Hiring Is in Slow Motion. Now What??
I don’t know if you’ve looked at the jobs reports lately, but…big yikes.
🐢 Hiring has slowed to a crawl!
Interview processes that used to take weeks now drag on for months.
Comp isn’t skyrocketing like it was in 2021…but it’s also not falling enough to give companies real breathing room.
And HR leaders are 🍀 lucky 🍀 enough to be stuck in the middle, with fewer seats to fill, more pressure to make each hire flawless, and less margin for error if the team gets it wrong.
Is this a safe space? Because I’m about to say something potentially hard to hear…
Fear could be driving a lot of your hiring decisions.
Leaders are terrified of hiring the wrong person, and candidates are terrified of being ghosted after interview round #27.
HR is terrified of both, because we’re the ones who have to help pick the right people and keep them happy once they’re here!
The moment we’re in requires a sharper, smarter approach.
Hiring fewer people means the cost per employee is higher than ever, so if it takes you more than six interviews to make a decision?
Your process could be broken…
So how do we move from panic-hiring to precision-hiring?
Here are three ways to make the best decisions with the talent you do bring in, and how to keep them once you’ve got them!
1. Hire for Tomorrow, Not Just Today
One of the biggest, most common mistakes teams make when hiring in a slow market is hiring for the immediate gap instead of the long-term need.
And hey, I completely get it! And I’ve even been there…
It’s tempting. Your team is underwater, the CEO is breathing down your neck, and you just need a body in a chair.
But today’s “quick fix” hire usually becomes tomorrow’s regret.
The risks are obvious:
- You hire for skills that could be automated in 12 months.
- You bring in someone great for the role now, but not adaptable as the company grows.
- You make a desperate choice because the process dragged too long and your top candidates bailed.
Future-proof hiring means asking these types of questions:
“Will this person grow with us?”
“Will their skills compound in value?”
“Are we screening for adaptability, not just credentials?”
If your hiring process is 6+ rounds of hoops and homework that doesn’t measure that, you’re potentially on the fast track to making a hire you will regret. And that is PAINFUL.
Hiring for tomorrow means hiring people who can grow with the business, not just survive the present.
💡 Pro-tip: when hiring for a role ask the hiring manager what the day to day looks like 30,60,90 days THEN ask about the 1 year mark. If they can’t answer at the 1 year mark or the answer is well the role is different, dig in there.
📚 Additional reading:
Attraction and Retention Are the Same Game
In this market, retention is a strategy.
Hiring has slowed, budgets are tight, and yet the competition for specialized talent is fiercer than it’s ever been.
Losing one high performer means your whole roadmap gets thrown off balance, and now you’re scrambling to backfill a role you didn’t even have on your radar.
So what makes people stay?
I’ll give you a hint: we know it’s not free lunches and ping-pong tables!
The employees you can’t afford to lose are looking for:
- Transparent pay practices (no one wants to play comp roulette).
- Growth paths they can actually see.
- Managers who know how to coach, not just micromanage.
Carta’s State of Startup Compensation Report highlights this clearly: equity transparency and career growth consistently rank as the top retention drivers, which is more than perks, more than titles, and more than “culture fit!”
The orgs that win are the ones treating retention as a strategy, not an afterthought.
If you don’t create clarity around comp and career, someone else’s recruiter will…
And that recruiter will be sliding into your top performer’s DMs by Friday!!
At the end of the day, retention and attraction aren’t two separate strategies. They’re the same thing.
Build a place where people see their value clearly, and you’ll attract the right talent and keep them.
Fail to do that, and you’ll be hiring for the same roles again six months later. 🙃
Pro-tip: Start with your pay practices. Does every manager AND employee understand how their pay is calculated? Put together a 1-pager. Train your managers and talk to your employees so they know that there is thought and care going into how these decisions get made.
Data > Vibes, Every Time
Here’s a hard pill to swallow: most people still hire on vibes.
“I liked her energy.”
“He seemed like a culture fit.”
“I’d get a beer with them after work.”
UGH UGH AND UGH.
Let’s be clear: vibes aren’t a hiring strategy.
None of those statements tell you if someone can actually do the job. And relying on vibes? It’s expensive. That’s how you end up overpaying because a candidate seemed impressive in the room, or worse, giving the role to someone who isn’t even qualified.
This is why you need actual data. Not your friend’s “I heard they’re paying X over at Meta” data.
I’m talking real-time, startup-specific benchmarks. Tools like Carta’s salary benchmarking for startups give you the antidote to all that guesswork. You walk into the hiring convo with hard ranges and equity packages that actually reflect the market, not your gut reaction or someone’s offhand comment after an interview.
When you bring data to the table, vibes stop running the show.
Finance listens. Leadership nods. Everyone chills out. ✌️
The bottom line: vibes might get you through a coffee chat, but data is what saves you when it’s time to make an actual offer.
The Hiring Problem You Can’t Ignore Any Longer
The reality is that hiring has slowed, interviews are dragging, and every single hire carries more weight than ever.
And guess what happens when you don’t have clarity on comp?
- Interviews stretch on forever because no one agrees on salary ranges.
- Candidates bail halfway through because your offer is off-market.
- Finance questions every number you bring to the table.
Even the people you do land churn after six months because their growth path isn’t defined, and you’re back to square one! 😭
Every delay, every mismatch, and every bad decision costs money, runway, and trust, all of which are three things absolutely no HR leader has the luxury of wasting right now.
But here’s the way forward: Carta Total Compensation.
And as an I Hate it Here reader you get 20% off!!! Yeah, you know I love a deal so swoop in and take advantage by mentioning you read it here first.
Instead of flying blind, Carta gives HR leaders the tools to benchmark salaries, design equity packages, and make decisions with confidence!
It’s transparent, it’s data-backed, and it keeps HR, finance, and leadership aligned on one comp philosophy.
That alignment changes everything. With it, interviews move faster. Candidates see clear, competitive offers. Finance trusts your numbers. And employees stick around because the growth and comp story makes sense!
In a tough market, clarity is the difference between retention and turnover. Between running lean and running scared.
Carta doesn’t just help you hire smarter, it helps you build a system where comp drives trust instead of undermining it.
And that trust is what stretches your runway, keeps your best people, and positions HR as the strategic powerhouse it should be.
Wanna see how Carta can help you move faster, hire better, and keep the talent you can’t afford to lose?
You have to read this guide on building an effective compensation strategy. It breaks down:
✅ How to create a compensation philosophy
✅ How to level and pay employees fairly
✅ How to calculate option pool
Basically all the things you need to have a solid foundation to build off of!
