Hiring playbooks for product companies.
What we have learned across two decades of placements — distilled into long-form guides on founder hiring, executive search, India team builds, AI, Web3, and the salary market.
Cornerstone reads
Hiring your first 20 engineers: a founder's playbook for India in 2026
Why the first 20 hires define your company forever — and a 30-60-90 day plan to get them right.
Setting up an engineering team in India: a playbook for global product companies
Stage 1 to Stage 4 of India team builds. The two biggest mistakes. How to think about HQ-India working models.
All posts
Hiring AI engineers in India: what "good" looks like in 2026
Real signals of AI capability beyond resume keywords. The MLOps gap. What AI engineers actually expect on compensation.
When does an Indian startup actually need a CTO?
The CTO definition problem, four stage-by-stage archetypes, and how to evaluate one when you're not technical.
Hiring for a Web3 startup in India: a practical guide
Where the talent actually is. Smart-contract vs full-stack-with-crypto. Token grants, vesting, and how Indian engineers think about them.
India tech salary benchmarks for product companies (2026)
Frontend, Backend, Full-stack, DevOps, Data, AI, Product. By city, by stage, by seniority. Plus equity bands and GCC pressure.