BOLT Staffing has spent considerable sums enlightening clients and potential clients regarding the actual costs of a bad hire. Indeed, even a successful hire involves enormous and generally overlooked costs for staff time devoted to advertising, interviewing, reference checking, etc. When things go bad with a new hire, all of this investment is lost.
Validation is always a pleasant experience. Recently Resourceful Manager posted Chapter 1 of their Guide to Hiring. It recites all that we have said and more regarding costs of hiring.
If you are reluctant to try before you buy your next employee, or if you are facing resistance to using temp-to-hire services here is an article you may find helpful.
As far as we know, Resourceful Manager (RM) has nothing to do with the staffing industry. Accordingly they stop short of recommending a temp-to-hire. That’s something we won’t do because, short of not hiring at all, we know of no other way to insulate yourself from a hiring mistake. Nonetheless, we appreciate RM’s validation of everything we’ve been saying!
As they say:  “Don’t take our word for it!”