The single most common conversation we have at HireUA on discovery calls sounds exactly like this:
“We’ve been working with another agency for a few months. They keep sending candidates. Nothing’s clicking. But we’re going to give it another month.”
It’s always one more month.
Because the alternative — admitting you chose the wrong partner, eating the sunk cost, starting over from scratch — feels worse than waiting.
And then four months go by. Six months. The role is still open. The team is still stretched. And you’ve spent thousands of dollars on an agency that couldn’t fill a position that HireUA fills in two weeks.
I watched this happen with a client named Matias — the founder of Email Engineers, an email marketing agency. He spent four months with Somewhere.com trying to find one hire from Latin America. Four months. Candidates that felt like compromises. He was about to settle for someone he wasn’t excited about just to stop the bleeding.
Then he called us.
We placed someone in two weeks.
His words, on camera: “Five times faster. And it’s not just speed — it’s getting the right fit, getting the right person.”
It reminds me, in a way, of February 2022 — when I was living in Kyiv, Ukraine.
That morning, my wife shook me awake with real urgency in her voice.
It was February 2022. We were in Kyiv. She was pregnant with our first child.
I’d wanted to leave Ukraine a few days earlier. Something felt wrong. The reports, the troop movements, the conversations people were having in quieter voices. Every instinct I had said go.
But she had a doctor’s appointment. And it would be fine.
It’s always fine.
Until the air raid sirens started.
Within hours, I was behind the wheel running stoplights out of Kyiv, passing tanks pointing their guns at civilian cars, with my pregnant wife, her father, and our dog in the back seat. Two nights of camping in the car in freezing temperatures. Sixty hours of travel. Countless moments where I genuinely did not know if we would make it.
Thankfully, we made it out…
I tell this story — the full version is on my blog — because of one detail that haunts me more than the bombs or the tanks:
Admitting that it wasn’t fine meant upending everything and leaving our lives behind.
And while it’s dramatic to compare this hiring a new team member…it also perfectly illustrates sunk cost fallacy.
Another client — a UK ecommerce founder running a Shopify brand — tried a few agencies before coming to us. The candidates they sent him had language barriers and were WordPress developers mislabeled as Shopify specialists. Months wasted. He specifically wanted Eastern European talent because he’d worked with EE developers before and knew the quality.
The other agencies couldn’t deliver.
We did.
Two independent clients. Two separate searches. Same agency. Same failure pattern.
And here’s the thing:
If you Google “great staffing agencies” right now, you’ll find about 40 articles that all do the same thing. They list 10 to 15 agencies, rank themselves first, and fill the rest of the list with companies that aren’t even in the same industry.
One of our competitors — a LatAm-focused agency — ranked themselves #1 on their “best staffing agencies” list. The other nine spots? Kelly Services. ManpowerGroup. Randstad. Adecco. Aerotek.
That’s like a sushi restaurant writing a “Best Restaurants” article and comparing themselves to McDonald’s, Taco Bell, and Olive Garden. Of course you look great next to Olive Garden. You’re not even in the same business.
This article is different.
I’m not going to rank HireUA against companies we don’t compete with. I’m going to break down what a staffing agency actually is, the different types that exist, what they charge, and how to figure out which one you need — regardless of whether that’s us.
If you’re looking for offshore remote talent, we can help. If you’re looking for 50 warehouse workers in Ohio, I’ll point you in the right direction.
Let’s get into it.
Last Updated: March 2026
Table of Contents
- The Nightclub Markup — What You’re Actually Paying For
- The 5 Types of Staffing Agencies (And How to Tell Which One You Need)
- The EOR Question — Blizzard Insurance in Florida
- What’s Actually Happening Behind the Scenes at Most Agencies
- The Somewhere.com Problem — When “Give It Another Month” Costs You Everything
- The Guarantee Game
- How to Evaluate Any Staffing Agency — The Checklist
- What HireUA Does (And What We Don’t)
- FAQ
The Nightclub Markup — What You’re Actually Paying For
A bottle of Grey Goose costs about $25 at a liquor store.
Order it at a table in Miami, you’re paying $300. In Manhattan, $400. A bottle of Dom Pérignon that retails for $180 runs $600 to $900 depending on which club and whether the sparklers are included.
Everyone knows this. You’re not paying for the vodka. You’re paying for the table, the ice bucket, the mixers, the scantily clad waitresses walking it over with a parade of lights. You’re paying to sit down instead of standing at a bar with your elbows in someone’s back.
