The true cost of recruitment: understanding your real investment in talent

Posted On 05.03.2025

CIPD research reveals a startling truth: 41% of employers reported their new permanent recruits always, mostly or sometimes resigned within just 12 weeks.

With Croner’s research showing the average cost of employee turnover is £11,000 per person – a figure which rises significantly for senior roles – the financial impact of poor recruitment decisions has never been clearer.

Understanding total recruitment costs

To make sure you are bringing the best people in – and avoiding the potential pitfalls of poor hiring – it’s vital to get your investment in recruitment right.

The first step is to understand the full range of costs associated with hiring, some of which may not be immediately obvious. Once you understand these visible and less-visible costs, you can make sure the total investment is correct for your organisation.

A typical, visible recruitment investment includes:

Advertising spend

To win the race for talent in a competitive jobs market, organisations need a strategic presence across job boards, social media platforms, and industry-specific channels.

Technology investment

Tools to streamline recruitment include an Applicant Tracking System (ATS), internal career platform, and effective candidate management software. These are especially important when hiring at scale, where manual processes won’t cut it.

Process costs

A combination of internal and external costs, including HR team salaries, background verification processes, and reference checking systems.

Most organisations can confidently track these visible costs. But other, less-visible costs lie below the surface, which can have unintended outcomes beyond just the pennies and the pounds.

The hidden impact on your business can include:

Extended recruitment timelines

Indeed’s research estimates the UK’s average time-to-hire from application to offer is 36 days. This timeline doesn’t account for the time it takes to source candidates, the length of their notice period, or how long it will take to onboard them. When hiring at volume, even small inefficiencies can significantly extend this timeline.

The cost of vacant positions

Leaving roles unfilled for too long can result in lost revenue opportunities, stretched internal resources, and reduced team efficiency. The net result of this is decreased overall output for the business.

Training and integration

New hires need time to adapt to new processes, work cultures, and systems to achieve full productivity. To achieve this, they may require formal training, a time investment from managers, and additional team resources and support.

The high price of staff turnover

When recruitment goes wrong, the costs can quickly multiply – especially when hiring at scale. These can include repeated hiring expenses, additional training requirements, and an increased strain on internal resources.

Understanding these hidden costs can help HR and procurement leaders make better decisions. By recognising where processes need to be improved and investing strategically, organisations will be rewarded with better hires who are more likely to succeed and stay in their roles.

Quality drives success

As a McKinsey study shows, better talent can deliver significantly higher performance and productivity in new roles. This makes it crucial to get recruitment right the first time around.

Making the right hiring decisions early on can contribute towards:

Reducing initial costs.
Avoiding expensive staff turnover.
Driving better business performance.
Building stronger, more efficient teams.

Driving Better Outcomes at Lower Costs – A Client Success Story

One of our clients was spending a high amount on recruitment.

To reduce costs, we looked at where we could streamline the end-to-end recruitment process to be more efficient, including utilising technology.

Our strategic approach:

Reduced annual recruitment costs by £366k
Reduced overall time to hire by 9 days per role
Exceeded hiring forecasts by 73%
Improved retention with 85% candidate satisfaction scores

Outcomes:

Following a successful six-week implementation, we were awarded an increase in hiring requirements over three years.

Essential questions for your recruitment strategy

An effective recruitment strategy is key to examining the strength of your recruitment capabilities, and where improvements need to be made.

Ask yourself:

Can your teams efficiently manage recruitment surges while maintaining quality?
Are you utilising technology effectively to streamline processes?
Do you have access to diverse sourcing channels and talent pools?
Is your employee value proposition (EVP) strong enough to attract and retain talent?

A strategic recruitment partner can add value

An established recruitment provider can help to achieve faster time-to-hire and lower costs over time by:

Distributing job listings strategically across multiple channels
Implementing targeted attraction campaigns
Maintaining active talent pipelines
Combining technology and human expertise effectively
Leveraging national and local resources
Accessing established talent pools
Supporting employer branding and onboarding

Take control of your recruitment investment

At Adecco, we have over 20 years of experience helping clients manage their permanent volume recruitment.

We can help transform your approach by analysing your current costs and identifying opportunities to drive efficiency. We’ll also help you create a strategic hiring plan to improve your recruitment return on investment (ROI).