We do about ninety hours of work. You do about two.
The whole point of paying someone to recruit for you is that you do not spend your week reading CVs. Here is exactly how the split works.
How it works
Three weeks, three steps, three candidates
You spend about two hours on this in total. We spend about ninety.
- 0115 minutes
Tell us what you need off your plate
A call, or a form if you'd rather not talk. We're working out the actual job, not filling in a template. Most owners describe tasks, not roles. That's fine, that's our job to translate.
- 02About 12 days
Meet three people, not thirty
We advertise, screen and test. You get three shortlisted candidates with skills-test results, reference checks and a short intro video each. You interview whoever you want. You can reject all three and we go again.
- 03Week three
They start, and we stay
We handle the contract, the onboarding checklist and the first-week setup. Then we check in at 30, 60 and 90 days, because the hires that fail, fail in the first quarter, and almost always for reasons somebody could have fixed.
No pitch deck. We’ll tell you if you’re not ready to hire.
From 300 applicants to 3 people
Every stage exists to remove someone. That is uncomfortable to write down and it is the entire value of the service.
- 300+applicants per role
We advertise the specific job, not a generic VA post. Volume is the point. It is what makes the screening worth anything.
- 40phone screened
A recruiter in Manila talks to every one. English, availability, internet, and whether they actually want this job.
- 12skills tested
A real task from your world, not a personality quiz. A bookkeeper reconciles a messy month; a writer writes.
- 6reference checked
Two references each, called and asked the awkward questions.
- 3shortlisted to you
With test results, reference notes and a short intro video. You interview whoever you want to.
Your side
All you have to do
Three things. The third one is the one people skip, and it is the one that decides whether the hire works.
- 1
A 15-minute brief
What you want off your plate, roughly what you can pay, and when you want them starting.
- 2
Three interviews
Half an hour each, at a time that suits you. We coordinate the scheduling.
- 3
An afternoon of screen-shares
Record yourself doing the tasks you're handing over. Your new hire turns those into written process. That's their first week's work.
Straight answers
“Yeah, but…”
The six things owners actually say on the first call. Two of them have answers you won’t like, and we’ve left those in.
Usually one of three things happened: they were hired off a marketplace with no screening, they were given tasks but no context, or nobody managed them. The first is ours to fix. The second and third are the reason we do a 30/60/90 check-in and hand you an onboarding plan rather than just an email address.
It's a fair question and the answer depends entirely on the rate. The people on our bench earn two to three times the Philippine market rate for their role, get paid on time, and get a real contract. That's not charity. Underpaid people leave, and a replacement costs you more than the difference ever saved.
Manila is ahead of the US and roughly aligned with Australia. Most of our people work either your morning or your overnight, and many prefer the shift. If your work genuinely needs someone live at 4pm New York time, say so early. Some candidates will and some won't, and we'd rather know before you interview them.
Then don't hire one. Part-time placements are common and cost proportionally less. The honest test: if you can't list 20 hours of recurring weekly work right now, you're not ready, and we'll tell you that instead of taking your fee.
Nobody does. That's why we ask you to record a handful of screen-shares rather than write documentation. Talking through what you already do takes an afternoon. Your VA turns those into the written process, which is a task they should be doing anyway.
You can, and for a small one-off task you probably should. The difference is screening and risk: we run skills tests and reference checks across a few hundred applicants for each role, and if the hire doesn't work we replace them free for six months. On a marketplace, that's all yours.
Everything else
Around 18 days from brief to start date, though it depends on how specific the role is. Very niche roles take longer. If we can't find the right person, we say so.
We replace them free of charge within the first six months. On the Managed plan you can also simply cancel with 30 days' notice.
On Direct Hire, you contract them directly. On Managed, we employ them in the Philippines and invoice you monthly, which keeps local employment compliance our problem rather than yours.
Every candidate is screened for a working machine and a backup connection. On the Managed plan we supply and maintain equipment, plus a power backup. Outages are a real thing in Manila and a backup is not optional.
Signed NDAs and confidentiality clauses as standard, plus role-appropriate training. HIPAA for medical roles, PCI awareness for anyone near payments. We'll work to your access policy: most clients use their own SSO and password manager rather than sharing credentials.
Yes. Three is what we've found is enough to choose well without wasting your week, but if none of them fit we run the search again at no extra cost.
Yes. Clients across the US, UK, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. Pricing is in USD.
Card or bank transfer. The placement fee is invoiced on your candidate's start date, not before. If nobody starts, you pay nothing.
Next step
Stop being the only person who can do it
Fifteen minutes, no pitch. Tell us what your week looks like and we’ll tell you honestly whether a hire fixes it.
Or email us, hello@menaitalentconsultants.com