If you own or run an Ontario business and also manage your finance and HR people day to day, this checklist is for you. Picture a growing company that reaches the first quarter and realizes it needs a controller and an HR generalist, yet has no approved budget, no salary range, and no sense of how long either search will take. Hypothetically, the owner starts posting before the numbers are settled, interviews candidates who ask about pay and work model, and cannot answer. The best candidates move on. That is an illustrative scenario, not a real client, but the pattern is a common one.
Finance and HR roles tend to be budgeted last and missed first. They rarely generate revenue, so they wait behind sales and operations until something breaks. Hiring for them also takes real lead time. When budget sign-off arrives late in the year, the search gets compressed, offers get weaker, and the business ends up reacting instead of planning. In our experience, the Ontario employers who hire well in these functions decided what they needed before the pressure arrived. Use the five steps below as a working checklist and adapt it to your own business.
Audit Your Finance and HR Team Before You Plan 2027 Hiring
Start with the people you already have. Go role by role and write down what each person owns, where work is backing up, and which tasks depend on a single individual. A Senior Bookkeeper who is the only person who understands the payables workflow is a headcount risk even if nobody has resigned yet.
Then separate true headcount needs from process or system problems. If month-end close runs late because three people re-key the same data, another hire will not fix it. A better workflow might. Be honest about which problem you actually have before you open a requisition.
Questions to answer before opening a requisition
- Is the need permanent, seasonal, or tied to a specific project?
- Is the role new, or is it a backfill for someone who left or is leaving?
- What does the person need to own on day 90, and who will manage them?
- Would a different title, such as an Accounting Manager instead of a second Bookkeeper, solve the underlying problem?
- Does the role need to be in the office, hybrid, or remote, and have you tested that against what candidates will accept?
Check succession and retention risk
Identify the people whose departure would stall payroll, month-end close, or employee relations. For each one, ask whether a second person could cover the work for two weeks. If the answer is no, that gap belongs in your 2027 plan, whether it is solved with a hire, cross-training, or a documented contingency. When a Controller leaves without notice, the first weeks are exactly when close accuracy and cash flow visibility are most exposed.
Map your business plans to team capacity
List what is changing next year: growth, new locations, a new accounting system, an acquisition, a reorganization. Each one adds load to finance and HR. A second location means more payroll complexity and more employee relations questions. A system migration pulls your best people off daily work for weeks. Tie each initiative to the capacity it will consume, and the headcount case writes itself.
Build Compensation Benchmarks and Salary Bands for Ontario Finance and HR Roles
Once you know which roles you need, settle the pay before you post. Candidates ask about compensation early, and an employer who cannot answer looks unprepared. Build a salary band for each role, with a floor, a midpoint, and a ceiling you are genuinely willing to approve.
Published salary surveys are a starting point, but they typically lag the market, sometimes by several months. They also average across regions and company sizes, which matters in Ontario, where a role in the Greater Toronto Area and the same role in Simcoe or Thorold may carry different expectations on pay and commute. Current ground-level data comes from recruiters who speak to finance candidates every day. That is one place where working with a specialist helps, because the compensation a Controller or Accounting Manager will actually accept is often different from what a survey suggests.
Include the full package, not just base pay
Finance and HR candidates compare more than salary. Work model, benefits, vacation, professional development, and bonus structure all enter the decision. Our consultants hear regularly that a hybrid or in-office policy can end a shortlist before compensation is even discussed. Decide your work model deliberately, and check it against what candidates are accepting right now. Our post on what HR professionals really want in 2026 is a useful reference for the HR side of this.
One trade-off to acknowledge: setting a band in advance gives you speed and consistency, but it can also lock you in. If the market shifts mid-year, a band set in the fall may be stale by spring. Build in a review point rather than treating the numbers as fixed.
Check Ontario Employment and Pay Compliance Before You Post or Make an Offer
Compliance is easiest to handle before a job is live, and costly to fix after an offer is signed. Review the current requirements under Ontario employment law as they apply to your posting and your offer terms, including pay transparency expectations in job postings, how you handle candidate information, and how your offer letter describes probation, termination, and benefits.
- Confirm whether your job posting needs to include a pay range, and make sure that range matches the band you built in step two.
- Review your offer letter template with an employment lawyer or qualified advisor so the termination and probation language reflects current Ontario rules.
- Check that your pay structure for new hires does not create internal equity problems with existing staff doing similar work.
- Document your hiring criteria so that decisions are consistent and defensible.
For finance leaders, this sits alongside broader risk management. Our CFO compliance checklist covers related ground. This section is a planning prompt, not legal advice, so confirm specifics with a qualified professional.
Plan Your Hiring Timeline, Sourcing Approach, and Budget for 2027
Work backward from the date you need the person in the seat. A permanent finance hire involves sourcing, screening, multiple interviews, an offer, negotiation, and a notice period, which for most employed candidates runs two weeks or more. If you need a new Accounting Manager in place by the start of a busy quarter, the search must begin well before that quarter, not at its start.
Decide how you will source
A job board posting reaches people who are actively looking. The strongest finance candidates are often employed and not browsing. If your plan relies only on postings, you are fishing in the smaller pool. Consider referrals, your own network, and direct outreach alongside any public posting. For a closer look at the process, see our guide to the accounting manager hiring process, and note that seasonal timing affects sourcing too, as covered in our piece on filling finance roles in summer.
Budget for the whole cost
Beyond salary, include benefits, payroll taxes, onboarding time, equipment, and the management hours the search will consume. Add a contingency for a second search, because a mis-hire in a standalone accounting role, where one person owns the entire finance function, can mean financial errors, compliance exposure, and a repeat search. Planning for that possibility is cheaper than absorbing it unprepared.
Decide When to Partner With a Recruitment Firm and What to Hand Off
Not every role needs outside help. If you have a strong network, a dedicated talent acquisition function, and a role that is easy to define, running the search yourself may be the right call. A recruiter adds the most value where the role is hard to fill, the timeline is tight, or you lack a pipeline of finance and administrative candidates. Owner-operated and mid-market companies without an internal recruiter often fall in this group.
If you do engage a firm, decide what to hand off. Sourcing passive candidates, pre-screening for technical and interpersonal fit, and supplying current compensation and work model intelligence are all natural fits. Final decisions on culture and fit should stay with you, since you will be managing the person daily. A firm focused exclusively on finance and administrative recruitment, like Elby, can also place a contract or interim Controller within days while the permanent search runs in parallel, which protects month-end close if someone leaves unexpectedly. For a broader view of planning this way, read our post on strategic talent acquisition.
Turning This Checklist Into Your 2027 Hiring Plan
Here is the one-page version. Audit each finance and HR role and flag single points of failure. Separate headcount needs from process problems. Set a salary band and total package for each role, with a review date. Confirm Ontario compliance on postings and offers. Work backward from your start date to set the search timeline, and budget for the full cost, including a contingency. Decide which searches you will run internally and which you will hand to a specialist.
Start this week by listing every finance and HR role you expect to need in 2027 and writing a one-line business reason beside each. If any of those searches look hard, tight, or urgent, contact Elby Professional Recruitment early, so you can talk through market conditions and compensation before the pressure builds.