And most people are fine with that. Because the experience matches the markup.
Now imagine you pay $400 for the Grey Goose.
No table.
No ice bucket.
No sparklers.
No waitresses.
They hand you a warm bottle across the bar and say, “Pour it yourself.”
That’s what an 80% markup at a bad staffing agency looks like.
You’re paying bottle service prices for a bar pour.
Here’s what the markups actually look like in the offshore staffing world — numbers most agencies will never publish:
Asia (Philippines, India, Pakistan): 70-80% markup is common. You’re paying $2,000 a month. Your hire is receiving $600 to $800. The agency is keeping the majority.
Latin America: 30-40% markup. One competitor charges a flat $1,600 per month on top of the candidate’s salary for every placement. So if you’re paying someone $1,000 a month, you’re actually spending $2,600. The candidate doesn’t see any of that extra $1,600.
Eastern Europe: The talent costs more, so the room for markup is smaller. If someone costs $3,000 a month, you can only add so much before the total exceeds what a client is willing to pay. This is why some agencies avoid Eastern Europe altogether — the margins aren’t fat enough for their model.
Here’s the thing:
The markup itself is not the problem.
Every agency needs to make money.
Good agencies earn their margin.
They screen hundreds of candidates so you only see five. They handle payroll, compliance, and HR issues. They replace bad hires at their own cost. They’re available when something goes wrong at 11pm on a Tuesday.
That’s worth paying for.
The problem is when you’re paying a real markup and getting nothing behind it. No vetting. No methodology. No speed. No accountability. Just a resume and an invoice.
That’s the difference between bottle service and a bar pour. You’re not trying to find the cheapest agency. You’re trying to find the one where the markup actually buys you something.
The question to ask isn’t “what’s your markup?”
It’s “what do I get for it?”
The 5 Types of Staffing Agencies (And How to Tell Which One You Need)
Before you start Googling agency names, answer three questions:
- What kind of position do you need to fill?
- Where does this person need to be?
- How much of the hiring work do you want someone else to handle?
Your answers determine which type of agency you need. And these types are not interchangeable. Hiring the wrong type is like calling a plumber to fix your roof. He might try. It’s not going to go well.
Type 1: Recruiting Firm
Higher-level positions. Typically US-based. Almost always direct hire.
When I got my job at the RAND Corporation — a Storage Engineer position requiring specific experience with Hitachi Data Systems — a headhunter found me. She took about 20% of my annual salary as her fee. That’s a recruiting firm.
Executive search. Director-level and above. Specialized technical roles where the candidate pool is small and the search is hard.
If you’re hiring a VP of Engineering or a CFO, this is your lane. If you’re hiring a Virtual Assistant for $1,500 a month, a recruiting firm will laugh you off the phone. Their fee structure doesn’t work at that price point.
Type 2: Traditional Staffing Agency
This is what most people picture when they hear “staffing agency.”
Seasonal roles. Temp work. Batch hires. You need 30 warehouse workers for the holiday rush. You need drivers for a logistics expansion. You need a temp receptionist while yours is on maternity leave.
Randstad, Kelly Services, Adecco, Aerotek — these are the giants here. They’ve been doing this for 50 to 80 years. They’re good at it.
But they’re filling physical, on-site positions in specific geographies. If you need a remote Bookkeeper from Eastern Europe, Randstad is not your call.
This is the type that most “Best Staffing Agencies” articles are comparing everyone against. Which is exactly the problem. Comparing a LatAm remote staffing agency to Kelly Services is comparing sushi to Taco Bell.
Different product.
Different customer.
Different planet.
Our competitors comparing themselves to these firms is disingenuous.
Type 3: BPO (Business Process Outsourcing)
You don’t want to hire individuals. You want to hire a process.
“I need 100 customer service agents handling phone support for my product.”
That’s a BPO. They bring the people. They bring the office (or the remote infrastructure). They manage the training, the scheduling, the quality control, the swapping of underperformers. You might not even know who’s working on your account on any given Tuesday.
You’re not managing people. You’re buying a managed outcome.
BPOs are common for call centers, customer support operations, data processing, back-office functions. If you need a floor of people doing the same repetitive task at scale, this is your model.
If you need one great Executive Assistant who integrates into your daily life and knows your schedule, your preferences, and your communication style — a BPO is the wrong answer.
