On money
- What exactly am I paying, and what does the operator receive out of it? A provider that cannot separate those two numbers is taking something it would rather not name.
- Is there a commission, a percentage, or a fee on anything we agree afterwards? Ask about the second engagement as well as the first.
- Is there a minimum term, and what happens if we stop after two months?
- If we later hire this person permanently, what does that cost us?
On who you are actually getting
- Do I choose the person, or am I assigned one?
- Has a human verified that this experience is real, and what did they check against?
- Can an operator pay you to appear higher in what I am shown? This is the single most useful question on the list, because the answer is either a flat no or a long one.
- How many other companies is this person working with right now?
On what happens when it goes wrong
- Who holds the contract, you or the operator?
- If this person is not right in month two, what actually happens?
- Can I speak to a company that stopped using you, not just one that stayed?
How to read the answers
A good answer has a number or a mechanism in it. Nobody can pay to rank is a mechanism. We match carefully on fit is an adjective, and it is compatible with almost anything happening underneath.
Watch for the gap between what is free and what is charged. A platform that is free for companies is usually charging operators, and one that is free for operators is charging companies. There is nothing wrong with either, but you should know which one you are on, because it tells you whose interests the ranking serves.
And ask the pay-to-rank question directly rather than reading the marketing. Order of appearance is the most quietly consequential thing on any marketplace and the least likely to be disclosed voluntarily.
The answers for this site
It would be a strange page that set eleven questions and refused to answer them, so: browsing and contacting an operator here is free and no commission is taken on anything agreed, in either direction, ever. The contract is directly between you and the operator and money never routes through the platform. You choose the person; nobody is assigned. Every listing is a named individual checked against their LinkedIn with a CV on file.
Nothing an operator can buy affects where they appear, on the bench or on a paid shortlist, and there is no plan that changes that. The separate paid service is a search a company chooses to buy, priced in public. If the engagement ends, that is between you and the operator under whatever you agreed, because the deal was never ours.
The honest weakness: you do the sifting. Nobody is shortlisting for you unless you pay for that, so if you want the process handled rather than done, a practice may suit you better and this page would rather say so than pretend otherwise.
Questions
- What is the most important question to ask a fractional executive marketplace?
- Whether an operator can pay to appear higher. If placement can be bought, the order you are shown is advertising rather than fit, and you cannot tell by looking at it. The answer should be a flat no with a mechanism behind it, not a reassurance.
- Should the contract be with the platform or with the executive?
- There is no universally right answer, but you should know which it is before you sign. Contracting with the executive directly keeps the commercial relationship yours and usually costs less. Contracting with a firm gives you somebody to escalate to and cover if the person leaves, and you pay a margin for that.
- Is it reasonable to ask for a reference from a company that stopped?
- Yes, and the reaction to the question is informative on its own. Every provider has companies that moved on, and a provider that can point to one and explain what happened is more credible than one that only has enthusiasts.