The average time to hire has doubled in the last two years. Companies now take 50 days to fill an open position. This dramatic shift shows how complex modern recruitment has become and why understanding industry standards is vital to staying competitive.
Different sectors show striking variations in their hiring speeds. The construction sector moves fast at 12.7 days. Healthcare services need much longer at 49 days on average. Government roles typically take 40.9 days to fill, while leisure and hospitality positions close in just 20.7 days. These differences prove why companies should measure their recruitment against industry standards. Time-to-fill metrics vary substantially between sectors and affect both candidate experience and operational efficiency.
This piece dives into typical hiring durations across major industries. We'll look at what these metrics tell us about hiring efficiency and share practical ways to speed up your recruitment process. Companies that cut their interview timeline by 5 days see a 20% boost in candidate Net Promoter Score - a key advantage in today's competitive talent market.
Understanding Time to Hire vs. Time to Fill
Image Source: AIHR
Recruiting success depends on understanding two metrics that people often mix up. Let's look at these significant ways to measure recruitment timelines that will help you set the right standards for your hiring process.
What is time to hire?
Time to hire measures how long it takes from the moment a candidate enters your recruitment pipeline until they accept your job offer. This metric shows how quickly your team finds and secures the right talent after they apply. According to SHRM, the average time to hire takes about 36 days. But other sources suggest it's closer to 24 days.
The formula is straightforward: Time to Hire = Day candidate accepts offer – Day candidate enters pipeline
This measurement shows your recruitment team's speed in moving candidates through evaluations. Your average hiring process time needs to stay short because research shows that 57% of job seekers lose interest in lengthy hiring processes.
How it differs from time to fill
Time to fill works differently and covers a wider timeline. The clock starts when someone approves or posts a job requisition and stops when a candidate accepts the offer. The average time to fill in the U.S. takes about 36 days.
The starting point creates the main difference:
- Time to hire: Starts when the candidate applies
- Time to fill: Starts when the position is approved or posted
Time to fill helps you learn about your entire recruitment cycle. This includes creating job descriptions, advertising positions, and finding candidates. So it's always longer than or equal to your time to hire.
Why this difference matters for benchmarking
You need to understand these differences to benchmark accurately. Time to hire shows how well your team identifies and secures talent. Time to fill reveals your overall recruitment efficiency.
Tracking both metrics lets you:
- Find specific bottlenecks in your recruitment process
- Make better hiring timeline predictions
- Compare your results against average time to fill by industry
- Create a better candidate experience (cutting interview time by 5 days can boost candidate satisfaction by 20%)
These metrics are a great way to get two views - one from the candidate's side and one from the organization's side. Together, they give you a detailed picture of your recruitment efficiency and how well you compete in today's talent market.
Average Time to Hire by Industry
Image Source: Hacking HR
"How long does it take to fill a role in your industry?" — Nikolay Filipova, HR Analytics Expert
Hiring timelines show striking differences across industries. These numbers help you understand how your recruitment process compares to others in the market.
Construction and Manufacturing
Construction leads with the fastest hiring time at 12.7 days. This speed comes from straightforward job requirements. Manufacturing shows a more complex pattern with hiring cycles between 25 to 44 days, based on role seniority. The industry currently has almost 800,000 open positions. Recruiters need different approaches for high-volume and specialized roles.
Healthcare and Education
Healthcare takes the longest to recruit, with an average hiring time of 49 days - twice the national average. Specialized medical roles need even more time. Primary care positions require 125+ days, while cardiology or psychiatry roles can take 180+ days to fill. Education roles average 29.3 days, though professor positions often need more than 60 days.
Finance and Government
Financial services have one of the longest hiring cycles at 44.7 days. Investment banking roles specifically take 21-60 days. Government jobs face bigger recruitment challenges at 40.9 days, while public sector positions need about 119 days. Federal roles often take longer due to background checks and security clearances.
Retail, Hospitality, and Logistics
Retail and hospitality shine with quick hiring processes, taking 14-20.7 days respectively. These industries benefit from bigger talent pools and more entry-level positions with high turnover and high-volume hiring. Logistics and transportation sit in the middle at 24.9 days, just under the industry-wide average of 44 days.
What Industry Benchmarks Reveal About Hiring Efficiency
Image Source: NetSuite
The patterns we see in recruiting efficiency tell us a fascinating story about hiring speeds in different sectors. A look at hiring processes reveals why some companies bring people on board quickly while others take their time.
Industries with the fastest hiring processes
Retail and hospitality lead the pack with quick hiring cycles. The numbers speak for themselves - 20.7 days for retail and 14-20 days for hospitality. These sectors move fast because they use standard requirements and need lots of people.
Tech giants set impressive speed records. Uber leads with a 9.34-day average hiring timeline, and Amazon follows at 10.11 days. The speed comes in part from their workforce model that brings on drivers and warehouse staff along with technical experts.
Industries with the slowest hiring processes
Engineering jobs take the longest to fill, with candidates waiting 49 days from application to start date. Healthcare services match this timeline at 49 days. Financial services come next at 44.7 days.
