Interviewed

In March 2015, Chris Bucky and his co-founders—including Daniel, who had worked together for nearly a decade starting at 42 Floors—entered a hackathon while still employed full-time. They built an internal tool they'd created at 42 Floors for streamlining non-technical hiring interviews. The judges, including Sian Bannister and Jason Calacanis, were impressed and offered $150-200k in prize money, with plans to invest up to $300k more. The founders had 24 hours to decide: quit their jobs or stay put. The CEO of 42 Floors, himself a YC founder, pushed them to go for it and even offered to help them get into YC. By Monday, they had incorporated, opened a bank account, and were off to the races.

The founding thesis was simple: while companies like HackerRank were revolutionizing technical hiring, non-technical positions (customer support, sales, operations) had zero structure. Interviewers were untrained, questions were inconsistent, and candidates had terrible experiences. Interviewed aimed to bring structure, consistency, and a better UX to that process. The prototype came together in 48 hours during a hackathon, demonstrating that execution speed and focus could trump lengthy development cycles.

Their first customer was Taskus, a Los Angeles-based outsourced support company. Chris leveraged an existing relationship: "I was the CEO of this company. We spent a lot of money on you guys. Could you repay the favor?" Taskus agreed and became a paying customer on day one—though they were paying far less than the product would eventually command. Chris and his team used the "three Ls" framework: Lettuce (cash), Learning, and Logo. They prioritized getting two out of three from each early customer. With Taskus, they didn't get much money, but they got a logo and permission to do a case study. They then leveraged that case study into deals with other startups: DoorDash, Lyft, Canva, and Thumbtack. Crucially, four of their first seven customers—including Jonathan Swanson from Thumbtack and the founders of Taskus—became investors, giving them social proof and network access to go after other hiring-focused companies.

The pricing model proved brilliant: they charged based on volume of candidates screened, not per seat. This aligned incentives perfectly—as customer companies grew and hired more, Interviewed's revenue grew with them. A company screening 100 candidates per day in March 2015 might be screening 1,000 per day two years later, driving a 10x increase in contract value with zero additional effort. This was a "rising tide lifts all boats" dynamic. The team prioritized betting on emerging startups that would scale rapidly rather than chasing established, slower-growing companies. Early customer selection proved as important as product quality. The three Ls framework kept the team motivated by ensuring every customer interaction produced a concrete win (money, learning, or social proof), rather than aimless selling. Remote work required intentional celebration of wins; without co-location, small victories could disappear into the daily grind.

By 2017-2018, Interviewed had grown to $2.5M in ARR and become profitable within 2.5 years. Indeed, one of their earliest investors (and later a customer), ultimately acquired them for approximately $50 million—a multiple many thought conservative. Chris attributes the outcome less to hypergrowth and more to steady 10-20% month-over-month growth, compounded over time, combined with minimal churn. The acquisition was almost inevitable in retrospect: Indeed had been watching the company for over two years, became a customer, and eventually acquired them. That long-term relationship and strategic fit drove the valuation far beyond what the revenue multiple might suggest. The lesson: build products for well-funded markets (HR tech), pick customers who will scale with you, and be willing to take structural bets on emerging companies.