Type 4: Offshore / Remote Staffing Agency
This is where HireUA lives.
You need a specific remote hire — a developer, an EA, a designer, a bookkeeper, an operations manager, a media buyer, an appointment setter — sourced from our global talent pool.
You interview the candidates yourself. You manage them yourself. The agency finds, screens, and presents qualified people. Some agencies also handle payroll and compliance (the employer of record model). Others do placement only.
The key difference from a BPO: You’re hiring an individual who becomes part of your team. Not renting a process.
The key difference from a traditional staffing agency: The talent is remote, international, and typically 40-70% less expensive than a US equivalent at the same quality level.
The key difference from a recruiting firm: The roles are mid-level, not executive. The price point is $1,000 to $5,000 a month, not a $150,000 annual salary with a 20% headhunter fee.
If you’re reading this article, this is probably what you need. But if it’s not — keep reading anyway. The evaluation framework in this article works for all five types.
Type 5: Job Boards and Marketplaces
Upwork. Fiverr. Remote.io. Djinni. LinkedIn job posts.
The DIY route. You do your own sourcing, your own screening, your own interviewing, your own vetting. Nobody curates anything for you.
Cheapest option. Most work. Highest risk.
For simple, short-term tasks — a one-off graphic design job, a weekend coding project, a quick translation — job boards are fine. They exist for a reason.
For a long-term hire who’s going to handle your finances, manage your clients, or build your product? You’re rolling the dice and hoping the resume isn’t a lie.
We get a lot of clients who come to us after spending months on Upwork interviewing dozens of freelancers, hiring two or three, watching them ghost or underperform, and finally deciding to pay an agency to do it right.
The Upwork route isn’t cheaper once you factor in the time you wasted and the bad hires you made along the way.
The EOR Question — Blizzard Insurance in Florida
Disclaimer: I’m not a lawyer or an accountant. None of this is legal or financial advice. Consult a professional for your specific situation. What follows is how I’ve seen it work in practice across hundreds of international hires.
If you’ve researched hiring overseas, you’ve seen the EOR pitch.
Employer of Record. A company that legally employs your remote hire in their country and handles payroll, taxes, benefits, and compliance. You pay the EOR, the EOR pays your person.
Sounds essential, right? How could you possibly hire someone in Ukraine without a compliance partner?
Here’s the thing:
For most small and mid-size businesses hiring one to five remote workers, EOR is blizzard insurance in Florida. You’re paying a monthly premium to protect against a risk that functionally doesn’t exist.
Here’s how it typically works in practice:
Your hire registers as a freelancer or opens a small business entity in their country. You sign a contractor agreement. They fill out a W-8BEN for US tax purposes. You pay them directly. They handle their own local tax obligations.
That’s a standard international contractor arrangement. A W-8BEN is not some obscure loophole. It’s literally the IRS form designed for this exact situation.
And here’s what nobody tells you:
This arrangement can actually be better for the person you’re hiring.
As an employee in pretty much all countries abroad — whether employed by a local company or by an EOR — a worker pays 30 to 40% in taxes. The healthcare they get access to through government employment is um…let me put it nicely bluntly:
UNUSABLE.
I’ve lived in Eastern Europe for a decade.
I know people who’ve been hospitalized in government facilities across Eastern Europe recently. The buildings look like they were built under communism and haven’t been touched since. The staff is overwhelmed and often rude.
And here’s the part that shocks most Americans…
You buy your own medicine. Out of pocket. At a pharmacy. And a family member delivers it to the hospital.
Every day.
Someone you love is lying in a hospital bed, and every morning a family member treks across the city to a pharmacy, buys the medication the hospital prescribed but doesn’t provide, and physically carries it to the ward.
That’s the “free healthcare” that comes with government employment in much of Eastern Europe.
Now compare:
As an independent contractor, your hire can pay roughly 10 to 15% in taxes instead of 30 to 40%. They get business write-offs — home office, equipment, internet, travel. Same deductions you take as a business owner in the US. They keep significantly more of their earnings. They’re fully registered, they report everything, they pay their taxes — they just pay a lot less of them.
And with the higher take-home pay from the good salary you’re paying them, they walk into a private clinic. Modern facility. Friendly staff.
My daughter in Poland sees her pediatrician for $40.
I stopped drinking last year and saw a cardiologist due to some weird feelings in my chest in the weeks after stopping. Same day — full tests, EKG — for $70.
