the job, the brief changes, and the next check runs against the new one.
Try M-Tracker free14-day trial. No credit card. No employee surveillance.
Questions people ask
What if the founder refuses to pick three must-haves?
Ask which one they would give up first. Keep asking until three are left.
Should the job description mention equity?
Yes, with the cash number next to it. Candidates discount equity they cannot see.
How long should a start-up job description be?
One page. Five sections. If it needs more, it is two jobs.
Work you can trust, without redoing it.
Your team gets feedback before work reaches you, or your client.
Copyright © 2020 – 2026 M-Tracker. All Rights Reserved. Privacy Policy