I happen to disagree regarding the hiring. I prefer to put more emphasis on the system itself, and not the developers, who should be replaceable. (I say this as a developer myself, who prefers to be replaceable.)<p>When a developer forgets to test their code before pushing it to production, we often blame the developer. But the real problem is lack of automated testing, lack of processes, and too much responsibility for the developer.<p>With a good system in place, you hire people who have all the prerequisite knowledge (the languages, patterns, experience with similar solutions to the ones they'll do, and preferably good team spirit that matches your culture). The rest can be learned on the job. But once again, focus on your onboarding materials!<p>In short -- you should always look to be optimizing the system. THAT is your "slope" if you will. Except it's not a slope, it's an exponent! Because it builds on itself week after week. And you don't risk that one developer somewhere messing up your code.<p>We say: people live lives, companies create products.