Your Engineering Hire Is Taking Months. Here's How to Keep Shipping Meanwhile.
Key takeaways
Hiring is slow. The average role takes about 45 days just to fill . Then come the notice period and onboarding.
Good engineers are hard to find. 72% of employers worldwide struggle to hire, and AI skills are now the hardest skills to find.
Even after joining, 72% of engineering leaders say new developers take more than a month to make their first three meaningful contributions
The wait has a cost: a slower roadmap, a tired team and delayed revenue.
You don't have to choose between hiring and shipping. Run both at the same time. Use task-based help, a dedicated monthly engineer, or a paid trial week to keep work moving.
Table of contents
1. The problem: you need an engineer now, but hiring takes months
You opened the job post weeks ago. You have read many profiles. You have done interviews. Maybe you even made an offer.
But the new engineer still has not started.
Meanwhile, your work did not stop. Customers still want the feature you promised. Your investors still expect the next release. And your current engineers are doing extra work to cover the gap.
This is one of the most common problems for startups and growing teams. The need is today. The hire is months away.
This guide explains:
why engineering hiring takes so long (with real data),
what the wait really costs you, and
three simple, low-risk ways to keep shipping while you hire.
2. What the data says about engineering hiring
Let's look at the facts. These numbers come from large, well-known surveys.
Hiring takes about a month and a half, before the person even starts
The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) surveyed 2,371 HR professionals in 2025. The average time to fill a role was about 45 days. That covers the time from opening the job to the candidate saying yes.
This number covers all kinds of jobs. Specialized technical roles, like senior engineers or AI engineers, are often harder to fill. And this number does not include the notice period or onboarding.
Most employers are struggling to find talent
ManpowerGroup's 2026 Talent Shortage Survey asked 39,063 employers in 41 countries.
It found:
72% of employers globally have trouble filling roles.
In the United States, the number is 69%.
In the Information industry, it is 75%, the highest of any industry.
For the first time, AI skills are the hardest to find. "AI model and application development" was named by 20%of employers. Engineering skills were named by 19%.
So if you are hiring an AI or ML engineer right now, you are competing for the hardest skill in the market.
Demand for developers keeps growing
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that software developer jobs will grow by about 10% from 2025 to 2035. That is much faster than average, with about 95,300 job openings every year.
More demand means more competition for the same people.
New engineers need time to become productive
Hiring is not the finish line. Cortex surveyed engineering leaders in 2024 about onboarding:
72% said new developers take more than one month to submit their first three meaningful pull requests.
54% said it takes 1 to 3 months.
18% said it takes more than 3 months.
Note: this was a small survey of 50 engineering leaders at larger companies, so treat it as a signal, not an exact rule.
Your current team is already stretched
LeadDev's Engineering Leadership Report 2025 surveyed 617 engineering leaders and developers:
22% reported critical levels of burnout.
65% said their responsibilities had grown in the past year.
38% said they were working longer hours.
When a role stays empty, this pressure grows.
3. The real timeline of one hire
Here is what a typical engineering hire looks like from start to finish. Your timeline may be shorter or longer, but most teams will recognize these steps.
Stage | What happens | Typical time |
1. Plan and post the role | Write the job description, get approval, post it | About 1 week |
2. Find and screen | Review profiles, do first calls | 1 to 3 weeks |
3. Interview | Technical rounds, take-home tests, team fit | 2 to 3 weeks |
4. Offer | Salary talks, references, approval | About 1 week |
5. Notice period | The candidate leaves their current job | 2 weeks (common in the US) to 3 months (common in India and parts of Europe) |
6. Onboarding | Laptop, access, codebase, first real work | 1 to 3 months to be fully useful |
Total: often 2 to 4 months from "we need someone" to "this person is shipping real work." For senior or AI roles, it can be longer.
These stage times are typical ranges, not exact data. Steps 1 to 4 line up with SHRM's ~45-day average time to fill. Step 6 lines up with the Cortex onboarding data above.
None of this is wrong. Careful hiring is good hiring. The problem is that your roadmap does not wait.
4. The hidden cost of waiting
An empty seat looks like "saved salary." In reality, it costs you in other ways.
1. Your roadmap slips
Features move from "this sprint" to "next quarter." Launch dates move. Promises to customers and investors become harder to keep.