Make an appointment online and 9 out of 10 times your new international team member can see someone within 24 hours.
Or they buy private health insurance for about $50 a month and get access to those facilities whenever they need them.
Everybody wins. It’s why our first core value at HireUA is Win-Win-Win.
Your hire pays less tax, gets better healthcare, has more money in their pocket, and has the autonomy of running their own small business. You pay less than the EOR markup. And the arrangement is straightforward for both sides.
The EOR companies have done a masterful job making people terrified of “compliance risk” that, for a handful of remote workers, is practically a non-issue.
Now — there IS a third option. Opening your own legal entity in their country.
You can do this. Technically.
What I mean:
If you enjoy getting a colonoscopy…owning an entity abroad is for you.
If you enjoy monthly accounting fees, legal fees up the ass, logging every single receipt for everything you’ve ever purchased, and providing your company registration number to buy a can of soda at a gas station.
In Poland, I can’t buy a pen at a stationery store without them asking for my NIP number. Then there’s the REGON number. And the VAT number. And a handful of other numbers that I genuinely cannot keep track. Every country outside the US is harder to run a business in than a basic LLC in Wyoming or Delaware. Every single one.
I wish I had never opened my Polish entity. There is not a day I don’t regret it. Thankfully it’s a temp thing and should not be an issue in the near future. I’ll never open another foreign entity as long as the US system works as easily as it does.
If you want to go this route, good luck. Seriously. You’ll need it.
For everyone else: W-8BEN, contractor agreement, direct payment. Talk to your accountant. Keep it simple.
What’s Actually Happening Behind the Scenes at Most Agencies
Here’s where we get into territory that most staffing agency articles will never touch.
Because most of those articles are written by staffing agencies.
And no staffing agency is going to tell you how the sausage is made.
I will. Because I’ve been in this industry long enough to know where the bodies are buried, and because we do things differently — so the comparison only makes us look better.
The Database Problem
Most agencies maintain a database of candidates. Sounds good, right? A talent pool ready to go.
But here’s what most people miss:
There’s a massive difference between a database of people who applied to a generic job post three years ago and a curated pipeline of pre-screened, enthusiastic candidates who’ve been qualified for specific roles.
Most agencies have the first one. A giant pile of resumes with minimal screening, sorted by keyword. When your order comes in, someone runs a search, pulls the closest matches, and sends them over.
That’s not recruiting. That’s a search engine with a monthly fee.
At HireUA, we invest heavily in building an inbound database of candidates who’ve been screened and qualified before a client ever asks for them. When you need someone, we’re presenting real candidates within days — not because we got lucky, but because the pipeline was built before you called.
The Fill Rate Nobody Talks About
We recently hired a recruiter from a well-known competing agency. During the interview, we asked about their performance targets.
Their KPI was filling 20 to 30% of client searches.
Let that sink in.
They accepted — as a company-wide target — that 70 to 80% of the time, they would fail to find someone for their client.
A lottery ticket basically.
Our target at HireUA: 80% fill rate. We don’t accept failure as the default outcome. We take on searches we believe we can fill, and we fill them.
The Somewhere.com Problem — When “Give It Another Month” Costs You Everything
I want to tell you about Matias.
Matias is the founder of Email Engineers — an email marketing agency that builds and manages email campaigns for ecommerce brands. Real business. Real clients. Real revenue.
He’d hired someone through HireUA two years earlier — Tanya, from Ukraine. Project manager. She’d been outstanding. Two years and counting, still with him.
When he needed a second hire, he went looking for someone in Latin America for timezone reasons. He didn’t know we’d started sourcing from that region. So he went with Somewhere.com.
Four months later, he had nothing.
Well, not nothing. He had candidates. Plenty of them. But they felt like compromises. People he could technically hire but wasn’t excited about. After four months of searching, he was about to settle — just to stop the bleeding.
But here’s what most people miss:
He wasn’t just losing the agency fee. He was losing deals. He was losing the ability to scale his agency because he didn’t have the person he needed to handle the work. Every week that position stayed open was revenue he couldn’t capture.
That’s the real cost of a bad staffing agency. Not the $3,000 or $5,000 you paid them. The tens of thousands in opportunity cost while you waited.
Matias called us. We placed someone in two weeks.
His words, recorded on video: “I mean, you got the job done that they couldn’t do in four months. You did it in two weeks.”
