How Companies Set Themselves Up for Hiring Heartbreak: Unrealistic Expectations for Recruiters and the Painful Consequences
TJ Kastning
Introduction: When the Hiring Problem Isn’t the Recruiter
Companies love to blame recruiters when hiring doesn’t go as planned.
🚩 “The candidates weren’t a fit.”
🚩 “The recruiter didn’t understand our needs.”
🚩 “We made a hire, but they didn’t last.”
But in reality, many companies set themselves up for hiring failure long before a recruiter enters the picture.
✅ They have unrealistic expectations of what recruiters can (and should) fix.
✅ They lack organizational self-awareness and oversell their company.
✅ They ignore red flags about internal dysfunction.
✅ They want a recruiter to find someone who will “fit” their broken system, rather than addressing why hiring is so hard for them in the first place.
The result? Wasted money, frustrated recruiters, burned-out employees, and a growing reputation as an employer that top talent avoids.
Common Ways Companies Set Themselves Up for Hiring Disappointment
1. Expecting the Recruiter to Find a Candidate Who Will Tolerate Dysfunction
Most companies don’t expect recruiters to fix their bad processes, broken culture, or leadership gaps.
❌ Instead, they expect recruiters to find a candidate who is somehow a perfect fit for the dysfunction.
❌ They don’t ask, “Why is this role so hard to fill?” They ask, “Why can’t you just find me someone?”
🚨 The problem?
- Candidates who are truly high-performing, accountable professionals will not tolerate broken systems.
- Candidates who do tolerate dysfunction are often damaged, toxic, or so desperate that they’ll take anything.
- Hiring them doesn’t fix the problem—it compounds it.
💡 A better approach: Instead of forcing a square peg into a round hole, companies should ask, “What about our leadership, culture, or systems is making hiring difficult?”
2. Overselling the Company and Creating a Day of Reckoning
Some leadership teams genuinely believe they have their act together.
They aren’t intentionally misleading candidates—they lack the self-awareness to see how their company actually operates.
🚨 The consequences?
- They oversell the company, culture, and opportunity.
- The new hire realizes the truth within weeks or months.
- They feel disillusioned, disengaged, and regretful.
- They quit—or worse, stay but underperform.
💡 A better approach:
- Companies must be radically honest about what the job and culture actually entail.
- If a candidate walks away because of that honesty? Good—it saves both sides from a future disaster.
3. Ignoring Red Flags About Their Own Hiring Process
🚩 One of my personal red flags for a problem client?
If I point out an issue with their job description, hiring process, or team dynamics and they don’t seem to care.
This means one of two things:
1️⃣ They don’t respect Ambassador Group as an experienced hiring partner.
2️⃣ Their ego is so fragile that they can’t handle constructive feedback.
Either way? We’re out.
🚨 Why does this matter?
- Companies that ignore recruiter feedback are usually the same ones that struggle to retain employees.
- If they can’t handle small course corrections now, they won’t handle turnover and hiring failures well later.
💡 A better approach:
- Treat recruiters as partners, not order-takers.
- If a recruiter flags something—listen. They’ve seen how these issues play out before.
4. Expecting a Recruiter to Solve a Problem They Don’t Have Permission to Fix
Recruiters don’t have the access, authority, or influence to fix a company’s internal chaos.
Yet, companies still expect:
❌ A recruiter to somehow improve retention when leadership is the real problem.
❌ A recruiter to convince candidates to accept lowball offers when compensation isn’t competitive.
❌ A recruiter to find talent for a role that no one wants because the job description is unrealistic.
🚨 The reality?
Recruiters can only bring great people to the door. If the company is a mess behind that door, great people won’t stay.
💡 A better approach:
- Before hiring, fix what’s broken internally so that strong candidates actually want to stay.
5. Hiring in a State of Delusion, Leading to Organizational Collapse
🚧 A real example:
We worked with a construction company undergoing multi-regional expansion.
💬 The visionary leader talked a good game, had big plans, and made everyone excited.
💬 We placed three senior leaders with them.
💬 Our onboarding check-ins revealed a disaster brewing under the surface.
🚩 Total lack of internal communication.
🚩 No real alignment among leadership.
🚩 Extreme stress, burnout, blameshifting, and disorganization.
🚩 Massive amounts of unrealized risk.
🔥 The likely outcome?
- Key people will quit.
- The company will be forced into a painful reorganization.
- If they refuse to change, they will cease to exist.
🚨 This is why Ambassador Group will not let them keep spending money with us on recruiting.
🚨 They aren’t humble enough to acknowledge the issues, and hiring people into this disaster is just feeding them into a corporate wood chipper.
💡 A better approach:
- Growth doesn’t come from hiring more people—it comes from having the foundation to support them.
- If a company isn’t operationally sound, hiring faster only speeds up the collapse.
6. Blaming the Recruiter Instead of Taking Responsibility
Most hiring managers don’t maliciously avoid responsibility.
They simply don’t know how to take it.
Hiring is complex, and many leaders:
❌ Don’t understand the second- and third-order effects of their hiring decisions.
❌ Don’t see how their leadership style directly impacts turnover.
❌ Don’t connect poor hiring outcomes to internal dysfunction.
So when hiring goes wrong? Blaming the recruiter is the easy way out.
🚨 The reality?
- Hiring success isn’t just about finding the right person.
- It’s about creating the right environment for them to succeed.
💡 A better approach:
- Take ownership of the hiring process.
- If recruiting isn’t working, ask “What about our company is making this hard?”
Final Thoughts: Hiring Success Requires Self-Awareness
✅ The best companies don’t just hire—they build an environment where people want to stay.
✅ Recruiters can’t fix a broken culture—but they can help leaders see what’s broken.
✅ Hiring isn’t just about bringing in talent—it’s about making sure talent can thrive.
💡 The companies that succeed in hiring are the ones humble enough to ask, “How do we need to improve first?”
Need Help Building a Hiring Process That Actually Works?
At Ambassador Group, we help companies:
✔️ Avoid hiring pitfalls that lead to high turnover.
✔️ Align hiring strategies with real business needs.
✔️ Develop hiring processes that attract and retain top talent.
📍 Schedule a call here → Ambassador Group Exploratory Call 🚀