2. Your team gets tired
Someone has to do the extra work. Usually it is your best engineers. LeadDev's data shows teams are already working longer hours with bigger workloads. An empty role makes this worse, and burnout can lead to more people leaving.
3. Engineers spend time on the wrong work
Stripe's Developer Coefficient study found developers spend about 17 hours a week on maintenance work like debugging and refactoring. That is time they are not spending on new features. When the team is short of people, maintenance and new features fight for the same few hours.
4. Revenue and deals wait
Customer pilots, integrations and enterprise requests often depend on engineering. If the work is late, the money is late too.
5. The new hire joins a mess
When the new engineer finally starts, they don't join a team with momentum. They join a team with a pile of late work.
A simple way to estimate your cost of waiting
You can make a rough estimate with this formula:
Cost of waiting = (value of the work per month) × (months until the new hire is productive)
Example (for illustration only):
A new feature is expected to bring in $20,000 a month in new revenue.
Your new hire will be productive in 3 months.
If you wait, you delay about $60,000 of revenue, plus the extra stress on your team.
Use your own numbers. Even rough numbers usually show that waiting is not free.
5. Why "just wait" and "rush the hire" both fail
Most teams feel they have only two choices.
Choice A: Just wait. You keep the hiring process careful. But your roadmap slips and your team gets tired.
Choice B: Rush the hire. You lower the bar to fill the seat faster. But a bad hire is expensive. SHRM estimates that replacing an employee can cost 50% to 200% of their yearly salary, depending on the role.
There is a third choice: run two tracks at the same time.
Hiring track: keep hiring carefully for the right full-time person.
Shipping track: add extra engineering hands now so the work keeps moving.
This is not new. Deloitte's 2024 Global Outsourcing Survey of 500+ business and technology leaders found that access to skilled talent and agility now sit next to cost savings as key reasons companies work with outside teams.
6. Three ways to keep shipping while you hire
Way 1: Hand off clear tasks to an outside team (task-based help)
Look at your backlog. Some work needs your core team's deep knowledge. But a lot of work is clear and self-contained, for example:
bug fixes and small UI changes
third-party integrations and API work
admin panels, dashboards and internal tools
tests, performance fixes and database migrations
small AI features like a chatbot, document search or summaries
You can give this work to an outside team task by task or as a small project. You decide the outcome, they deliver it, and you pay for the work, not for a full-time salary.
Good for:
clearing a backlog quickly
teams that want no long-term commitment
Watch out for:
unclear tasks. Write a short, clear description for each task, with what "done" looks like.
Way 2: Add a dedicated engineer by the month
If the work is ongoing, like a new product area, an AI feature or regular sprint work, one-off tasks are not enough. A dedicated engineer on a monthly basis works better.
This person works like part of your team:
joins your daily standups and sprint planning
works in your code repository, your tools and your process
reports to your engineering lead
works hours that overlap with your time zone
Good for:
ongoing work while the full-time hire is still months away
teams that need a specific skill, like AI/ML, quickly
teams that may need extra capacity even after the hire joins
Watch out for:
poor onboarding. Give the engineer access, a short guide to the codebase and a first small task on day one.
Way 3: Start with a paid trial week
The biggest worry with any outside team is simple: "Will this work for us?"
A paid trial week answers that question fast. For five working days, an engineer works on real tasks in your environment. You see the quality, the communication and the speed for yourself.
If it works: continue with a monthly or project engagement.
If it doesn't: stop. You only risked one week.
Good for:
teams that have never worked with an outside engineer
founders who want proof before committing
Watch out for:
picking the wrong trial tasks. Choose 2 or 3 real tasks that show skill, not just setup work.
7. How to choose the right option
Use this table to find your best starting point.
Your situation | Best starting point |
You have a list of clear, separate tasks | Task-based help or a fixed-price project |
You have ongoing sprint work and the hire is months away | Dedicated engineer (monthly) |
You have never worked with an outside team | Paid trial week |
You have one feature with a clear scope and a deadline | Fixed-price project |
Your priorities change often | Time-and-material or a monthly retainer |
You need AI/ML skills you don't have in-house | Dedicated AI engineer (monthly) |
Still not sure? Start with a paid trial week. It is the lowest-risk way to learn what works for your team.
