Everyone knows that great gimmicks are the key to hiring top developers for your startup.
That’s why small AI startup LemonLime—which “optimizes your existing data to work with AI”—has so many of them. Want a job interview? Score a perfect 7/7 on the company’s own “Is it a Lemon or a Lime?” game. Or—hear me out—get something permanently tattooed on your flesh.
LemonLime has tried both tactics in the past few weeks. The tattoo stunt generated the most publicity, of course, much of it negative. According to a writeup in Inc., seven people took the deal and got tattooed with the LemonLime logo during a party.
Backlash was immediate, and CEO Jordan Zietz has now copped to “poor judgement,” saying he “messed up” and got a little “carried away.”
7 days a week #
LemonLime is a small company with a grindset mentality. If you think you’re going to work there and, say, “have free weekends,” you are fooling yourself. The “entire team shows up to the office 7 days a week,” Zietz wrote in a LinkedIn post two weeks ago.
“Over a dozen applicants thus far have withdrawn after stating that they do not work past 5 pm or on weekends,” he added. “Lol.”
What you will be doing instead is pushing “critical product features to production while watching Pitch Perfect Sing-Along Edition at 1 a.m. on a Saturday.”
The company does not care about your grades; Zietz notes that his “freshman year GPA was a 2.3.” But LemonLime does require that you be a good hang. Zietz says that the company hires “people we want to be friends with,” since “changing the world is easier with friends. It should be fun.”