The funnel of doom is broken because sourcing 100 people only yields the 20 who happen to reply (caught on a bad day), so remainder hiring regresses to the mean; instead, you should identify the top 50 people in the world for a role and relentlessly activate them.
Adam Ward contrasts the 'funnel of doom' (mass outreach, weed out, hire the remainder — which regresses to the mean) with a 'pillar of excellence' approach: define great up front, map the top ~50 people, and pursue them directly. ✦ AI generated
Adam Ward · Lenny's Podcast · 2026-08-09 · original ↗
starts at this moment · 19:34
“let's start with something you call the funnel of doom hiring. Talk about the funnel of doom. What is the funnel of doom?”
Companies think about recruiting like a funnel. I'm going to reach out to 100 people. 20% of those will apply. By definition, that is not the top 20%. That is just the 20 people who you caught on a bad day... you kind of regress to the mean over time as you get to as you get to volume. And so, I we just think about this in a different way is like, what if you had confidence up front of who the top 20% was and then you use your assessment process to validate that thesis of who those are... there's this funnel doom, but there's like within a funnel doom this is a pillar of excellence. What if you started with the pillar of excellence and went from there versus having this wide funnel?
verbatim transcript · starts at 19:34
19:38this wrong or has company doing funnel of doom. So, why would we mirror or map someone else's process that we feel like like maybe wasn't perfect? Um and your company is different, your product is different. And so, you you owe it to yourself to kind of identify what does great look like for you and who's going to be successful in this role in this product versus what was successful for
19:57someone else in a process that maybe you don't have full confidence in anyway. >> So, you're saying specifically don't focus on and it's a trap to focus on the logos on the resume. >> I think so. >> Mhm. >> Yeah. There are clearly vintages of companies when you're like, "Hey, you know, this team at this company at this time did fantastic things. And possibly because that person was on that
20:20team at that company at that time, they are great." Possibly. That can be like shorthand. Um but that But, most companies jump to that almost immediately. >> Awesome. Okay. Step two is mapping out and finding basically the top 50. What are tools that help you do that? Is it like LinkedIn? Is it something else? >> I think it's a combination of things. Um but I think I where I where we typically
20:42start is a set of people who we trust in terms of having high taste in talent. And so, it But, I think the mistake though, and that's not that's an obvious point, but the mistake that most companies make is they'll say, "Hey Lenny, who's the best uh product engineer you know?" That is the worst question you can ask. The best The better question to ask is, "Hey, Lenny, of all the product
21:09engineers you worked with, who stands out to you as the person who's most collaborative with designers? Or who can translate a framework into a product better than anyone you've ever seen?" You got to have to put these very specific characteristics or skills or needs for your team, and then that's way easier for you to conjure up people that way than like this broad question of who's the best
21:35person. >> And I imagine that maps to the step one, which is where you map the skills, experience, and all that. >> you're asking are mapping back to those that cornerstone work that you did in step one. So, when you ask the right targeted questions to a set of people, you actually start to triangulate around the same names. >> Mhm. >> Like, "Ah, >> Um >> Lenny mentioned them, but so did Sally.
21:55What What Let's Let's put this person on the list on the target list." >> Okay, so So, part of the strategy here is you talk to people you trust who are awesome, whose taste you trust, ask them these questions. Uh what else helps you find these people in the world? >> So, if you think about um let's Let's pull out like the set of um characteristics. Like, "Okay, um the characteristics of
22:16someone we want is like really uh curious, uh systems thinker, whatever they might be." Maybe two or three things. Then you're like thinking about, "What companies also share that approach to how they hire?" And you could literally probably do a quick Boolean or AI string and be like, "Hey, look at all the job openings in the world among these 100 companies, which ones also say these characteristics matter?" Right?
- ·Reach out to 100 people; 20% apply.
- ·That 20% is not the top 20%.
- ·It's just the ones caught on a bad day.
- ·Mass volume regresses to the mean.