Prerefer LogoPrerefer

Rethink Recruiting

Strategies to Hire Faster, Better, Cheaper in 2025

As we discussed in The Hidden Costs of Hiring post, recruiting employees has become one of the most expensive, time-consuming, and frustrating challenges for modern businesses.

Filling a single mid-level professional role can cost tens of thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours of employee time. Recruiter fees, job platforms, endless interviews, internal debates—it all adds up to a bloated process that feels increasingly unsustainable and unproductive.

The good news? There's a better way. If you're a founder, executive, or HR leader, here's how you can supercharge your hiring in 2025.

1. Use AI-First Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS)

A traditional ATS is no longer enough. Modern systems that are AI-first don't just collect resumes, they streamline hiring.

AI-first ATS platforms such as Ashby, Lever and Greenhouse can:

  • Screen resumes and identify top candidates, reducing hours spent by your team on initial filtering.
  • Automate logistics like interview scheduling, status updates, and candidate communication, reducing hours spent on tedious administrative tasks.
  • Integrate assessments directly into the application flow to filter out uninterested and unqualified candidates.

Combined, all these features ensure hiring faster, better, cheaper.

2. Automate Interviews with New AI Tools

Interviewing is the most time-intensive (and expensive) stage of hiring. Now, AI can handle much of the initial burden.

AI interview platforms like HireVue, Willo, or Sapia conduct interviews that candidates can complete on their own time. They then analyze responses based on tone, content, and context to flag top performers.

Some platforms like Codility or HackerRank go further by automating technical screening for engineering roles, or automating role-based simulations for product and project management roles.

Letting AI take the first pass saves your team's time for critical final-round conversations. It also reduces time-to-hire by weeks.

3. Double Down on Referrals

Referrals are the best, most trusted signal in recruiting – the most cost-effective and reliable sources of high-quality hires. Candidates who come through referrals:

  • Get hired faster
  • Stay longer
  • Perform better

Supercharging your referral program means:

  • Offering competitive financial bonuses,
  • Making it easy to refer with one-click workflows,
  • Engaging your entire network, both internal and external.

Prerefer can help here.

4. Hire From Within

Before spending thousands of dollars on an external hire, ask: can we promote or laterally move someone internally?

Internal mobility is a secret weapon for cost-conscious and culture-smart companies. It significantly lowers:

  • Time spent sourcing and interviewing outsiders
  • Money on recruiters and hiring tools
  • Time spent on onboarding and getting an external hire ramped up
  • Risk of cultural misfit or slow ramp-up

Employees already know your systems, values, and processes. Promoting from within boosts morale, supports retention, and helps develop leaders.

To do this well:

  • Encourage managers to nominate team members proactively
  • Make internal job boards visible and easy to navigate
  • Create pathways for skills development (mentorships, internal upskilling)

Companies with strong internal mobility fill roles 2x faster and save significantly on hiring costs.

5. Embrace Fractional and Contract Talent

Sometimes a full-time hire isn't the best solution—especially for projects that are time-bound, skill-specific, or uncertain.

Platforms like Toptal, Upwork, and even niche agencies offer access to highly skilled contractors who can:

  • Start immediately
  • Hit the ground running
  • Fill gaps temporarily without full-time overhead

Fractional hiring is particularly effective for startups and SMBs that need senior-level expertise (e.g. a fractional CPO or PM) but can't afford the full salary. It's also a way to test talent before committing to long-term employment.

6. Streamline Your Process (Less Is More)

Finally, remember that a simpler process is a better and cheaper process for everyone involved. Many companies suffer from bloated hiring flows: too many interviews, redundant assessments, unclear decision-makers. Every added step burns hours of employee time.

Audit your hiring process with these questions:

  • What are we uncovering or derisking at each stage of the interview?
  • How do we determine who is the best candidate?
  • Who is the decision maker on the hire?

Fewer rounds, better tools, faster decisions. Top candidates won't wait weeks. Team output will remain unaffected. And your budget will thank you.

In Summary

Hiring in 2025 is expensive—but it doesn't have to be wasteful. Smart businesses are cutting costs and accelerating hiring by:

These aren't just tactics. They're a strategic shift in how modern teams think about hiring and build world-class talent. Companies that embrace these tools and methods will not only hire better and faster—they'll win the talent wars of the next decade.

← Back to All Thoughts