Frustrated with recruiters? It's not personal. It's the business model.

If you've ever spent time in between permanent roles, you'll recognise the pattern. A promising first call. An enthusiastic "you're exactly the kind of person our clients want." Your CV sent somewhere, sometimes without asking you first. Then silence. No feedback, no update, no idea whether the role was ever real.

It's maddening. It's also entirely predictable once you look at how recruiters get paid.

Follow the fee

Most finance recruitment is contingent: the agency gets paid only when someone is placed. For a permanent hire, that fee is typically 15% to 25% of the first year's salary. Place a £120,000 finance director and the fee might be £24,000 or more, for a single placement.

Now look at your two-days-a-week, six-month fractional brief. There's often no fee structure for it at all. Where there is, it's a margin on your day rate, and on a part-time, short engagement it's a fraction of what a permanent placement pays. A consultant with a monthly billing target has a simple choice about which phone call to return first. You're not being ignored because you're not good enough. You're being ignored because you're not worth enough to their model.

Recruiters aren't the villains. They're incentivised to get the biggest fee in the quickest time. It's not personal.

Why it goes wrong even when they try

• Keyword matching. Many CVs are screened by people, or software, matching job titles and systems. "Led the finance workstream on a PE exit" doesn't match "Head of FP&A, NetSuite, 5 days, office-based".

• CVs sent without consent. Some agencies submit you to clients to stake a claim on the fee. If a second agency does the same, you can end up looking careless to a client you've never spoken to.

• No feedback loop. You rarely hear why you weren't selected, so you learn nothing, and the next application goes the same way.

• Fractional isn't understood. Many consultants haven't worked with fractional professionals before, and try to sell you to clients as a cheap permanent hire.

• The interim channel is crowded. Interim providers do understand time-bound work, but they tend to focus on full-time interim assignments, not part-time fractional ones.

What about the good ones?

They exist, and when you find one, look after the relationship. A good specialist recruiter knows the market, gives honest feedback, never sends your CV without asking, and will tell you plainly when a role isn't for you. Some have built proper interim and fractional desks. To find out who you're dealing with, ask three questions early: how are you paid on this role? Will you always ask before submitting me? Will you give me feedback either way?

Stop depending on one channel

The fix isn't to give up on recruiters. It's to stop relying on them. The fractional finance professionals who stay busy tend to build four channels at once.

1. Introducers. Accountants in practice, corporate finance advisers, commercial lawyers and business bankers see businesses at the moment they need finance help, often before anyone else does. Twenty good relationships here beat two hundred recruiter contacts.

2. Former colleagues and clients. CEOs, chairs and PE operating partners you've worked with. Tell them specifically what you do now and what kind of brief you want.

3. Other fractional professionals. Fractional CMOs, COOs and HR directors meet the same CEOs you want to meet. Swap referrals.

4. Platforms built for fractional work, where time-bound work is the point rather than an afterthought. We're one of those, and we intend to be the best.

Keep your own records

Log every agency you speak to, every role and every client your CV goes to, with dates. It takes two minutes. It protects you from duplicate submissions, gives you evidence if a fee dispute ever involves your name, and shows you which relationships produce work and which just waste time.

Why we built something different

Because the frustration you feel is the market telling you something: there's no efficient way for a good business and a good fractional finance professional to find each other. So we built Fracifind on a simple rule — nothing happens without your say-so, and our fee is a fraction of a recruiter's, so nobody here has a reason to push you towards the wrong role.

Start the search, trust the result. For the business owner, and for you.

Fee ranges are typical contingent permanent placement fees in UK finance recruitment; individual agency terms vary.

Be found, without the green banner. Fracifind is a confidential register for fractional finance professionals. Free to join, and always free to the Fraci. No recruiter spam. Join at fracifind.com.