We’ve been working at this startup thing for several months now and with every day we learn more. Sometimes we get surprised when things turn out just as we expected. But more often than not we realize what really works for us after much trial and error. This is definitely the case when it comes to finding additional folks to join our crew. Fortunately, in this particular case, our realizations came to us as we already have a handful of folks helping us out who fit the bill we describe below. These are fundamentally great people with a super positive outlook who are already contracting with us on some exciting projects.

• Realization #1 — We need developers most of all. So far we’re doing ok finding design help as we need it.
• Realization #2 — For now, we’re looking for per project help only. We’re just not ready to sign people up for full-time gigs just yet. Though we have plenty of contract work available. We’d love to have a rolodex filled with great people who want to come help us build some fun online consumer experiences.
• Realization #3 — As much as deep technical skills are critical for us, the most successful working relationships we’ve had over the past few months have been with folks who are incredibly professional, disciplined, focused, and leave their egos at the door. Attitude comes first.
• Realization #4 — The work we’re doing generally falls into the same profile in terms of what we’re building. On the front end its HTML, CSS, AJAX, Flash, and Silverlight. On the back end it’s either Linux+Apache+Rails+MySQL or the Microsoft stack including ASP.NET and SQL Server. And typically we like to work with folks who can span the front and back ends. Folks with expertise in one or another are ok as long as they understand how to interact with the other side. And for front end folks, we need production code quality only. No prototype code.

You can stay working out of your home office or cool studio or neighborhood café. Though you’re more than welcome to come by and hang out working from JFM HQ whenever the mood strikes you.

We prefer folks based in Seattle so we can have at least a few face to face meetings. But once we get comfortable, folks can work anywhere on the planet where there’s internet.

We are happy to work with agencies and contract shops, but ultimately we don’t need much of the infrastructure that these groups provide. We work directly with developers and do our own project management, etc.

We pay competitively, we’re good to work with, and we have a bunch of fun efforts underway on which we are striving to do our absolute best.

As for full-time work, we hope and expect to be in a position down the road where some of our best contract folks are interested in full-time gigs and we’re in a position to offer them.

That’s it for now. We’d definitely love anyone who is interested in working on one of our projects to get in touch.