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How and When Your Startup Should Hire a Recruiter

The average cost of hiring a new employee is about $4,129, and it takes roughly 42 days to fill an open position. High turnover rates from unwise hiring decisions can have a serious effect on mature businesses, but this onboarding cost is even more crucial for a startup. A young company doesn’t have the time or resources to make poor hiring decisions. Not to mention there are a lot of other tasks and demands that require attention at a startup.

As your startup continues to grow and expand, the hiring process is one step you should consider outsourcing to a startup recruiter.

3 Signs It’s Time to Hire a Recruiter for Your Startup

When to Hire a CEO for Your Startup

Managing a company’s growth while maintaining staffing needs is not a simple task. It’s difficult to determine when you should hire a recruiter for your startup, but recognizing the need is important. Below are three signs it’s time to hire a recruiter for your startup.

1. Spending too much time on hiring

Recruiting top talent to a business is a full-time job. If the task of hiring new employees is falling on the CEO this task may be taking up too much of their valuable time. Assess how much time you spend every month on recruiting new employees and determine if it’s impacting other important workflows.

The time spent recruiting, interviewing, and onboarding new employees is time that could be spent developing new products and creating important business connections. If too much of your time is spent on hiring and recruiting new employees, it could be time for a recruiter to step in.

2. Employees are overwhelmed

Employees often become overwhelmed at startups when hiring is not being done in a timely manner. If you don’t have dedicated hiring staff, the recruiting and hiring process can fall behind. This results in extra work from your growing business falling on the shoulders of your already busy employees. If you notice staff falling behind in their tasks, it’s time to hire a recruiter to fill your extra staffing needs.

3. Excessive turnover

Excessive turnover within your startup is another sign it’s time to invest in a recruiter. The wrong hiring decisions are costly and can impact the overall growth of your company. If you struggle to find people with the right qualifications, experience, and overall culture fit, then it’s time to hire a recruiter.

A recruiter will be able to locate the right talent for your startup so your turnover rates will improve, and your business can have a better chance at success.

How to Hire Your First Recruiter

Now that you know when you should hire a recruiter for your startup, it’s time to look at how to hire a recruiter. You need to be detail-oriented when hiring your first recruiter as the position is responsible for talent acquisition. It may take some time to find the right recruiter, but this is one hiring instance where you should dedicate plenty of time to the process.

Below are a few steps you should take when hiring your first recruiter.

Invest Properly

There are a few different options when it comes to hiring recruiters. There are contingency recruiters and retained recruiters. At first glance, contingency recruiters may seem appealing as they are usually a cheaper option.

Contingency recruiters are paid if you hire a candidate they bring to you, however, they tend to do less in-depth work because they’re looking for candidates for several different companies.

Retained recruiters, on the other hand, work as your exclusive consultants. They learn the fine details of your company so they can find the best candidates for the role and help you refine your hiring process. Hiring a recruiter is an investment either way, so make sure you’re getting the most value from the recruiters you work with.

Choose a Specialist

If you’re looking to hire executive or senior positions for your startup, then make sure you work with a specialist. Recruiters who specialize in CEOs, COOs, or VPs, for example, will be able to quickly narrow down your candidate search.

Executive recruiter specialists are already familiar with the top talent in the industry and likely already have relationships with many of the candidates you’d like to interview. This insider knowledge will help you find the best candidates to fill your needs and fit your company.

Build a Hiring Team

Sit down to determine how much you’re looking to scale the business in the next year. If you want a recruiter to help you hire 20 new employees over the next few months, then you may want to focus on building up your recruiting team first. Having a solid interview and onboarding process are two aspects of growing a business that will lead to improved employee experiences and smoother hiring transitions.

National Executive Search Firm | How We Help

Our hands-on executive recruiters have experience working with private, public, pre-IPO, and non-profit organizations. Clients are typically $50 million in revenue to Fortune 1000’s or have assets between $500 million to $15 billion. Successful placements span the entire C-Suite – CEO, Chief Operating Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and include vice president, general counsel, and other director-level leadership roles.

Check out our industry-leading resources to see why Cowen Partners is a 5-star human resources executive search firm in Seattle, New York City, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, and beyond:

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How & When Startups Should Hire Recruiters - Executive Recruiter