First Hire in a Startup: Cold Calls and Small Wins

Startup lessons from the trenches: cold calls, early milestones, and the first month of building Vestingnotes.

Sep 30, 2025

Reflections from my first 9 months at nestermind

I’ve now been part of nestermind for 9 months.

If you’ve been following Vestingnotes, you probably know that already. I’ve mentioned it a few times — maybe even too many 🙃.

But here’s the new milestone:

→ Vestingnotes just turned one month old 🎉

This is already my fourth newsletter in a row, and yes, I’m counting that as a win.

Because one thing you quickly learn inside a startup is this:

Small wins matter.

In early-stage startups, progress rarely comes in big, dramatic leaps. Instead, it’s built through dozens of small milestones that slowly move the company forward.

And celebrating those moments is part of the journey.

Over the past months at nestermind, we’ve celebrated things like:

Signing our first LOI (Letter of Intent)
Growing the team
Launching new product features

Each of these moments is a reminder that progress is happening — even when the road ahead is still uncertain.

Why Celebrating Small Startup Wins Matters

This mindset isn’t unique to us.

In a podcast episode hosted by Alan Frei with Besfort Biljali, they discussed something that stuck with me: the importance of celebrating every success, no matter how big or small.

Whether it’s:

Closing a small deal
Landing a big client
Publishing your first newsletter

the level of joy should be the same. That episode was both inspiring and practical.

And as a bonus, it gave me a perfect excuse to keep my Schweizerdeutsch sharp while running or commuting to the office 👌🏼

Thank You to the First Vestingnotes Readers

So before going further — thank you.

During this first month of Vestingnotes:

199 people started following on LinkedIn
Several readers subscribed on Substack

That might not sound like a huge number in internet terms. But in startup terms?

That’s 199 people who decided this journey is worth following. And that means a lot.

If you’d like to join, you can subscribe and get Vestingnotes straight into your inbox every Tuesday morning 🚀

A Cold Calling Story From My First Hire Experience

As I mentioned, cold calling was a huge part of the process.

And speaking of it - in my last newsletter, I actually forgot to share this picture as “proof.”

Funny story:

I wasn’t even on a call in that picture - it was right after a team event when I finally got a proper headset with a microphone, ready to call.

The very next day, excited to test my new gear, I called a potential client.

Here’s how it started:

“Hello XY, this is Jonathan - Jona from nestermind. […] How much time do you currently spend updating your CRM?”

His reply?

“Jonathan, do you know how I actually save time?”

I could feel a big wave coming, so I said:

“Sure! Tell me…”

His reply:

“By avoiding conversations with people like you.”

Fair enough. Probably not the German accent you want to hear on a rainy Monday morning.

Feel free to share this story with your friends and colleagues - maybe someone in your network has experienced something similar 😁

The Bigger Question Behind Vestingnotes

Finally, I’m starting to sketch out some answers to the big picture behind Vestingnotes:

“How do the right people, at the right time, in the right market, turn ideas into companies that last?”

Of course, what follows isn’t a universal truth. It’s just my perspective - shaped by what I’m living right now as a first hire inside an early-stage startup. These are observations in motion, not conclusions.

From where I stand today, I see the question splitting into different layers.

Some pieces you can address from the very beginning, others only reveal themselves over time.

People and timing are the first two dimensions you encounter.

People are where everything begins. Skills matter, yes - but they can be built along the way. What’s harder to find is the mindset: the ability to stay steady in uncertainty, to adapt when plans fall apart, to keep moving when there’s no clear road ahead. And it’s also why startup CEOs invest so much time in recruiting - because choosing the right people early on has an exponential impact.

Timing, instead, is something no one fully controls, but no one can ignore.

Sometimes the very same team and idea can fail one year and succeed the next - simply because the market or culture wasn’t ready before. Timing is always a mix of luck, awareness, and trial-and-error, and often you only recognize the “right moment” afterwards. Even when the timing feels off, it still comes down to people - the right team can adapt, adjust, and keep going until the timing finally aligns.

As for market and companies that last - those parts of the question will come later in the story.

I’d be very curious to hear your opinion 👇🏼

nestermind

Here our last update: 🚀 nestermind Product Update – August/September 2025

If you want to learn more and stay updated, you can subscribe at the bottom of the page!

Why Vestingnotes

Why bother writing all this down?

Because the messy, unexpected, human lessons usually vanish in the rush of startup life.

I don’t want to forget what it feels like right now. And maybe by writing, I can give something back - to students curious about startups, founders searching for a first hire, and investors wondering what really happens in the trenches.

Vestingnotes

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