Recruitment for technology startups & scaleups
A different way to pay for recruitment in technology teams.
SUS is recruitment for international technology startups and scaleups — software, deep tech and other technically complex businesses. Hire specialist technical talent without one large recruitment invoice at the point of hire: you pay an agreed monthly percentage of that employee’s gross monthly salary for as long as they stay.
Not ready for numbers? Talk to us instead. Nothing is committed either way.
- No day one fee
- Spread the recruitment cost
- Stops if they leave
- Billing follows the hire
- Buyout available
- On agreed terms, any time
We find and place specialist technical talent for your team — engineering, product and technology leadership roles — and you pay a simple monthly percentage of their gross monthly salary for as long as they stay.
Startup Staffing is operated by Humand Talent Solutions Limited.
The problem
The recruitment fee lands at the worst possible moment.
Hiring a £60,000 employee can create a significant recruitment invoice almost immediately, at exactly the same time the business is absorbing salary, onboarding, equipment and the ramp up period before that person is fully productive.
For an early stage or scaling business, that concentration of cost is the difference between hiring now and hiring later. SUS moves the recruitment cost onto a monthly footing tied to that employee, rather than stacking it at the start of the hire.
- 1Recruitment invoiceOften due within weeks of the start date
- 2Salary and NILive from month one
- 3Onboarding and equipmentLaptop, tools, licences
- 4Ramp up timeFull value takes a few months
How it works
Five steps from open role to a hire you pay for month by month, for as long as they stay.
- 01
Tell us who you need
We work with you to understand the role, the team around it and where the business is heading.
- 02
We find the right person
Humand's recruitment team sources, assesses and introduces suitable candidates.
- 03
Hire them
The candidate becomes your employee in the normal way, on your contract and your terms.
- 04
Pay monthly while they stay
Instead of one large recruitment invoice, the agreed recruitment fee is paid through monthly payments linked to that employee.
- 05
Stay flexible
If the employee leaves, billing stops. You can also choose to buy out the agreement under the agreed commercial terms.
The recruitment work is unchanged. Only the way you pay for it is different.
Search, assessment and introductions are delivered by Humand's recruitment team. Our income continues only while the person we introduced is still with you, so we are motivated to find hires that last.
See the process in full
Cost calculator
One large invoice, or a predictable monthly cost.
This calculator is here to show one thing clearly: the difference between paying a recruitment fee at the point of hire and paying a monthly fee for as long as the employee stays. Change any figure to model your own situation.
It is not a quote and it does not set your rate. Over a long enough period the totals can cross over — what SUS offers is cash flow, flexibility, shared risk and aligned incentives, not a promise of the lowest total cost.
Your actual SUS percentage and commercial terms are agreed with you individually and confirmed in writing.
Your figures
Every percentage here is editable and illustrative. It is not a quotation or a standard SUS rate.
Changes the modelling currency only — figures are not converted between currencies, remain illustrative, and actual commercial terms are agreed directly with Startup Staffing.
Percentage of annual salary, invoiced at the point of hire.
Percentage of gross monthly salary, charged monthly while the employee stays. An example, not the universal SUS rate.
Under the SUS model, billing stops when the employment ends — so this is how many monthly payments would be made.
What this looks like
- Traditional fee at the point of hire
- £12,000
- 20% of £60,000
- SUS cost per month
- £875
- 17.5% of £5,000 gross monthly salary
- SUS cost after 15 months
- £13,125
- £1,125 more than the traditional fee at this point
- Recruitment cost not paid upfront
- £11,125
- Cash kept in the business in month one compared with paying the traditional fee immediately. This is timing, not necessarily an overall saving.
- Traditional (dashed)
- SUS (solid)
Traditional recruitment: £12,000 paid in month one, unchanged thereafter. SUS: £875 each month, £13,125 in total after 15 months. Cumulative SUS equals the traditional fee at approximately month 14.
At these example rates, the cumulative SUS cost reaches the traditional recruitment fee at approximately month 14. Before that point less has been paid out; after it, more. Neither is presented as better — the difference is when the money leaves the business and what happens if the hire does not stay.
