How to hire a chief customer officer · chief customer officer recruitment · customer success director

Hire a chief customer officer · seat and route

To hire a chief customer officer, first name the customer problem: churn after the sale, service split across teams, or complaints a regulator is asking about.

Then decide whether it needs a C-suite owner or a customer success director, choose the route (permanent, fractional or interim), and test candidates on retention results they were accountable for.

We recruit fractional, interim, part-time, temporary and permanent executives, and non-executive directors.

On every brief we send a shortlist of 3–5, each with pay or day rate, availability and IR35 position set out, after five-stage vetting.

Brief us on a customer hire →See the roles

How a brief runswhat we undertake

01Brief30-MINUTE SCOPING CALLDay 0
02Shortlist of 3–5VETTED · RATE BENCHMARK · IR35After the brief
03InterviewsYOU MEET THE SHORTLISTYour diary
04Scoped startFIRST-MONTH OUTCOMES AGREEDYou set the date
05Fractional, interim and permanentIR35 POSITION SET OUTOn every brief

Shortlist3–5

In the press

Fast Company 16 leaders on when fractional C-suite hires make sense · 24 Jun 2026
Useful before you choose between a permanent customer executive and a part-week one. Leaders here set out when a fractional executive suits a defined mandate and when the seat needs someone in it every day.

3–5

Shortlist · with pay or day rate, availability and IR35 set out

Vetting · stages before a candidate reaches you

15 minutes · video or phone

Book 15 minutes to hire a chief customer officer

Tell us the scope and the days a week. We come back with Chief Customer Officer candidates, their day rates and availability.

0115 minutes, video or phone
02We scope the role and the days a week
03A shortlist of 3–5 after the call
04Fractional, interim and permanent briefs

Prefer email? Use the booking page →

Pick a day that suits · live availability

Open the booking calendar →

On the board · last 3 months

Customer leadership jobs on the board

3 on the board · 2 confirmed open

Browse every role on the board →

Current customer leadership roles

Fractional recruitment works differently from a permanent search — shorter, scoped by days a week, and priced on the engagement. Send a Chief Customer Officer brief and we come back with a shortlist of three to five vetted candidates.

01/ the role

Hire a chief customer officer: what the seat owns

A chief customer officer owns what happens after the sale: onboarding, service, support, customer success and renewals.

The seat exists to join up teams that each own a piece of the customer and answer to different people.

The CXPA’s CX Framework sets out the discipline in five parts: customer insight, experience strategy, measurement, design and culture.

It is a useful checklist for what your brief should cover.

Customer, not commercial

On this site, CCO means the chief commercial officer, who owns revenue, pricing and go-to-market.

This page is about the chief customer officer, who owns retention and service; if you need the revenue seat, hire a chief commercial officer instead.

Job adverts use CCO for both, and sometimes for a chief compliance officer as well.

Write the full title in your brief so candidates know which job it is.

When the seat earns its place

New business is healthy but renewals are not, and nobody owns the reasons.

Or support, onboarding and account management report to three different people, and the customer feels it.

In regulated sectors the seat carries rules.

The FCA’s Consumer Duty requires financial services firms to put their customers’ needs first, and phone and broadband providers work under Ofcom’s rules for providers.

02/ scope

How to hire a chief customer officer: the steps

1. Name the customer problem

Write down what should be different in a year: churn down, one service model instead of three, a complaints backlog cleared.

That sentence decides the seat, the route and the person.

Then list the teams that will report in, the measures the role answers for, and what stays with the CEO, sales and product.

2. Decide the seat and the route

Choose between a chief customer officer and a director-level customer success leader, then between permanent, fractional and interim.

The sections below set out both decisions.

3. Test on retention evidence

Ask each candidate for a retention or satisfaction result they owned, and how they got product and sales to act on what customers said.

The CIPD’s guidance on selection favours structured processes and skill-based tasks, so set the same task for everyone.

A good task: define the early signal that a customer will renew.

Mark Roberge, of the venture fund Stage 2 Capital, frames it as a share of customers reaching a set event within a set time, and often sees that share set between 60% and 80%.

4. Check, offer and plan the first months

Take references from a CEO and a peer in sales or product, not only from the candidate’s own team.

For a permanent hire, GOV.UK says you must check the right to work before employment starts.

