Recruiting in Silicon Valley

For the last few months our USA operations at Fon have been managed by me personally in a role akin to that of a CEO and by Ejovi Nuwere in a role akin to a COO (we just call ourselves lead foneros so I am translating titles). But yesterday I interviewed four candidates to replace myself in the role of US CEO. To team up with Ejovi. It is getting very hard for me to come to America so frequently and now that USA is our first country in number of foneros, we need to focus a great deal on making this country a huge success. I have built 7 companies over 20 years, some in the States (NYC), most in Europe. Until recently however, I had never interviewed in the West Coast of the United States. My impression? I am just amazed at the level of the candidates here. No wonder that the West Coast rules the world on the internet. As an entrepreneur I felt like a kid in a candy shop. What makes this part of the world unique is that it just attracts the best people, period, but this is partly because it educates them (Stanford being a great source of educated talent). Mostly it is because the best people in the technology world immigrate here. It´s not that there aren´t amazing people in other countries. Is that the occasional top candidate in other countries is like the average top candidate here. Now please don´t send me the “DAH” comments. You knew about this, I did not. Now I do.