And then he said something that stuck with me:
“An agency is a talent acquisition machine at the end of the day. Most often it’s the talent acquisition system that fails more than the client acquisition system. You don’t want to be four months waiting for the right talent and leaving a lot of lost deals on the table.”
He’s right.
Here’s the story, again.
The Guarantee Game
Most agencies offer some form of replacement guarantee. 180 days is standard in the offshore space. HireUA included.
But here’s what they don’t tell you:
Once the agency has your money, the incentive to give their absolute best effort on a replacement drops. Not to zero — most agencies will honor the guarantee. But a replacement search doesn’t generate new revenue. It’s a cost center. And cost centers don’t get the A-team.
The bigger issue is something most clients don’t realize until they’re in it:
A replacement is not a free upgrade.
If you hired an Account Manager and it didn’t work out, you’re entitled to a replacement Account Manager. What you’re NOT entitled to is a replacement Account Manager who also does bookkeeping, speaks three languages, and has five years of Salesforce experience — requirements you didn’t have the first time.
What happens in practice: The first placement fails. The client has learned from the experience. They now have a much clearer picture of what they need. So they add requirements. The search scope changes. The replacement becomes harder to fill than the original — sometimes impossible at the same price point.
And then the client is frustrated because “the agency can’t find anyone.”
The agency didn’t fail. The target moved.
Before you accept a guarantee, understand the terms. What counts as a replacement? What requirements can change? What’s the timeline? Get it in writing. And understand that a guarantee is insurance — it protects against bad outcomes, not an opportunity to redesign the role for free.
How to Evaluate Any Staffing Agency — The Checklist
This works for any type. Offshore, traditional, recruiting firm, BPO. Before you sign anything, ask these five questions:
1. What’s your fill rate?
This is the most important question nobody asks. If the agency won’t answer, or says “it depends,” be cautious. Every serious agency knows their numbers. If their fill rate is below 50%, you’re more likely to waste time than find someone.
2. What does my hire actually earn?
If the agency won’t tell you what the candidate receives, you’re in the warm-bottle-across-the-bar situation. Transparency on compensation is the single fastest way to evaluate whether an agency is a real partner or a margin machine.
Some agencies are transparent. Some are not. You can figure out which is which by asking this one question.
3. What exactly is included in your fee?
Sourcing? Screening? Payroll? Compliance? Ongoing HR support? Replacement guarantee?
The fee structure varies wildly. A 30% markup with full payroll management, compliance, and replacement coverage is a different product than a 30% markup that’s just a finder’s fee.
Know what you’re buying.
4. How fast can you present candidates?
Days is good. A week is acceptable. Multiple weeks means they don’t have the pipeline — they’re going to start sourcing from scratch when you sign.
If an agency tells you candidates will take three to four weeks, they’re not really staffing. They’re headhunting. And headhunting is a different game entirely — it means they’re actively trying to pull people away from their current jobs, convince them to take yours, and sell them on the opportunity. That comes with its own set of problems: counter-offers from the candidate’s current employer, last-minute cold feet, longer timelines, and no guarantee the person actually makes the jump.
There’s nothing wrong with headhunting. It’s how you fill senior and niche roles. But if you’re being quoted headhunting timelines and paying staffing agency prices, something doesn’t add up.
5. Do you specialize in this role and this region?
Generalists fill slower and worse. An agency that does everything from warehouse workers to senior developers to executive assistants is spreading thin across all of them.
The best agencies pick a lane. They know the talent pool for specific roles in specific regions. They’ve placed dozens or hundreds of the exact role you’re looking for.
If you’re hiring a Bookkeeper from Eastern Europe and the agency’s website is full of case studies about call centers in the Philippines, they’re not your agency.
What HireUA Does (And What We Don’t)
We do one thing:
Remote knowledge worker placements, globally — all vetted and screened by our Unfair Advantage process.
Executive Assistants. Virtual Assistants. Developers. Web Designers. Graphic Designers. Bookkeepers. Operations Managers. Social Media Managers. Media Buyers. Video Editors. Appointment Setters. Project Managers. Inbox Managers. Client Success Managers.
One monthly bill. Replacement guarantee. No HR headaches.
We don’t do on-site roles. We don’t do temp placements. We don’t do batch industrial hires. We don’t do BPO. We don’t fill warehouse floors or staff call centers.