If the employee leaves, SUS billing stops from their final date of employment. Modelling 15 months above means 15 monthly payments — not a longer commitment.
Buy-out. You can agree an option to buy out the agreement and end monthly billing. The buy-out value is agreed separately in your commercial terms, so it is not calculated here.
Model several hires, share the scenario and ask us for a rate. Illustrative example only — your SUS percentage, buy-out value and commercial terms are agreed with you in writing.
Is it a fit?
Is SUS right for your business?
The model suits some businesses far better than others. Here is an honest view, so you can work out quickly whether it is worth a conversation.
SUS tends to work well when…
- You are an international technology startup or scaleup hiring permanent employees — pre-seed through Series B+, bootstrapped or funded.
- You are hiring specialist technical or engineering roles: software engineering, technical leadership, product, design, DevOps, platform, infrastructure, QA, data or AI/ML.
- Protecting cash flow matters as much as making the hire.
- You want experienced technical recruitment support rather than doing it all in-house.
- You would rather pay for recruitment monthly, while the hire stays, than take a large invoice at the point of hire.
- You value a recruitment partner whose commercial model stays connected to how long the hire lasts.
SUS may not be the best fit when…
- You specifically want a conventional one-off recruitment fee and are happy to pay it at the point of hire.
- You are hiring temporary, contract or other non-permanent workers, which sit outside the standard SUS permanent placement model.
- A different commercial arrangement suits your situation better — we will say so rather than force the model.
In those cases we can still help through Humand's conventional recruitment service, or tell you plainly that we are not the right partner for this hire.
The five-question version suggests where to start — a cost model, a hiring plan, a brief, or a conversation — and explains why. Nothing is stored and nothing is sent to us.
Who delivers SUS
A new way to pay for recruitment, delivered by an established recruitment company.
Startup Staffing is not an anonymous new recruitment website. It is a product of Humand Talent Solutions Limited, a UK-registered recruitment business working with international technology startups and scaleups. The way the recruitment fee is paid is what is new — the recruitment work behind it is delivered by Humand's existing team.
- A registered UK recruitment companyHumand Talent Solutions Limited, company number 12379847, registered in England and Wales at 1 Abbey Street, Eynsham, OX29 4TB, United Kingdom.
- Humand consultants do the recruitingSearch, assessment and candidate introductions are carried out by Humand's recruitment team — the same people, process and standards behind their conventional placements.
- Written commercial termsYour percentage, invoicing arrangements and buy-out value are agreed with you in writing before any work begins. Nothing on this website is a quotation.
Why Humand created SUS
Humand kept meeting technology startup founders who wanted proper specialist recruitment support and could not justify a five-figure invoice landing in the same month as a new salary.
Some of those companies hired alone, more slowly, and sometimes badly. Others paid the fee and felt the cash gap for months afterwards.
SUS was created so the recruitment cost follows the employment rather than arriving ahead of it — and so Humand only keeps earning while the hire is still there.
Startup Staffing (SUS)
A recruitment fee model from Humand Talent Solutions Limited. Company number 12379847. Registered office 1 Abbey Street, Eynsham, OX29 4TB, United Kingdom.
You can meet the consultants who run SUS searches, or read more about the recruitment business behind SUS.
Meet the team behind a SUS placementRead published Google reviews of HumandVisit the Humand Talent Solutions websiteUseful before you talk to anyone
Work the numbers first
Free to use, nothing to sign up for. Everything here works whether or not you ever hire through us.
FAQ
The questions founders ask first
The questions that come up first. The full FAQ covers costs, contracts, buy-outs and getting started in detail, with a plain English glossary.
Ask us your questionBuild your team without taking the recruitment hit all at once.
You do not need a finished job specification to talk to us. A rough idea of the role is plenty — we will do the rest with you.
- A specific live vacancy you are trying to fill
- Hiring you are planning over the next few months
- Several future hires and how they would work together
- Whether SUS is the right fit for your business at all
Prefer to talk? 01865 657 000
Prefer email? joseph@humand.co.uk