What a mis-hire really costs.
A wrong senior hire is rarely a one-time cost. Enter the salary of the role you are filling and see the number build, then weigh it against the cost of getting the hire right the first time. Move the sliders to match your situation. Every figure is yours to check.
The role you are filling, at VP-equivalent and up.
How long the wrong hire holds the role before you act. This drives the underperformance line: the longer they stay, the more value you pay for and do not get.
A right hire delivers 100%. Whatever is below that is value you paid for and did not get. At 50%, half the role’s value is lost for every month they are in the seat.
Severance or notice paid on the way out, expressed in months of base salary.
The all-in cost to recruit, onboard, and bring a replacement up to speed. This is the do-over, and it is a separate hire from the one that failed. Gallup (2019): The cost of replacing an individual employee can range from one-half to two times the employee’s annual salary.
Left out on purpose: the money already spent hiring the wrong person, stalled initiatives, customers who wobbled, and good people who leave under a bad leader. Kept out so this stays a floor.
One mis-hire you avoid is worth about 8 times the search that prevents it. The real question is how you make the right hire more likely in the first place.
Getting the person right is only half of it.
We do not just tell you the candidate can do the job. We show you how they will work with the people around them, so the hire lands and holds.
- Proof over polish. We assess the finalist for the job itself, an evidence-based read on whether they can actually do it, not just interview well.
- Fit in every direction. We map their CliftonStrengths against the people they will work with, so you see how they partner up, across, and down before day one.
- A faster ramp. The new leader learns the team and the team learns the new leader, so the first ninety days begin with understanding, not guesswork.
- A warm welcome. It is a positive read, not a gauntlet, a constructive way for everyone to see how their future boss, peers, and reports are wired.
- Built to last. The result is a hire who fits, contributes sooner, and stays.
Assumes the CliftonStrengths package is run for at least the new hire's manager and direct reports.
This is a transparent, conservative model, not a quote. Two figures are anchored to published research; the rest is plain arithmetic on the numbers you set above.
- Gallup (2019): “The cost of replacing an individual employee can range from one-half to two times the employee’s annual salary.”
- SHRM (2022): “The total cost to hire a new employee can be three to four times the position’s salary.”
For context, our conservative floor lands well under the three-to-four-times-salary that SHRM cites for the full cost of a hire, because we leave the largest soft costs out.