A long time ago, I was a solo entrepreneur. Worked out of my bedroom for 3 years. Extremely profitable, with a product that had become very popular in its segment. And one fine day, I was invited by an engineering college to speak about software and my experience being an entrepreneur while in college. All went well until they requested me to take a few students as interns at Tenmiles. I almost agreed and then realized that I don’t even have an office space. Honestly, that lead to me getting an office space, thinking of the next product and getting the first two full-time employees. I started with hiring.

Fortunately and quickly enough, I could find really interesting people in my network. Met two academically brilliant engineering graduates who studied with me at high-school. Location: Coffee shop. They had just finished their engineering while I was already 3 years in business. They loved my vision but couldn’t risk working for me in comparison to the offers they already had. I did my best but couldn’t win them.

I went on to next set of people, in LinkedIn terminology – they were my 2nd degree of contacts. Next interview location: high-end chinese restaurant. Web developer with reasonable experience writing web apps. Went well, he was ready to join Tenmiles. Of course, he asked me where was the office located. He couldn’t believe Tenmiles was a one-man show. I reassured him that the office would be up and running before his notice period ends.

Now, I was really desperate to hire one more person. Wanted someone who was good with SQL, designing database and write the core application. I was lucky. Found a guy over the same weekend. Interviewed him in a coffee shop. Told him about the other guy who was coming on-board. After 2-hour long discussion and couple of rounds of coffee, I got a ‘will get back to you’ response. My chances seemed 50-50. But I was sure, that I need an office space immediately. The hunt began.

Two days later, this guy actually got back to me. And he got back to me with a positive response. By then I had already found a great place close to my house. Ordered dell machines, setup interiors and even threw an inaugural party. My 3 year old company was reset into the startup mode.