Proof of Work Hiring

Money, often considered a taboo topic, plays a critical role in shaping our world. As Bitcoiners, we know that understanding money and ultimately having the best money, directly impacts our ability to create positive outcomes in the world.

When teaching someone about Bitcoin, we have two fundamental challenges. The first is educating them about fiat money and how it steals wealth through inflation. The second is the importance of having a fixed supply of monetary units for our money. Only then can we finally introduce bitcoin as the greatest store of wealth the world has ever known.

In this article, we delve into the concept of proof-of-work(PoW) and its application in the hiring process. I’ll show how proof-of-work(PoW) reigns supreme over proof-of-stake(PoS) and any other consensus algorithm. Just as PoW ensures the integrity of transactions, implementing a PoW framework in hiring can lead to more successful and reliable outcomes.

I’m also optimistic that if we can connect with anyone, on any topic, on the power of proof-of-work, perhaps we can start the orange-pilling from a more neutral topic than money.

The Foundation: Byzantine Generals’ Problem and the Blockchain Trilemma 

To understand the concept of PoW in hiring, it’s essential to first understand the challenges inherent in decentralized decision-making. The Byzantine Generals Problem serves as a metaphor for achieving consensus in distributed systems, highlighting the complexities of reaching agreement in a situation where there are conflicting priorities and objectives.

Similarly, the blockchain trilemma highlights the tradeoffs between decentralization, scalability, and security. This framework can be applied to hiring decisions, where striking a balance between these three elements is critical for successful outcomes. 

The Hiring Trilemma

In order to increase one of the trilemma elements you are forced to reduce the effectiveness on one or both of the other elements.

I am going to attempt to map this trilemma to the concept of hiring decision making.

Decentralization. Decentralized hiring ensures there is no single decision maker. All data points are considered before making a decision. It is important to ensure that no single person can control or censor the hiring decision.

Scalability. Scalability is focused on speed and throughput and aims to minimize waste and friction. It is important to establish repeatable and thorough processes early to ensure that your hiring can scale while maintaining the same speed and output.

Security. In blockchain, the more nodes, the more secure the network. These nodes must be running the same software or have the same understanding of their objective. Therefore, the more interviewers or specific and limited the decision points, the more trust we can have in the outcome. 

Just as in blockchain systems, PoW hiring involves balancing decentralization, scalability, and security. Decentralized hiring ensures a diverse range of data points are considered, scalability focuses on efficiency and throughput, security emphasizes trust and reliability in the hiring process.

Now that you are familiar or refreshed on these concepts, let’s move into the differences between proof-of-work and proof-of-stake hiring.

The Hiring Problem

A ledger is a recording keeping system. Each company has a talent ledger and each company is decentralized from other companies.

Hiring has a distribution of knowledge challenge. How can we trust the information that a candidate submits to a company is true and accurate? What is the best way to verify the aptitude, alignment, and attitude of a candidate and determine who to hire?

How can we be confident in the information reaching us from all of our hiring data sources? 

Proof-of-Work Hiring: A Paradigm Shift

In a proof-of-work(PoW) hiring model, the focus is on validating the skills, aptitude, attitude, and alignment of candidates through diligent effort and verification. This mirrors the rigorous process of validating transactions in the PoW-based Bitcoin system. Proof-of-work hiring requires that the process uses energy and attention to verify the skills and aptitude of the candidate.

Conversely, proof-of-stake(PoS) hiring relies on credentials, company names, tenure, and candidate storytelling as indicators of a candidate’s suitability. 

Proof-of-stake selects validators in proportion to their quantity of holdings. The larger the organizations' talent reputation and reach, the bigger validator they become. This explains why hiring decision makers put such a large weighting of their hiring decisions on people who come from specific organizations or industries. Someone’s tenure and company employment tell you very little about their personal contribution to the success of the organization and if they will do well in your company.

To fully grasp PoW as a hiring concept, it’s crucial to analyze it at the individual hiring decision(or a single transaction), rather than aggregating  across multiple companies’ hiring practices. While we’ll focus on the individual hire level, by the end, you’ll see how creating the best outcomes on an individual hire enables the best long-term outcomes for all hiring decisions into the future.

Contrasting Through Examples

By now, you may be wondering what hiring techniques are more proof-of-work focused and which ones are proof-of-stake focused. Here are some ways you can determine how your selection process measures up.

Proof-of-work interviewing allows for verification of skills through diligent work effort on both the company and the candidate. Proof-of-work interviewing takes more time up front, as it requires expanding energy before reaching a decision. You must thoughtfully craft a hiring plan and structured process to verify, not trust, your hiring decision.

Proof-of-stake hiring will feel faster at first, and on an individual hiring decision you may get lucky on a few hiring decisions. Over time, you will slowly erode the concentration of talent in your company and your top performers will move on to better opportunities. Your initial moonshot company may follow the path of all the other shitcoins and slowly lose market share to greater proof-of-work hiring organizations.

The beauty of PoW hiring is that once the decision is made(and transaction verified) you can minimize nearly all future time impacts of managing that person's work output. You can give them objectives and deliverables and provide autonomy for them to deliver. Because you verified first, you can continue to verify and build trust as they deliver against the stated performance objectives.

If you rely on PoS hiring, you may find yourself managing and dealing with your non-verified, high trust issues(low performers) later.

When it comes to the success of your project or company are you willing to proof-of-stake your hiring decisions?

While PoW hiring may require more time and effort upfront, it ultimately leads to more reliable and sustainable outcomes. By verifying a candidate's skills, aptitude, attitude, and alignment organizations can minimize the risk of hiring mismatches and ensure long-term success.

Don’t Trust, Verify.

If we can extend PoW concepts and link it to better outcomes over PoS, can it work for other topics? Maybe this is the way to influence the thinking of the world. Meet people where they are at and discuss topics they are passionate about and knowledgeable on. 

And once you have their attention on the importance of proof-of-work, invite them to think about………proof-of-work money.

Fix the money, fix the world.