AI-native recruitment · Finance only · India

Finance hiring,
decided on depth.
Not résumés.

FunnelHQ is India's AI-native recruitment firm for accounting, taxation, and management consulting. Every shortlist arrives with a Talent Analysis Graph — a skill-level map of the candidate, scored by finance practitioners, not keyword engines.

Sub-15 day time-to-hire 8–12% outcome fee Practitioner QA on every shortlist
TAG / CANDIDATE 07
Senior Manager — Direct Tax & M&A
7.4 yrs · Big 4 background · CA, LLB
LIVE · v1.0
Transfer Pricing 9.1 / 10 M&A Tax 8.8 / 10 GST Litigation 5.6 / 10 Ind-AS (deep) gap Client comms Leadership Chess · Strategy Internal Controls
Strong Needs work Skill gap Transferable
Live · interactive · real candidate

Don't take our word for it. Open a real TAG.

This isn't a screenshot. It is the exact artifact a CFO receives with every shortlist — for Candidate 07, a Senior Manager in Direct Tax & M&A. Click any node to surface interview evidence, scoring rationale, probe questions, and role-fit context. Zoom, pan, filter by strength or gap. Judge the depth yourself.

  • 11 skills across 4 clusters
  • 47-min AI interview · transcript-backed evidence
  • Practitioner QA, 18 Apr 2026
  • Click to inspect · scroll to zoom · drag to pan
funnelhq.co / tag / candidate-07
LIVE
Talent Analysis Graph
All Strengths Gaps
CANDIDATE Transfer Pricing 9.1 M&A Tax 8.8 GST Litigation 5.6 Ind-AS (deep) gap Chess → Strategy
Click anywhere to open the live TAG
The state of finance hiring

The cost of a wrong hire is rarely the salary.

In specialised finance roles, a mis-hire at senior level costs 2–3× annual compensation. Yet most firms still hire from keyword-matched shortlists and 30-minute interviews. The system is structurally unfit for the roles that matter most.

01 / Speed

45–60 day hiring cycles break your quarter.

The India average time-to-hire for a specialised finance role is 45–60 days. The cost is not the delay. It is the mandate that sat on your P&L unfilled while the market moved.

02 / Depth

Keyword engines can't read a Big 4 CV.

The difference between an M&A tax specialist and a compliance accountant doesn't live in their job title. It lives in how they structured the last three transactions. Legacy screens can't tell.

03 / Insight

You receive CVs. You need conviction.

Traditional agencies deliver a stack of résumés and a consultant's opinion. No data, no evidence, no reasoning. You run the full interview loop again — because you have to.

04 / Fit

Horizontal AI tools don't know finance.

Platforms built to screen engineers don't understand Ind-AS, transfer pricing, or the difference between statutory audit and internal audit. They are fast and wrong — the worst combination.

The Talent Analysis Graph

A CV tells you a story. A TAG tells you the truth.

Every FunnelHQ candidate comes with a TAG: a structured, visual map of every skill they demonstrated in their interview — scored against a rubric built by finance practitioners, not generalists. You see strengths, gaps, and — uniquely — transferable depth a keyword engine will always miss.

Green
High-scored skill. Strong command demonstrated against our domain rubric. Reliable for the role.
Orange
Present but weak. Needs supervision or upskilling. We flag the specific gap, not just the label.
Red
Critical absence. The skill is not demonstrated. Flagged for your decision before offer — no surprises.
Purple
Transferable. A competitive chess background reasoned onto strategic thinking under pressure. A marathon runner mapped onto audit endurance. A keyword engine cannot do this. A graph can.
TAG / REPORT SUMMARY
QA'd by domain expert
Recommended. Strong core tax; coach on Ind-AS depth within 90 days.
International Tax 9.3 TP Documentation 8.9 M&A Tax 8.6 Client Comms Ind-AS (deep) gap GST Litigation 5.8 Internal Controls 6.2 Chess → Strategic Depth
3 recommended probes sent to your hiring manager
FIT SCORE 8.4
How it works

Mandate to placement, in under 15 days.

Our operating stack is AI-first, human-gated. AI does the sourcing, interviewing, and graph generation. Our domain expert — a senior finance practitioner — reviews every TAG before it reaches you.

Mandate intake

You brief us on the role. We calibrate our rubric to the hiring manager's definition of "good" — not a generic JD.

AI sourcing

Passive + active candidate discovery across LinkedIn, ICAI alumni networks, Naukri, and our proprietary pipeline.

AI interview

Domain-calibrated video interview. 40–60 minutes. Candidates are onboarded with a Loom intro, role brief, and prep guide.

TAG generated

LLM pipeline extracts and scores every skill. Transferable skills reasoned. Graph built. QA'd by our Domain Expert.

Shortlist delivered

You receive 3–5 TAGs with side-by-side comparison and our placement recommendation. You decide — in hours, not weeks.

The landscape — and where we sit

Three ways to hire for finance. Only one sees the full candidate.

Traditional agencies

Michael Page · Robert Half
  • 21 years of brand. Zero data layer.
  • Relationship-led — strong when they have the network, silent when they don't.
  • 15–30% contingency fee on a CV stack.
  • 45–60 day average time-to-hire.
  • Sources: 90% repeat clients, 10% referrals. Your new NBFC isn't on their list.

