Behind the Cloud: The Untold Story of How Salesforce.com Went from Idea to Billion-Dollar Company—and Revolutionized an Industry

9.5. Play #104: Keep Your Standards High as You Grow

In our early days, we had to sell hard to win candidates, but now we've created a place that people flock to—and more than half of the people who come to us aren't the right fit. Just as it is imperative to set the talent bar high from the beginning, it's essential to keep it just as high. As a company grows, the biggest challenge is the constant pressure to lower your hiring standards.

Hiring the best requires diligence. When we hire talent directly out of college, we look for individuals who come from the top universities and make up the top 5 percent of their class. If we are hiring someone with more experience, those rules change. We look for massive accomplishment and energy. We like ...