Hiring & Firing with Fexingo: Recruitment, Performance, and Workforce Decisions

Most companies think internal mobility means letting people transfer departments. But the most effective approach is what some firms call 'talent hoarding'—actively retaining and redeploying high performers before they even think about leaving. In this episode, Lucas and Luna unpack a case study from a mid-sized tech firm that cut external hiring by 30 percent by building a formal internal talent...

Lucas and Luna explore how limiting initial job application questions to three critical items dramatically increases completion rates and candidate quality. Lucas shares data from a mid-sized tech firm that saw a 47 percent jump in qualified applicants after dropping a 12-question form to three. They discuss cognitive friction, signal-to-noise ratio, and why many HR departments over-engineer the a...

In episode 55 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore why the popular hiring strategy of 'culture fit' often backfires by creating homogeneous teams. They dive into the data: companies using 'culture add' criteria see 21% higher innovation scores and 30% lower turnover. The hosts dissect a case study at a mid-size tech firm that replaced culture-fit questions with culture-add promp...

In this episode of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore a counterintuitive hiring strategy: actively recruiting candidates who have publicly criticized your company. They break down how one engineering team at a mid-size SaaS company turned negative Glassdoor reviews into a pipeline of high-retention hires. The episode covers the psychology behind candidate honesty, a three-step sc...

In episode 53 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore a simple but powerful change that transformed applicant quality: including salary ranges in job postings. They break down a real case from a mid-size tech company that saw a 30% increase in qualified applicants and a 15% shorter time-to-hire after adding salary transparency. The conversation covers why candidates skip ads withou...

Lucas and Luna explore the radical impact of paying job applicants for their time during interviews. They examine a 2024 experiment by a mid-sized tech firm that offered $100 to every candidate who completed a two-hour skills assessment. The result: a 34% increase in applicant quality and a 28% drop in no-shows. They discuss the psychology of reciprocity, how paychecks signal respect, and why this...

In this episode of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore how a mid-sized tech company eliminated names, schools, and photo from early resume screening and saw the diversity of their interview slate jump from 18% to 41% in one quarter. We walk through the exact process they used — anonymized application forms, a skills-based knockout quiz, and a structured rubric for the first phone...

Lucas and Luna dig into the hiring philosophy of a standout recruiter at a midsize cybersecurity firm who deliberately looks for 'uncommon commonalities' — niche shared experiences between interviewer and candidate that predict fit better than standard culture-fit questions. They walk through a real example: a candidate hired because both she and the hiring manager had worked on the same obscure L...

Lucas and Luna dig into the research showing that unstructured job interviews—the classic 'tell me about yourself' conversation—are barely better than random chance at predicting on-the-job performance. Lucas cites a 2024 meta-analysis of 117 studies finding a corrected correlation of just 0.20. They contrast this with structured interviews, which reach 0.57. The hosts walk through a concrete exam...

Episode 48 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo: Lucas and Luna dig into a surprising hiring failure — the team interview. They examine a 2025 study of 1,200 candidates showing that 62% of top performers declined offers after multi-panel interviews, citing wasted time and groupthink pressure. The hosts break down why unstructured team interviews backfire, how one mid-sized tech company cut its intervie...

Lucas and Luna dig into the failure of the standard exit interview — why departing employees rarely tell the truth, how companies waste the data they do collect, and what a redesigned offboarding process looks like. They examine Dropbox's post-exit pulse surveys, which boosted actionable feedback by 60 percent, and contrast them with the typical HR checklist that captures nothing useful. Lucas sha...

In this episode of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna dive into the surprising power of second-degree internal referrals — recommendations from current employees who don't directly work with the candidate but know them through professional networks. They break down a real-world case from a mid-sized tech firm that increased offer acceptance by 30% and reduced time-to-hire by 12 days simp...

