To hire on your own, you’ll need existing internal resources that can commit the necessary time and skills to filling your open positions. Depending on the size of your company, this could be you, your HR team, or the hiring manager. Can your internal team handle the search, screening, offer process, onboarding, and post-hire support that’s necessary for the number of candidates you need? If so, hiring on your own can be the most straightforward way to find your new talent.

Use this approach when:

• You’re hiring folks with skill sets that you’re familiar with and know how to find.
• Your existing employees understand your needs and culture enough to help you recruit and evaluate these applicants.

Keep in mind:

• Hiring the wrong candidate can be expensive. In 2003, the US Department of Labor estimated a failed hire costs at least 30% above that employee’s first year pay (that’s more than most direct hire recruiters).
• Keeping a critical position unfilled is also costly. The cost of leaving a high-level position open for months could be much greater than recruiter fees. It can be helpful to estimate how much revenue you lose if you don’t fill a position.
• Personality profiling tools can help you vet candidates (check out Core Values Index, Wonderlic, DISC, and Predictive Index)
• Post your positions to sites that will attract the right candidates (Mac’s List, Indeed, Dice, Monster, CareerBuilder, Craigslist)

There are a lot of industry terms in the recruiting and staffing world. If you want to learn more, refer to this glossary of recruiting terms that we’ve been building.

*This content was originally written as a guest post on Mac’s list, available here: https://www.macslist.org/for-employers/hiring-decisions-should-you-use-a-recruiter-or-staffing-agency-to-hire-new-employees