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The average open role takes 63.5 days to fill.
That's the market average, whether you're running the search yourself or handing it to an agency. Job post, inbox, screening, scheduling, and the dead air between every step.
It isn't our number. Our average from kickoff to a start date is between 2-4 weeks.
But the clock only starts when you start it.
Thanksgiving is 72 days out. On the 63-day path, a search kicked off this week signs an offer around Black Friday. On ours, that person is in the seat by mid-October with six weeks to get useful first.
Both paths run out of road in early October.
The call we had last week
On a call last week, a founder told us they wanted someone hired "before Thanksgiving."
It's a technical services business, growing on outbound and referrals, and this would be the first sales hire the company has ever made. So the deadline was real and the reasoning behind it was sound.
Then, a few minutes later, they mentioned that their business partner wouldn't be able to review anything until the following Monday.
That's the whole problem in one sentence. The deadline was real, but the decision cycle underneath it wasn't built to meet it.
What ten weeks actually buys you
Working backwards from November 26:
3 to 5 vetted candidates in your inbox inside 7 to 10 days
12 days, median, from kickoff to a hiring decision
30 days, average, from kickoff to a start date
That's a mid-October start and roughly six weeks in the seat before Thanksgiving week.
Wait until November 1, and the same process lands a start date in December, which makes January their real first month.
You end up paying for Q4 twice, once in chaos and once in salary you never got to use.
"We're too busy to hire right now"
That's the point. You're busy in October and November.
You’re not buried this week, and this week is when almost all the work of hiring actually happens.
Here's what happens if you start now:
One kickoff call to tell us what the role needs to do.
A shortlist of 3 to 5 people we've already screened and interviewed.
Then conversations with the two or three you actually like.
Nearly all of that lands before your crunch begins, which is the entire point of moving in September.
The alternative is running interviews during the worst weeks of your year. That's how rushed hires happen.
The week your US team is off
Consumers spent $257.8 billion online between November 1 and December 31 last year. Cyber Week alone did $44.2 billion in five days. If you sell to consumers, or you serve brands that do, that's your whole year compressed into a handful of weeks.
Your US team should take Thanksgiving week. They've earned it. Your Q4 shouldn't stop because they did.
Thanksgiving isn't a public holiday in Cape Town, Belgrade, or Bogotá. Someone hired there is at their desk on the Friday morning your inbox is loudest, on hours that overlap yours.
If you want to be covered by Thanksgiving, the search starts in the next two weeks, not the first week of October.
Reply to this email or book a call below, and we'll help you make the right hire before your busiest weeks of the year.
>>>> Book Your Free Call <<<<
Until next time,
The Go Carpathian Team
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