Airtasker CEO: Hire internally when scaling

Tim Fung is a serial entrepreneur who founded the Australian company Airtasker in 2012 and is the CEO. The platform allows people to post small tasks online, enabling them to use their skills to find work in the flexible labour economy, across jobs from mowing lawns and moving furniture to taking photographs at a wedding.

Airtasker has a global community following of 4.7 million members across Australia, New Zealand, the UK and the US, and has generated more than £700m in job opportunities as it continues to scale.

The secret that Fung wants to share is that leaders should focus on hiring internal candidates when scaling, rather than bringing in new, external talent.

“When you're scaling your business, I think it's really important to create opportunities for people to expand their responsibility so that you can put people into positions where they know the internal context of the business, “ says Fung, “rather than just hiring people based on their CV.”

Internal candidates can be a safer bet, he argues, because you know the person’s track record very well already, though you may need to develop their skills to suit the new role.

The impact of artificial intelligence (AI) has made this approach more compelling, Fung argues, because the overall headcount of the company is less important. “I think in the age of AI and autonomy, people are looking more at how you can make your business more efficient, not just how you can grow headcount,” says Fung. As AI automates some tasks, it can free up some staff for development and promotion.