If you need any of those things, we’re not your agency. And I’d rather tell you that upfront than take your money and waste your time.
Here’s what makes us different from the other offshore agencies — the ones who actually ARE our competitors:
I’m American. I’ve founded three companies that each crossed $1 million in revenue. I’ve lived abroad for ten years — first in Ukraine, now in Poland. I know what American businesses need because I’ve built them. I know the talent pools because I live in them.
Our screening methodology isn’t a keyword match on a database. It’s a rubric built from placing over 1,000 people and learning — often the hard way — what actually predicts success in a remote hire.
Our fill rate target is 80%. The industry average is 20 to 30%.
And we’re transparent about what your hire earns and what our fee is. Always.
If that’s what you’re looking for, we’d love to talk.
Click here to get started:
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FAQ
What is a staffing agency?
A staffing agency is a company that finds, screens, and presents candidates to businesses that need to hire. Some agencies handle payroll and compliance as well. Others simply make the introduction. The term covers everything from temp agencies filling warehouse workers to offshore firms placing remote developers — which is why it’s critical to understand which type you’re dealing with before you sign anything.
What’s the difference between a staffing agency and a recruiting firm?
A recruiting firm typically handles higher-level, US-based, direct-hire positions. Executive search. Director-level and above. They charge a percentage of annual salary — usually 15 to 25%. A staffing agency is broader — it can mean temp placements, seasonal hires, or offshore remote talent. The term is used loosely across the industry, which is why you should always ask what model the agency actually operates before assuming you know.
How much do staffing agencies charge?
It depends on the type and region. Traditional US staffing agencies charge a markup on hourly rates, typically 25 to 50%. Offshore agencies charge monthly markups ranging from 30% (Eastern Europe, LatAm) to 80% (Asia). Some charge flat monthly fees on top of the candidate’s salary. Always ask what the candidate actually earns — if the agency won’t tell you, that tells you everything.
Are staffing agencies worth it?
For the right situation, absolutely. If you’re hiring for a role you’ve never hired for, in a region you don’t know, and you want someone else to handle sourcing, screening, and sometimes payroll — a good agency saves you months of trial and error. A bad agency costs you months and money with nothing to show for it. The difference is vetting the agency the same way you’d vet a candidate.
How do I know if a staffing agency is legitimate?
Ask for their fill rate. Ask what candidates earn. Ask for case studies with real names and real numbers, not anonymous testimonials. Check whether they specialize in your role type and region, or whether they claim to do everything. And ask how fast they can present candidates — if the answer is weeks, not days, they don’t have a pipeline.
What is an Employer of Record (EOR)?
An EOR is a company that legally employs your remote hire in their country and handles payroll, taxes, and compliance. For large companies hiring 50+ people across multiple countries, EOR can be valuable. For most small and mid-size businesses hiring a handful of remote workers, a standard contractor agreement with a W-8BEN is all you need. The EOR industry has done an excellent job making the simple option sound scary — don’t fall for it.
What’s the best staffing agency for remote workers?
It depends on what kind of remote worker you need and from where. For remote knowledge workers from our Unfair Global Talent Pool — EAs, VAs, developers, designers, bookkeepers, operations roles — HireUA specializes in exactly this.
For remote hourly workers or on-demand shift workers, platforms like Instawork serve that market. For enterprise-level managed services, Randstad and ManpowerGroup are the traditional leaders. Match the agency to the type of hire.
Should I use Upwork or a staffing agency?
For one-off freelance projects — a quick design job, a weekend coding task — Upwork works fine. For a long-term hire who’s going to handle your finances, manage your clients, or be part of your daily operations, the DIY approach on Upwork costs more in time and failed hires than most people realize. If you value speed, quality, and not having to screen 200 resumes yourself, an agency is worth the markup.
How fast should a staffing agency present candidates?
Days, not weeks. A good agency with a real pipeline presents qualified candidates within 2 to 5 business days. If they’re telling you 3 to 4 weeks, they don’t have the pipeline — they’re starting from scratch when you sign. That’s not a staffing agency. That’s a recruiting project you’re funding.
What questions should I ask a staffing agency before hiring them?
Five things: (1) What’s your fill rate? (2) What does my hire actually earn? (3) What’s included in your fee — sourcing, screening, payroll, compliance, guarantee? (4) How fast can you present candidates? (5) Do you specialize in this role and region, or are you a generalist? Any agency worth working with will answer all five without hesitation.