You can see every engagement model side by side here: Ways to work with Codersarts →
8. A simple 30-day plan
Here is a simple plan to keep shipping in the next 30 days while your hiring continues.
Week 1: Find the work
List all work that is late or waiting.
Mark each item as core (needs your team's deep knowledge) or clear (can be handed off).
Choose 2 or 3 clear tasks for a trial.
Week 2: Start a trial
Start a paid trial week with an engineering partner.
Give access to the code, tools and one point of contact.
Review the work at the end of the week.
Week 3: Decide and scale
If the trial went well, move to task-based or monthly dedicated work.
Add the outside engineer to standups and sprint planning.
Week 4: Measure
Count what was shipped: tasks closed, features released, bugs fixed.
Ask your team: "Is the pressure lower?"
Decide whether to keep, increase or reduce outside support.
Your hiring process keeps running the whole time. Nothing is paused.
9. How to choose an engineering partner (checklist)
Not every outside team is a good fit. Before you start, check these points:
You own 100% of the code and IP from day one.
An NDA is signed before you share any access or data.
Working hours overlap with your team's core hours.
Senior review: someone experienced checks the work.
Weekly reports show what was done and what is next.
Clear exit points: no long lock-in contract.
A small start is possible, like a trial week or a single task.
Safe access: they use separate accounts and limited permissions.
Real skills in your stack: ask for examples in your languages and frameworks.
If a partner says no to any of these, think twice.
10. Common mistakes to avoid
1. Waiting for the "perfect" moment. There is never a perfect time. Every week you wait, the backlog grows.
2. Handing off unclear work. "Fix the app" is not a task. "Fix the login error on Safari, and here is how to reproduce it" is a task.
3. Treating outside engineers as outsiders. Invite them to standups. Share context. They will move faster and make fewer mistakes.
4. Starting too big. Don't sign a 12-month contract on day one. Start with a trial week or one project.
5. Stopping the hiring process. Outside help is not a replacement for a strong core team. Keep hiring for long-term roles.
6. Not measuring results. Track what was shipped. Numbers make it easy to decide what to do next.
11. How Codersarts helps
Codersarts is a product development and engineering company. We work with startups and growing teams as extra engineering hands: when you need us, for as long as you need us.
Ways to work with us:
Task-based help: clear tasks, done one by one
Fixed-price projects: a defined scope, delivered on time
Dedicated engineers: monthly, working inside your team and tools
Paid trial week: a low-risk way to test the fit
Co-development: we build alongside your in-house engineers
Skills we cover: full-stack development (MERN, Next.js), AI/ML, AI agents and RAG, and production fixes for apps built with AI coding tools.
Included in every engagement:
100% code and IP ownership for you
NDA from day one
Working hours aligned to your time zone
Senior review of the work
Weekly progress reports
Clear exit points: no long lock-in
Hiring takes months. Shipping doesn't have to wait.
Or book a free 15-minute scoping call. We'll tell you honestly whether a task, a dedicated engineer or a trial week makes the most sense for you.
12. FAQ
How long does it take to hire a software engineer?
SHRM's 2025 data shows an average time to fill of about 45 days across roles. Add the notice period and onboarding, and it often takes 2 to 4 months before a new engineer is fully productive. Senior and AI roles can take longer.
Why is hiring AI engineers so hard right now?
ManpowerGroup's 2026 survey found that AI skills are now the hardest skills for employers to find globally. Many companies are competing for a small group of experienced people.
Is using contract engineers the same as outsourcing?
Not exactly. Traditional outsourcing usually hands over a whole project. A dedicated or contract engineer works inside your team, in your tools and process, under your direction.
How fast can a Codersarts engineer start?
Usually within 5 to 7 working days after a scoping call, depending on the skills needed."]
Who owns the code?
You do: 100% of the code and IP, from day one.
What if it doesn't work out?
Every engagement has clear exit points. With a paid trial week, your risk is limited to five working days.
Can we keep the engineer after our full-time hire joins?
Yes. Many teams keep outside support for overflow work, new projects or special skills like AI.
Will the engineer work in our time zone?
Yes. We plan working hours to overlap with your team's core hours for standups and live collaboration.
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