Episode Details

The average hiring funnel converts just 0.6% of applicants to hires — but that number tells you almost nothing useful. The real story is where candidates are leaking out at each stage, and whether those leaks are features or bugs in your process. In this episode, we break down the full five-stage hiring funnel using 2026 benchmark data: sourcing, screening, interviewing, offers, and hire quality. You'll hear why internal mobility converts at 32 times the rate of job boards (and why most teams still ignore this), how a 3x variance in recruiter screening rates is hiding in your team averages, and what the actual math looks like on offer-stage speed — every extra day between interview rounds costs you 1-2% of candidate retention. We also cover where OVI fits in: how the Sora sourcing agent tracks channel-level conversion, and how Milo's audio chats apply a consistent rubric across candidates to close the recruiter-variance gap. The teams that win aren't the ones with the biggest applicant pools. They're the ones who can read their funnel, find the biggest leak, and fix it first.