Your question is Diagnose Qualified Candidate Conversion Drop. Take a moment with it on the right.
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You are looking at the qualified candidate funnel for an AI recruiting platform. Over the last 4 weeks, the conversion rate from qualified candidate to successful placement fell from 18% to 11%, while the weekly count of qualified candidates stayed roughly flat at about 4,800 to 5,100. The drop started shortly after changes to candidate ranking in the Mercor talent marketplace and a faster employer review workflow in Mercor's client dashboard. Leadership wants to know whether the issue is candidate quality, employer behavior, funnel friction, or a measurement problem.
If the conversion rate of qualified candidates dropped sharply, how would you diagnose the cause?