Your First AI Hiring Plan: A 90-Day Framework for Growing Companies
A first AI hire should remove a real delivery constraint. Growing companies can use a 90-day planning framework to clarify the work, run a focused search, and give the new employee a realistic path to contribution. Treat the timing as a planning guide, not a guaranteed hiring schedule.
Days 1–15: define the mission
Choose one priority use case and name its business owner. Document the current workflow, data sources, technical dependencies, and success criteria. Agree on what the hire will own and which existing team members will provide support.
Days 16–45: run an evidence-led search
Create a scorecard with a short list of essential capabilities. Use the same practical scenario across candidates and collect structured interview feedback. Explain the work arrangement, compensation parameters, and decision process early. Adjust the brief if the evidence shows that requirements conflict.
Days 46–90: support delivery and learning
Prepare system access, documentation, and stakeholder introductions before the start date. Set achievable onboarding milestones and review dependencies regularly. Ask the employee to establish a baseline, test the approach, and document the next capability gap. Hiring is the beginning of delivery, not the end.
Hiring checklist
Select one use case with a named sponsor.
Define first-month and first-quarter deliverables.
Align interviews to a shared scorecard.
Prepare onboarding and technical support.
For an internal assistant, the first milestone might be a tested workflow using approved information sources. A clear delivery target helps determine whether the first hire should emphasize integration, data engineering, or AI application development.
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