In this episode of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna dive into a specific data point: companies that send a short, role-relevant pre-interview quiz see offer acceptance rates climb by nearly 20 percent. They unpack a case from a mid-size tech firm that implemented a 15-minute coding logic quiz before the first phone screen. The quiz wasn't about right or wrong answers—it was about signa...

Lucas and Luna dig into a surprising hiring case: how a single tweak in a job description—replacing '5+ years experience required' with 'we welcome candidates with 2+ years'—caused a 40 percent drop in applicants, but a 60 percent increase in quality hires. They break down why overqualified candidates are often a trap, how specificity in job ads acts as a self-selection filter, and why the best hi...

In this episode of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna dive into a surprisingly effective hiring tactic: the one-question screener. They unpack a case study from a mid-size SaaS company that added a single, job-specific question to their application process and saw a 40 percent drop in early-stage mis-hires. Lucas explains why traditional screening filters — years of experience, degree re...

Episode 42 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo. Lucas and Luna challenge the near-universal practice of reference checks. They examine a 2025 study from the Journal of Applied Psychology showing that reference letters have a correlation of just 0.12 with actual job performance — barely better than random. Lucas argues that references measure who the candidate knows, not what they can do, and explains...

In this episode of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna dig into the surprising impact of listing salary ranges in job postings. They break down a case study from a mid-size tech company that added a single line—'$110,000–$135,000'—to every job description and saw a 40% increase in qualified applicants within three months. The conversation covers why transparency reduces negotiation anxiet...

Episode 40 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo. Lucas and Luna dig into a specific experiment by a mid-size SaaS company that replaced '3-5 years experience' with 'proven ability to ship' in their job postings. The result? 40 percent more applicants, 60 percent drop in early-stage screen-outs, and hires who outperformed at 90 days. They break down why that phrase triggers self-selection bias, how it f...

Episode 39 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo digs into the hidden costs of unpaid trial tasks in recruiting. Lucas and Luna cite a 2025 study by the recruiting platform Applied showing that companies requiring unpaid 'test projects' lose 34% of in-demand candidates before the interview stage. They contrast this with a case study from Buffer, which replaced trial tasks with a paid, two-day simulation...

Episode 38 of Hiring & Firing digs into the surprising data behind job description language. Lucas and Luna examine a 2025 study from Textio analyzing 2.7 million job posts, which found that listings with more than 10 requirements in the 'must-have' section received 40% fewer applications from high-skill candidates. They walk through why overloaded descriptions signal unrealistic expectations, how...

Episode 37 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo dives into the overlooked power of internal mobility. Lucas and Luna examine why companies that promote from within see 24% longer employee tenure and 18% higher productivity than those that rely on external hiring. They break down specific data from a 2025 LinkedIn study showing that internal hires reach full proficiency 40% faster than external hires. T...

In Episode 36 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna dive into why the popular concept of hiring for 'grit' can actually harm team dynamics and performance. They examine a 2024 study from Stanford showing that overvaluing persistence leads to underweighting adaptability and collaboration. The hosts discuss a real example from a mid-sized tech firm that hired for grit and saw turnover spik...

Lucas and Luna drill into a specific problem that costs companies millions in wasted recruiting budget: hiring managers who pad job descriptions with 'nice-to-have' requirements that have nothing to do with actual on-the-job performance. Drawing on a 2025 study of 20,000 job postings from the National Bureau of Economic Research, they break down why requiring five years of experience for a role th...

Episode 34 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo. Lucas and Luna take down the 'grit' hiring fad. They trace the concept back to Angela Duckworth's 2016 book, then break down why a gritty individual can destroy team cohesion. Using the example of a real sales team at a mid-market SaaS company, they show how one relentlessly persistent hire actually drove away three high-performers because they refused t...

Episode 33 of Hiring & Firing with Fexingo. Lucas and Luna dive into a growing body of research showing that candidates hired for their learning ability, curiosity, and adaptability consistently outperform those hired solely for past experience — especially in fast-changing roles. They examine a 2025 study by the Society for Human Resource Management that tracked 2,400 hires across 18 months: work...