What Is Direct Hire?
Direct hire is a placement in which a candidate becomes the client company's own permanent employee immediately, never sitting on the staffing or recruiting firm's payroll the way a temp or contract worker does, with the firm earning a one-time placement fee for the introduction and search work instead of ongoing hourly markup, per the standard rate-and-fee vocabulary compiled in Murray Resources' recruiting and staffing industry glossary.
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Direct hire is a placement in which a candidate becomes the client company's own permanent employee immediately, never sitting on the staffing or recruiting firm's payroll the way a temp or contract worker does, with the firm earning a one-time placement fee for the introduction and search work instead of ongoing hourly markup, per the standard rate-and-fee vocabulary compiled in Murray Resources' recruiting and staffing industry glossary.
Direct Hire explained
Direct hire is the cleanest version of a permanent placement: no trial period on the agency's payroll, no temp phase, the candidate starts as the client's own employee from the first day. That makes it the opposite end of the spectrum from temp-to-hire, where the same eventual outcome, a permanent employee, is reached gradually, through a trial assignment first.
The fee attached to a direct hire is the perm fee, and whether that fee is earned on a contingency basis or a retained basis is a separate decision that shapes the whole search, not a detail attached after the fact. A contingency direct-hire search competes against every other firm also working the requisition; a retained one typically does not.
Direct hire tends to concentrate in roles where a client wants full commitment and control from day one, permanent leadership positions, specialized roles a company plans to invest in long-term, rather than roles where flexibility or a trial period matters more to the client than speed to a permanent hire.
Why it matters when you're buying
Confirming whether a client actually wants direct hire, or would accept temp-to-hire instead, before you commit search effort matters, since the two carry different fee timing, different risk, and often a very different bar for how fast the client expects a candidate in front of them.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is direct hire in staffing?
What's the difference between direct hire and temp-to-hire?
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