Government jobs also take their time at 40.9 days. Size matters too - organizations with 5,000+ employees need 58 days compared to the national average of 25 days.
How job function affects time to hire
Technical roles need more time in every industry. Research positions take 48 days, finance needs 46 days, and IT requires 44 days - all longer than average. Non-technical roles move faster: customer service (34 days), sales (38 days), and human resources (39 days).
This trend shows up everywhere. Engineering positions need 29 days globally and 28 days in North America. Customer service roles move faster at 21 days in both regions.
Impact of seniority level on hiring speed
Leadership roles shape recruitment timelines significantly. Executive and senior management positions take 40-50% longer to fill than entry-level jobs. Companies need extra time to properly evaluate candidates for these key positions.
How to Improve Your Time to Hire
Image Source: SlideBazaar
"How productive are recruiting teams in filling open roles?" — Nikolay Filipova, HR Analytics Expert
Your average time to hire just needs strategic improvements across your recruitment funnel. These five proven strategies will help you speed up your hiring process by a lot without compromising quality.
Build and maintain talent pipelines
Proactive talent pipelines help you avoid starting your search from scratch. Research shows this approach ranks as the most effective sourcing method. Start by identifying roles you hire frequently. Define specific requirements and connect with qualified candidates at industry events, conferences, and professional networks like LinkedIn. Regular contact with these prospects through personalized messages helps them stay interested and ready when positions open.
Use an Applicant Tracking System (ATS)
An ATS makes recruitment smoother by automating repetitive tasks like posting jobs, screening resumes, and scheduling interviews. The numbers speak for themselves - 94% of companies using an ATS report better hiring processes. Modern systems come with AI-powered features that rank candidates based on skills and experience. This helps recruiters spot top talent quickly.
Streamline interview scheduling and communication
Interview scheduling creates a major bottleneck that typically takes 30 minutes to two hours per candidate. Automated scheduling tools can cut this time by 80%. Quick and efficient communication matters - 56% of US candidates rank it as a priority. Self-scheduling options and automated updates keep candidates engaged and boost their experience throughout the process.
Make use of internal talent pools
Internal promotions speed up hiring and improve team morale. External hires cost about 18% more than internal promotions and show lower performance in their first two years. Internal mobility initiatives build diverse capabilities in your organization. They reduce both time and cost to fill positions.
Track and analyze your hiring metrics
Informed recruitment decisions help identify bottlenecks and create improvements. Key metrics to watch include time in each process step, candidate source effectiveness, and application completion rates. Regular analysis shows where candidates spend too much time in your pipeline. This enables targeted improvements that steadily reduce your average time to fill.
Conclusion
Your industry's average time to hire is a vital standard to measure recruitment success in today's competitive talent market. This piece has shown how hiring timelines vary dramatically—from construction's swift 12.7 days to healthcare's lengthy 49-day average. Generic recruitment targets often fail to provide meaningful guidance because of these differences.
Time to hire and time to fill measurements help pinpoint recruitment bottlenecks precisely. This difference lets you spot challenges in sourcing candidates or moving them through your evaluation process.
Seniority level and job function affect hiring timelines without doubt, whatever the industry. Technical roles need more thorough evaluation, while executive positions take 40-50% longer to fill than entry-level roles. Your recruitment planning and candidate communications should reflect this reality.
Shorter hiring timelines give you a competitive edge. Cutting just 5 days from your interview process can boost candidate satisfaction by 20%. The strategies outlined—building talent pipelines, using an ATS, streamlining scheduling, tapping internal talent, and tracking metrics—create both immediate and long-term recruitment benefits.
The doubled average time to hire mentioned earlier doesn't have to be your story. You can create a recruitment process that attracts and secures top talent before competitors schedule their first interviews by using industry standards and proven optimization strategies. Your improved hiring efficiency will optimize both candidate experience and organizational performance—a winning combination for any industry.
FAQs
Q1. What is the current average time to hire across industries?
The average time to hire has increased to approximately 44 days across industries. However, this can vary significantly depending on the sector, with some industries like construction having much shorter hiring cycles and others like healthcare taking longer.
Q2. How does time to hire differ from time to fill?
Time to hire measures the period from when a candidate enters your recruitment pipeline until they accept the job offer. Time to fill, on the other hand, starts when a job requisition is approved or posted and ends when a candidate accepts the offer, encompassing the entire recruitment cycle.
Q3. Which industries have the fastest and slowest hiring processes?
Retail and hospitality tend to have the fastest hiring processes, averaging 14-20 days. On the other hand, healthcare and engineering positions typically have the slowest hiring processes, averaging around 49 days.
Q4. How does job function affect the time to hire?
Technical roles like research, finance, and IT generally require more time to hire, regardless of the industry. Non-technical functions such as customer service, sales, and human resources tend to have faster hiring processes.
Q5. What strategies can improve time to hire?
To improve time to hire, companies can build and maintain talent pipelines, use an Applicant Tracking System (ATS), streamline interview scheduling and communication, leverage internal talent pools, and consistently track and analyze hiring metrics. These strategies can significantly accelerate the hiring process without compromising on quality.
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