I Couldn't Offer Employees the Major Perks That Tech Giants Can — Here's How I Hired the Best AI Engineers Anyway I couldn't match the glamour of Open AI or Google, but this strategy helped me find game-changing talent.

We had an exciting idea for an AI company. But we struggled to hire AI engineers.

The idea was this: We can use AI to help prevent chronic health conditions like diabetes. My cofounder and I developed a company called January AI, raised money from investors, and posted AI engineering jobs. But the candidates we saw were uninspired. They were more interested in the likes of OpenAI, where they could work on flashy tools with broad appeal, and not applications like health.

This problem is common among smaller businesses: Everyone competes for talent against industry behemoths, who can offer the kind of glamour and benefits that we cannot. That means we must get creative, offering things that our larger competitors cannot.