We’re approaching present day life here at Synapse International. Only a few chapters remain. Possibly the most important ones of our short existence….

Seemingly out of nowhere, we came across a Series A funded startup in Houston, Texas, a city not well known for tech innovation, but rather for it’s deep roots in Big Oil.

This was a unique company, in that it was founded by brilliant thought leaders, but being grown by proven industry experts. It gave us an opportunity to show them what we knew of the tech startup space, and we didn’t disappoint. Within the first two weeks, we placed two engineers. This was beginning to look like we struck oil, pun fully intended. If we could ride this wave and potentially pick up a few other clients in the city, we could actually make Houston a consideration for our future landing spot.  Thoughts were racing through our heads – should we fly down there and meet the team? Do we try to stamp our brand on this company as it’s preferred recruiters? We have an identity, but our struggle has been solidifying it in the minds of our clients. We needed to find a way to ensure we left our mark on these guys.

After about another month of grinding away, we closed another deal with the same company (sandwiched around one in Chicago, because hey, we can’t just ignore the rest of the country, there are hundreds of other startups that needed our help). The difference with this placement over the other two was that it was far more costly to the client, and as such, put them in a bit of a pickle. Side note: this is a pickle we’ve faced a few times already. They asked us to renegotiate our fees so that we could help them continue to grow without draining their entire recruiting budget. Seems fair considering they’re clearly serious about hiring, as seen by the three hires they’d already made. Ok, so we agreed to reduce our fee in exchange for exclusivity. Finally, the recognition we’ve been searching for! The ability to represent a company on all tech hiring fronts. This should make our lives so much easier….

Well, let’s just say that while we trudged onward trying to fill the remaining openings, it only became more taxing on us. No one seemed to be good enough anymore. There was always a problem. We were being fought at every turn. It just wasn’t working out. Maybe the exclusivity arrangement proved to be the wrong way to ensure long-term viability with a company. Maybe the side note I referenced was the real killer: the company could have reached it’s limit vis-a-vis its recruiting budget and was only going to extend it for a diamond in the rough, which we obviously failed to find them.

That’s the thing about this business. You never know what’s going on in the minds of the people on the other side of the glass. We can see them, but we can’t read their minds. We can’t sit at the table in their board meetings. We’re left in the dark until it’s too late and then we’re stuck with the wasted hours. Oh, and did I mention Houston was a wasteland for tech talent? Yea, we got lucky with these guys and the city was nothing but a blip on the radar as far as our search for geographic relevance goes.

In the 3 months between our successes in Montreal and our successes in Houston, we had heaviest workload in the brief history of the company. I even flew out to Vancouver to spend a “power week” with Ali so hat we could crush it and line up dozens of interviews. We we’re probably working on over 25 jobs for 10+ clients at once. Maybe we over-extended ourselves. Maybe we took things for granted. Whatever it was, we began to feel the pressure creep back in. We didn’t want to experience another dry summer, it would be detrimental to our overall growth and could potentially kill whatever momentum and confidence we’d spent the last 8 months building.

We’d reached a critical point in our existence. What would the next 3 months have in store for us …

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