Every day a revenue-generating role sits vacant, it costs money. Not hypothetically — measurably, directly. The sales manager who hasn't been hired can't build the pipeline. The senior developer who's been "nearly shortlisted" for four weeks isn't shipping product. The customer success lead who is "moving through the process" isn't retaining clients.
Research from OpenArc puts the cost of an unfilled position at $4,129 over 42 days on average, with revenue-generating roles in engineering and sales costing $7,000–$50,000 per month. Slow hiring is expensive. It's just that the cost is invisible until you add it up.
The Company: A 40-Person SaaS Business
A UK-based SaaS business came to us after their Head of Engineering role had been open for six weeks. They'd posted on LinkedIn, indeed, and a specialist tech job board. Their ATS had 140 applications. Their internal HR team had screened 28. Twelve had moved to first-round interviews. Four had made it to final stage. None had been offered the role.
Six weeks. Four months of management time across two rounds of interviews. Zero hires. The CTO was interviewing candidates himself, pulling him out of the product work he should have been doing.
What We Did Differently
Step 1: We Stopped Relying on Inbound Applications
Inbound applications are self-selecting. The best engineers in your target market are not refreshing job boards. They're employed, probably not actively looking, and will only move for the right opportunity presented in the right way. We went outbound.
Using a combination of LinkedIn Recruiter, GitHub activity data, and our proprietary database of passive candidates, we built a targeted list of 180 engineers who matched the technical requirements, had the right seniority level, and were showing passive signals of openness to a move — recent profile updates, engagement with competitor job posts, or reduced posting activity on their current employer's page.
Step 2: Personalised Outreach, Not Copy-Paste Messages
Each candidate received a personalised message that referenced their specific technical background and framed the opportunity in terms of what it would offer them — technical challenge, team quality, equity, flexibility — rather than what the company needed. Response rates to personalised candidate outreach are 40–60% higher than generic messages.
Step 3: Pre-Screening Before the Client Sees Anyone
We conducted 15-minute pre-screen calls with every candidate who responded positively. We assessed communication skills, technical depth (at a surface level), timeline and notice period, salary expectations, and motivations for moving. Only candidates who passed all five filters moved forward.
We presented eight candidates to the client. All eight were worth interviewing. The client interviewed six. Three made it to final stage. Two received offers. One accepted within 11 days of us starting the engagement.
The Result
Twelve days from engagement start to accepted offer. Compared to six weeks of the client's own process with no hire at the end, the improvement was stark. The CTO got back to product work. The engineering team had its senior hire. The backlog started moving again.
This result is consistent with what the research shows about outsourced candidate sourcing: outsourced recruitment saves 20–30% on costs while improving hire quality, because you're paying for expertise and a network, not for the process of learning how to hire.
What Made the Difference
Three things distinguished our approach from what the client had been doing:
- We targeted passive candidates, not just active applicants — the best people are rarely actively looking
- We pre-screened before presenting — the client only saw candidates worth their time
- We moved fast — our outreach was live within 48 hours of taking the brief; there was no three-week setup period
Is This Relevant to Your Hiring?
If you have a role that's been open for more than three weeks, you have a sourcing problem, not a market problem. The talent exists. The question is whether you're reaching them — and whether you're presenting the opportunity in a way that makes them want to reply.
We specialise in finding candidates that job boards don't surface, presenting opportunities that passive candidates actually respond to, and pre-screening thoroughly enough that every interview you do is worth having. If you're paying in slow hiring costs, it's worth a conversation.