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Recruitment Team
This section at a glance
Recruitment is a core competency so you shouldn't rely on external recruiters; building a recruitment team with a sole focus on your hiring needs will help you maintain control over quality and is more cost-effective
Build your recruitment team like you would a sales team, staffing it with people who can find and engage the right candidates while setting the proper incentives and KPIs
Start a team with a simple structure reporting to the Head of Recruiting, Recruiters and Sourcers to run the recruiting process, an Ops Manager to set up processes, and a Recruiting Coordinator to manage admin tasks
The size of the team will depend on your hiring needs, with one Recruiter hiring for 4-7 roles a quarter and number of people in other roles growing proportionately
As you are scaling the team, organise Recruiters by business function to leverage synergies from hiring for similar roles and add Team Leads and Managers to manage the team
Pay Recruiters quarterly bonuses, in cash, with a direct link to the achievement rate of their quotas
The case for an internal recruitment team
You can’t scale a tech company without a top-notch internal recruitment team. Revolut learned this the hard way - a few years in, hiring became a bottleneck. External recruiters were too slow, too expensive, and couldn’t deliver enough high-quality candidates. Growth stalled until the company built an internal dedicated recruitment org, separate from HR, designed to move fast and hire at scale.
Internal recruitment is critical for many reasons:
Recruitment is a core competency - attracting and retaining A-players is a long-term strategic advantage; an internal team will have the ability to identify and engage candidates who are technically qualified but also culturally aligned
Sole focus on your hiring needs - third-party recruiters juggle multiple clients at a time; an internal team is fully immersed in the nuances of your business and quickly reacts to changing priorities
Control over quality - an internal dedicated team gives you full control over the hiring process, from sourcing and screening to interviewing and onboarding, ensuring consistency and a higher talent bar
Cost efficiency - while setting up a separate team may seem costly initially, it can be more cost-effective as the expenses associated with third-party recruiters can add up significantly
Building a recruitment powerhouse
You should build your recruitment team like a world-class sales team.
Recruitment shares many aspects with traditional sales, such as relationship-building, effective communication, understanding needs and motivation, and negotiation, so best practices are often transferable:
Outbound-driven approach: Recruiters should proactively source and engage top talent, not just filter inbound applications
Tech-enabled hiring: Use CRM-like tools to track candidate interactions and nurture long-term relationships (for example staying in touch with candidates who are not currently available)
Data-backed decision-making: Monitor pipeline metrics, pass-through rates, and hiring velocity to optimise performance
Quota-based recruiters: The biggest share of recruiter compensation should be based on reaching quarterly quotas
Structuring and scaling the recruitment org
We recommend you start with a simple structure for your recruitment team: one Ops Manager, one Recruitment Coordinator, as well as Recruiters and Sourcers, all reporting to the Head of Recruiting. The number of Recruiters and Sourcers will depend on your hiring quota:
a Recruiter can hire 4-7 roles a quarter
a Sourcer can support 2 Recruiters
As your hiring needs grow, we recommend you adjust the size and structure of the team accordingly:
add a second team once you reach more than 10 Recruiters
organise recruitment teams by vertical, based on your company’s functions
add new manager roles with a Team Lead managing a team of 10-15 Recruiters and Sourcers and a Recruitment Manager managing 5-7 Team Leads
add more Recruitment Coordinators with a ratio of one per 9 Recruiters
add a Data Analyst to support recruitment operations
Overall, the size and structure of your recruitment team should grow according to your hiring targets:
Recruiter Quotas & Incentives
To build a high-performance hiring team, quotas and incentives should be structured like a sales organization; measuring output and impact.
Bonuses should be paid quarterly and in cash, calculated as a % of the base salary. This percentage is determined based on the performance of the team member against their predefined quotas.
