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The cost of agencies
When you are building a company with 5 to 15 people, every hire changes the trajectory. You need a backend engineer, a head of sales, a customer success lead. You know exactly who you need but not how to find them.
The default advice is to hire a recruitment agency. They know the market, they have the network, and they do the legwork. But at 15 to 25 percent of first-year salary per hire, the math gets difficult fast. A single senior hire through an agency can cost 15,000 to 25,000 EUR in fees.
Most startups cannot afford that for every role. So founders end up doing it themselves, spending hours searching and messaging candidates and hoping for the best. There is a middle ground.
Why startup hiring is different
At a large company, the talent acquisition team handles sourcing, screening, and scheduling. At a startup, the founder or COO does all of this between investor calls, product meetings, and customer conversations. There is no dedicated recruiter, no established process, and often no applicant tracking system.
This means the tools and methods designed for TA teams do not work well here. You do not need a complex recruitment stack. You need something fast that helps you find the right people and reach out to them without spending hours every day on it.
Build a simple process
Before you start searching, set up a basic workflow that keeps you organized.
Define the role clearly. Write down the 3 to 5 things this person must be able to do, not a 20-point job description. Think about what success looks like after 90 days.
Decide where to look. For most startup roles in the Nordics, LinkedIn is where most recruiters search today. Your personal network is second. Employee referrals come third once you have a few people on board. If you already have a LinkedIn Recruiter license, even better. The right tools can integrate with it so you manage everything from one place.
Set a response window. Aim to respond to every candidate within 24 hours. Speed is your advantage over larger companies. Startups that move fast in the hiring process close candidates that big companies lose.
Search smarter, not longer
The biggest time drain in startup hiring is the search itself. Scrolling through profiles manually is slow and inconsistent. You look at 100 candidates, maybe 10 are relevant, and you spend 20 minutes writing messages to each one.
AI-powered sourcing tools change this equation. Instead of manually filtering results, the tool ranks candidates by relevance to your role. You see the best matches first, with their current title, company, and contact details ready.
For a founder spending 2 hours a day on hiring, this can cut that down to 30 to 45 minutes while actually improving the quality of candidates you reach.
Write outreach that gets replies
Candidates get dozens of recruitment messages. Yours needs to stand out, especially because you are not a recognizable brand yet.
Keep it short. Three to four sentences maximum. Say who you are, what you are building, why this person specifically caught your attention, and what the next step is.
Be specific about why them. "I saw your work at [Company] on [specific thing]" gets replies. "I came across your profile and thought you might be interested" does not.
Lead with the mission, not the title. Early-stage candidates care about what the company is doing and why. The job title matters less than the opportunity.
Use your unfair advantages
Startups have things that big companies cannot offer. Use them.
Speed. You can go from first message to offer in a week. Large companies take months. Scope. Early employees get to shape the product, the culture, and the direction. Equity. If your startup is venture-backed, equity is a real part of the compensation story.
Make these part of every conversation.
When to bring in help
If you are spending more than 10 hours a week on hiring and still not closing roles, it is time to either bring in a part-time recruiter or invest in tools that automate the repetitive parts. The goal is not to become a full-time recruiter yourself. The goal is to find great people while building the company.
TalentRiver helps founders find and reach the right candidates without recruiter experience. AI-ranked results, automated outreach, and no agency fees.