Horizontal AI tools

Findem · Kula · HireBound
  • Built to screen engineers, repurposed for finance.
  • Generic scoring — can't tell M&A tax from GST compliance.
  • SaaS subscription — you still do the hiring work.
  • US pricing, US roadmap, US sources. Weak in India.
  • Sell software. You're on your own with the outcome.

FunnelHQ

AI-native · Finance only · India-built
  • AI-native operating stack from day one — not bolted on.
  • Rubric built by Big-4 practitioners. TAGs QA'd by a finance expert.
  • 8–12% placement fee. You pay on outcome, not access.
  • Sub-15 day target time-to-hire. Transparent timelines.
  • Every shortlist includes a TAG. Insight is the product.
What we recruit for

Three domains. No others — ever.

We do not take tech, sales, or operations mandates. Domain depth is only a moat if you refuse to dilute it. These are the roles our rubric, our team, and our TAG models are purpose-built for.

A

Accounting & Controllership

Close, consolidation, reporting, and statutory compliance roles for CFOs and Financial Controllers at scaled teams.

  • Financial Controller
  • Head of Finance / FP&A
  • Statutory Reporting Lead
  • Internal Audit Lead
  • Group Consolidation Manager
T

Taxation

Direct tax, indirect tax, and international taxation — where the difference between specialist and generalist costs you the matter.

  • Head of Tax · VP Tax
  • Transfer Pricing Lead
  • GST / Indirect Tax Manager
  • M&A Tax Specialist
  • International Tax Advisor
C

Management Consulting

Risk advisory, transaction support, forensic, and management consulting — the advisory roles growing 25%+ while entry-level compliance shrinks.

  • Risk Advisory · Manager / Senior Manager
  • Transaction Services
  • Forensic & Investigations
  • Restructuring & Turnaround
  • Big-4 lateral moves
+24%
YoY growth in India
F&A hiring demand
41%
AI adoption in accounting
(up from 9% in one year)
<15d
Target time-to-hire
(industry average: 45–60)
8–12%
Outcome-based fee
(incumbents charge 15–30%)
Operating principle
We should be embarrassed to send a CV without a TAG. That's the standard we're building for — depth over pedigree, evidence over opinion, outcomes over access.
K
Krishna Mohan
Founder & CEO, FunnelHQ
Two ways to start

Hiring this quarter? We'll be your shortlist.

Primary · For CFOs & hiring heads

Book a 20-minute hiring consult.

Walk us through the mandate. You'll leave the call with a defined scoring rubric, a target shortlist date, and — if we're the right fit — a signed engagement within 48 hours.

  • Direct call with our Founder + Domain Expert
  • No obligation. No deck. 20 minutes, on the clock.
  • Outcome-based pricing explained upfront.
Book the consult
Secondary · Try the TAG

Claim a free TAG on a candidate you're already considering.

Send us one candidate you're about to interview. We'll run a full TAG — at no cost — so you can see the output before you commit to a mandate.

  • Live sample: open our interactive TAG →
  • One free TAG per company · 72-hour turnaround
  • Delivered as an interactive graph + PDF
Send us a candidate
Frequently asked

The questions CFOs ask on the first call.

How is a TAG different from a pre-hire assessment score?+
An assessment score is a single number — pass/fail on a test bank. A TAG is a reasoned graph: every skill as a node, scored against a finance-specific rubric, with explicit links to transferable and adjacent skills. It's an interview output, not a test output. Assessments are for gating. TAGs are for deciding.
Who actually interviews the candidate — human or AI?+
The structured interview is AI-conducted. The interpretation — every TAG — is reviewed by our Domain Expert, a senior finance practitioner, before it leaves FunnelHQ. We treat candidate experience as product quality: personalised Loom intros, role briefs, WhatsApp support. Candidates who are respected perform better, and their TAGs are more accurate.
What's your replacement guarantee?+
Ninety days. If the candidate leaves — or you determine they are not a fit — within 90 days of joining, we replace at no additional fee. The TAG is your evidence on both sides of that conversation: you see the gaps before you hire, so this rarely gets invoked.
How quickly can you start on a mandate?+
Within 48 hours of the consult call. We aim to send a first calibrated shortlist — with TAGs — within 10 working days. Time-to-offer depends on your interview loop, but mandates typically close under 15 days for mid-management and 20–25 days for senior roles.
Do you work with funded startups and fintechs without a formal HR team?+
Yes — disproportionately so. Our ICP includes Series A–C fintechs, NBFCs, new-age banks, and scaling Big 4 alumni boutiques. If your founder or CFO is the hiring manager, we shorten the loop: one call with you, TAGs in 10 days, placement in under three weeks.
What happens to candidate data and TAGs after the mandate closes?+
TAGs are shared exclusively with you for the duration of the mandate. Candidate consent is obtained upfront — standard DPDP-compliant consent for AI interview and scoring. We retain anonymised performance data to improve our rubric; identified candidate records are handled per our data-processing agreement.