17 Hires in One Week: The AI Recruitment Tool for Small Teams
How a 3-person startup used Empathix to hire 17 people in one week, saving 95% of CV screening time and cutting recruitment costs by half.
The Challenge
When you're a small team trying to scale fast, recruitment becomes your biggest bottleneck. Every hour spent screening CVs is an hour not spent building your product, talking to customers, or growing your business.
This was exactly the situation one of our early customers faced. A 3-person startup that had just raised their seed round and needed to grow their team from 3 to 20 people in less than 3 months.
"We needed to hire fast, but we couldn't afford a recruiter. We were spending 23 hours a week just reading CVs, and most candidates weren't even close to what we needed."
— Startup Founder
The Old Way: Painful & Slow
Manual CV Screening
23 hours per week reading 200+ CVs per role, most completely irrelevant
Endless Phone Screens
30-minute calls with candidates who didn't match the role description
Can't Afford Recruiters
$15,000-25,000 per hire was completely out of budget
Slow Time to Hire
4-6 weeks from job posting to offer, losing top candidates to faster competitors
The Empathix Solution
The team integrated Empathix into their hiring workflow. Here's what changed:
AI-Powered CV Screening
Empathix automatically screened every applicant against their specific role requirements, surfacing only the top 3-5 candidates per position. Time spent on CV screening dropped from 23 hours to just 90 minutes per week.
Voice Outreach to Passive Candidates
For specialized roles, Empathix's voice AI reached out to passive candidates in the market, engaging people who weren't actively job hunting but were open to the right opportunity.
Interview-Ready Matches
Every candidate that reached the founder's inbox was pre-qualified, genuinely interested, and matched on both skills and culture fit. No more wasted interview slots.
The Results
From job posting to signed offer, across engineering, product, sales, and operations roles
From 23 hours/week on CV screening to 90 minutes - founders could focus on interviewing and closing candidates
Avoided recruiter fees of $7,500 per hire across 17 positions
All 17 hires were still with the company 6 months later - quality over quantity works
"Empathix gave us agency-quality recruitment at a fraction of the cost. We got our time back to focus on building the company, and we hired better people faster."
— Startup Founder, Series A Company
How Small Teams Can Hire Like Enterprises
The traditional recruitment model is broken for small teams. You either:
- •DIY it and burn 20+ hours/week on admin work, or
- •Pay recruiters $15K-25K per hire (if you can even afford it)
Empathix gives you a third option: agency tools without the agency.
You get AI-powered CV screening, passive candidate outreach, and interview-ready matches - all integrated with your existing ATS. You spend your time choosing the right people, not drowning in unqualified applications.
What You Can Learn
Quality over quantity wins every time
3-5 perfectly matched candidates beats 200 random CVs. Save time by only interviewing people who actually fit.
Passive candidates are often the best hires
The best people aren't desperately job hunting - they're happily employed but open to the right opportunity. You need to find them.
Speed matters in competitive hiring markets
Top candidates have multiple offers. The faster you move from application to interview, the more likely you are to win.
AI should augment decisions, not replace them
Empathix handles the screening grunt work, but founders still made the final hiring decisions. That's the right balance.
Ready to Hire Like This?
If you're a small team that needs to hire fast without burning your budget or your time, Empathix can help. We integrate with 50+ ATS platforms and work alongside your existing workflow.
Try Empathix Free