Agree the first measures before day one, so the first review is against the brief rather than impressions.

What we do on a customer brief

We send a shortlist of 3–5, each with pay or day rate, availability and IR35 position set out.

Every candidate goes through our five-stage vetting first.

03/ comparison

Permanent, fractional, interim or part-time?

Four ways to fill the customer seat. Choose by how much of the week the work needs, and for how long.

PermanentFractionalInterimPart-time

TimeFull-time, open-endedAgreed days a week, often alongside other clientsFull-time, for a fixed termA fixed part of the week, often employed

SuitsA business whose customer teams need one owner every dayDesigning the function, setting measures, joining up teamsA departure, a service failure or a remediation with a fixed endA steady customer function in a smaller business

PaySet out on each shortlistSet out on each shortlistSet out on each shortlistSet out on each shortlist

IR35On payrollDecided by how the engagement runsDecided by how the engagement runsUsually on payroll

04/ vetting

How we vet chief customer officers

What we undertake on every brief, before a candidate reaches you.

01
Qualification screen
Verify Chief Customer Officer tenure, sector context and stage fit.
SOURCING
02
Mandate fit
Match to your situation — stage, board dynamics, timing.
MATCHING
03
Reference deep-dive
We take references ourselves, from recent past clients — real outcomes, not titles.
VERIFY
04
Shortlist
Three to five candidates with day rate, availability and IR35 position set out.
SHORTLIST OF 3–5

05/ chief customer officer recruitment

Chief customer officer recruitment: where the candidates come from

Chief customer officer recruitment draws on several backgrounds, because the title covers several jobs.

Candidates usually come up through service operations, customer success in a subscription business, customer experience, or account management.

Match the background to the problem.

A complaints backlog needs someone who has run large service teams; churn in a software business needs someone who has built customer success and owned renewals.

An advert that says “hire chief customer officer” mostly reaches people already looking.

Many strong candidates are in post at a business like yours, so someone has to approach them directly.

In service-heavy businesses, ask how the candidate has run complaints.

ISO 10002, the international guideline for complaints handling, starts with top management involvement and commitment, which is this seat.

For an outside view of service quality by sector, the Institute of Customer Service publishes the UK Customer Satisfaction Index twice a year.

Ask candidates how they would use it, and what they would measure instead.

Part-week candidates are a different pool; to go that way, hire a fractional chief customer officer.

That page also sets out when an interim one fits.

06/ chief customer officer, CCO or customer success director

Chief customer officer, CCO or customer success director: which hire

Choose a chief customer officer when the customer problem crosses functions and needs a voice on the executive team: product, sales, service and finance all have to change.

Choose a CCO in this site’s sense, the chief commercial officer, when the problem is revenue: pricing, new business and partnerships.

The two seats work closely on renewals and expansion, but they are different jobs.

Choose a customer success director when the job is running the customer success team and the renewals number, below the executive team.

To go part-week, hire a fractional customer success director.

If the work is mostly key accounts and the client team, hands-on, the seat is a fractional client services director.

If retention and new business need one owner, look at a fractional CRO.

If the customer problem is really operations (fulfilment, billing, systems), the neighbouring seat is a fractional COO.

No source we can verify publishes UK pay for a chief customer officer, so this page quotes none.

On every brief we set out each candidate’s pay or day rate on the shortlist.

If a fractional or interim customer executive works through their own company, the off-payroll working rules (IR35) may apply.

Status depends on how the engagement runs in practice, and a medium or large client makes the determination; our IR35 guide sets out the tests.

07/ questions

Hire a chief customer officer FAQ

The questions people ask before bringing in a chief customer officer.

Name the customer problem first, then decide between a chief customer officer and a customer success director, and between permanent, fractional and interim. Test every candidate on retention or satisfaction results they owned, and take references from a CEO and a peer in sales or product.

No source we can verify publishes UK pay for a chief customer officer, so we do not quote a figure. On every brief we set out each candidate’s pay or day rate on the shortlist, so you can compare like with like.

Four: name the customer problem, decide the seat and the route, test candidates on retention evidence with the same task for everyone, then check references and the right to work and agree the first measures before day one.

Match the candidate’s background (service operations, customer success, customer experience or account management) to your problem, then approach people in post as well as those answering adverts. