Hiring new talent is not a small investment. With inflation, talent shortages, job shortages, and longer hiring timelines, the average cost to hire is now around $4,700 per employee, and that is just the baseline. That figure includes everything from recruiting and screening to onboarding a new hire. Additionally, costs might exceed $10,000 for positions in in-demand industries like data analytics, cybersecurity, and nursing.
If you’re a growing company or wearing multiple hats as a business owner or HR lead, here is the truth: partnering with a staffing agency can save you serious money and a whole lot of time. In this blog, we’ll detail the hard hiring stats employers need to know, compare the cost savings of in-house recruiting vs. staffing agencies, and answer five common questions employers ask about hiring.
Additionally, check out Staffing Support Specialists’ “Resource Center” for more information on employment laws, hiring help, industry trends, and employer resources.
The Hard Hiring Stats Employers Need to Know
- Average cost to hire in 2024: $4,700+ per role (source: SHRM)
- Average time to fill role: 44 days nationally (dependent on role)
- Cost of a bad hire: $14,900 or more (dependent on role)
- Top candidates leave the market in 10 days
- Executive search costs: Up to $28,000 per hire (dependent on role)
- IT & Healthcare hire costs: $6,000 – $12,000
Now factor in lost productivity, internal recruiter time, training ramp-up, and turnover—hiring becomes a cost center if you’re not careful. In short, time is money in hiring. Reducing your time-to-fill by even a couple of weeks can translate into thousands saved, especially for critical roles.
Speeding up hiring doesn’t mean cutting corners on quality. It means having an efficient process and maybe some expert help.
Source: Average Time To Hire By Industry, By Genius
The Hidden Cost of Slow Hiring
Every day a position remains unfilled is a day of lost productivity, missed opportunities, or overtime pay for other staff covering the gap. Why does time matter? It increases recruiting expenses, risks losing top candidates (who are off the market in just 10 days), and can hurt your company’s reputation.
Source: Average Time To Hire By Industry, By Genius
The total cost of vacancy and replacement can reach 1.5 to 2 times an employee’s salary. Speeding up hiring doesn’t mean sacrificing quality; it means being efficient. This means using clear job descriptions, employee referrals, and smart screening tools. Even shaving off a few weeks can save thousands and help you secure the best talent before your competitors do.
In-House Recruiting vs. Staffing Agency: What’s More Cost-Effective?
When it comes to recruiting, employers generally have two paths: do it in-house with your own HR/recruitment team, or partner with a staffing agency to handle some or all of the process. Both approaches have costs attached, but those costs take different forms. Let’s compare:
In-House Recruiting Costs:
Hiring internally means you’re bearing the expense of an HR or talent acquisition team, plus all recruiting tools and advertising. For a company with frequent hiring needs, you might have full-time recruiters on payroll. The average salary for a talent acquisition specialist is around $60,000–$80,000 per year (not including benefits). If your organization needs continuous hiring, this can be efficient.
However, if you only hire occasionally or have sudden spikes in hiring, paying a full-time recruiter (or pulling managers into recruiting duties) can be costly and inefficient. Don’t forget overhead: the cost of LinkedIn recruiter licenses, applicant tracking software, career fair sponsorships, and so on, which fall on the company.
Despite the costs, in-house recruiting does offer control. You have full visibility into the process and can ensure candidates align with your culture. It can be cost-effective if you’re hiring at scale (so that your recruiter’s salary is spread over many hires). Large organizations often benefit from economies of scale. But for many small-to-medium businesses, the math doesn’t always favor doing it all yourself.
Source: Average Time To Hire By Industry, By Genius
Staffing Agency Costs:
When you work with a staffing agency, you typically pay a placement fee per hire (often a percentage of the hire’s annual salary). According to SHRM data, agency fees usually range from 15% to 25% of the new hire’s first-year compensation. At first glance, that fee can seem steep. However, remember that this is contingency-based – you usually pay only when the agency successfully finds you a candidate you hire. If you factor that fee into your cost-per-hire, it often replaces many of the direct costs you would have paid by recruiting yourself (job ads, background checks, internal staff time, etc.), since the agency is handling those.
There are also time savings that translate into money savings. A good staffing agency has pipelines of pre-screened candidates and dedicated recruiters who specialize in your industry or the roles you need. This often means faster fills for your openings. For instance, Staffing Support Specialists (a staffing agency in Wisconsin) often present qualified candidates within days. Compare that to the 44-day national average time-to-fill! Every week shaved off the hiring timeline is a week of productivity regained.
So, Which is More Cost-Effective?
It often comes down to your hiring volume and expertise. Large companies with continuous hiring needs may justify an in-house team and only use agencies for niche roles. Smaller businesses or those with sporadic hiring spikes frequently find that outsourcing to a staffing agency saves money when you tally up all the internal costs saved. In many cases, a staffing agency can reduce your total cost-to-hire by speeding up the process and delivering better-fit candidates the first time around.
Agencies like Staffing Support Specialists in Wisconsin even offer referral (You find a potential employee and we employ them until you are ready to hire) and temp-to-hire programs, meaning they carry the payroll, insurance, and compliance risk for the first 90 days. While the employer only hires permanently when they are confident in the new talent.
5 Common Questions Employers Ask About Hiring
1. Why is hiring so expensive right now?
Because you’re paying for more than just ads—you’re paying for time lost, team distraction, onboarding, and ramp-up. One bad hire can cost nearly $15,000 in wasted salary, training, and downtime.
2. What is the real-time cost of hiring?
It takes approximately 44 days and $4,700+ on average to fill a role. During that time, you’re either missing productivity or paying overtime. Staffing agencies can often cut that time in half or better.
3. Is a staffing agency fee really worth it?
Yes, especially if your HR team is lean or you’re hiring in spikes. A 20% fee on a $50K role ($10,000) replaces weeks of ads, recruiter salaries, software, and lost productivity. It’s often cheaper overall.
4. Can I evaluate an employee’s fit before hiring?
Absolutely. Staffing Support Specialists offers referral and temp-to-perm placements, meaning they reduce onboarding and hiring risk for the employer. You only convert the employee if they’re a great fit.
5. What types of roles can I fill with a staffing agency?
Everything from IT and healthcare to admin, clerical, warehouse, and executive support. Agencies specialize in these fields and often have vetted candidates ready to go.
How Staffing Support Specialists Save Employers Money
Staffing Support Specialists, based in Wisconsin, bring deep local expertise to the hiring process, having successfully placed over 5,000 candidates for area employers. As a full-service agency, we handle everything from screenings and skills testing to onboarding and payroll, saving your team valuable time and administrative effort.
We also offer flexible hiring models, including referral, temp-to-hire, and direct placement options, allowing you to scale your workforce based on your needs. Most importantly, our focus on quality matches leads to better retention and a lower cost of turnover, translating into long-term savings for your business.
If you have any questions about our services, give us a call at (262) 673-0698 (Hartford, WI) or (414) 279-9349 (Milwaukee, WI). You can also fill out our employer form to start partnering with us!
