Fractional Hiring Manager for Engineering Teams
A bad senior hire costs more than a salary.
It costs months of runway, team momentum, and trust. I run the interview process for engineering leaders who'd rather hear an honest no than a convenient yes.
The problem
Most hiring processes run on gut feel, not evidence.
It usually goes the same way: an interview loop that's inconsistent, badly documented, and leaning more on first impressions than proof. Nobody notices until months later, when it's already expensive to fix.
Cost of a bad hire, as % of annual salary
Estimates vary by country and method, but they agree on the direction: replacing someone costs far more than their salary alone.
In the UK, the Recruitment & Employment Confederation and Oxford Economics put the real cost of a bad hire at three to four times the person's salary, once training and lost productivity are counted. For a mid-level manager on £42,000, that works out to about £132,000.
Source: Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) and Oxford Economics, in partnership with Unum.
What I do
I run the interview process. I don't source candidates.
I'm not a recruiter, and I don't work on volume. I design the interview loop, run the interviews myself, and hand you a hire or no-hire recommendation you can trust.
- Design the interview loop, mapped to what actually matters for this hire
- Run every stage myself, scored against a consistent rubric
- Give you a clear recommendation, with the evidence and the risks laid out
How it works
Four stages, agreed before a single interview happens.
Kickoff
A working session with you and your team to define exactly what great looks like for this role. Not a generic job spec: the real bar you're hiring against.
Loop design
A structured interview plan, mapped to the competencies that matter for this hire, agreed with you before a single interview happens.
Structured interviews
Every stage gets scored against a consistent rubric. Evidence is captured in the room, not reconstructed from memory afterward.
The report
A clear recommendation, reasoned competency by competency: the risks if you hire, and how confident I actually am.
How I work
The standard every engagement is held to.
Mutual, both ways
You're handing me one of the most consequential decisions your team will make this quarter. In return, I need everything relevant: the context, the constraints, and the history of what's gone wrong before.
Straight answers, always
My read on every candidate is unbiased and backed by evidence. If someone isn't right for the role, you'll hear that clearly. I don't soften a call just to keep a process feeling smooth.
A tool, not a judge
I use AI to take notes and help write reports clearly. I never ask it for an opinion. Every assessment, every score, every recommendation is mine, built on what I actually saw and heard in the room.
Priced per hire
I don't price by interview count or seniority as a blunt formula. We scope the effort a role actually needs together, then price it, because what you're paying for is the outcome, not a set of meetings.
With your team, not around it
What great looks like for a role isn't something I decide alone from a spec. It comes from the people who'll manage this person, sit next to them, and depend on them.
I am your team
I will never recommend a hire I don't believe is right. Not to close the engagement faster, not because it's the easier answer. If I wouldn't hire this person myself, I won't tell you to.
The evidence
Why structured interviews work
Structured interviews predict job performance meaningfully better than unstructured ones. That's not a stylistic choice. It's the reason the whole process is built this way.
Source: Schmidt & Hunter, meta-analysis of personnel selection methods, Psychological Bulletin (1998, updated 2016)
Who this is for
Engineering leaders hiring senior or high-stakes roles
Who want a structured process without having to build and run it themselves, and who'd rather hear an honest no than a convenient yes.
Pricing
Priced per hire, not per interview
Every engagement gets scoped together before we start: how many stages, how much structure, how much time. Then it's priced accordingly. You're paying for the outcome, not the hours.