Contingent is a bet on the role being easy
No cure no pay is a genuinely good deal when the role is straightforward: a clear profile, a reasonable package, a market with depth. The agency can find someone quickly, so the risk they are carrying is small and the arrangement works for everyone.
It stops working when the role is hard. If an agency has three contingent searches on the desk and one exclusive one, the exclusive search gets the deep work, because it is the only one guaranteed to pay. That is not cynicism, it is arithmetic — and it is worth understanding before you assume competition between agencies is helping you.
Exclusivity buys depth, not loyalty
The thing people misread about exclusive search is that it is not about being nice to one agency. It is about changing what the agency can afford to do.
With one search and a committed fee, the time goes into mapping the market properly — approaching the people who are not looking, having conversations that do not convert, building a picture of who exists. That work does not happen on a contingent role because it cannot be justified.
- The role has been open more than two months
- You want to see the whole market rather than a sample
- The search needs discretion
- Previous attempts produced shortlists that all looked the same
Retained buys the whole map
A retained search is agreed and paid for upfront, so the work can start with the market rather than with the first CVs to hand. You see who exists before you see who applied: a longlist, then a shortlist of people who have been properly interviewed.
The trap is using it for a role that is easy to fill. If the profile is clear and the market is deep, a contingent search will get you there for less.
A simple way to decide
Ask how long the role has been open and how much it matters. One role, open a few weeks, clear profile: contingent. A role that has stalled and needs one agency's full attention: exclusive. Senior, sensitive or hard to find: retained.
If an agency recommends the most expensive option regardless of the answer, that tells you something useful too.
Choose the model by the problem, not the price. The cheapest option on paper is expensive if the role stays open.
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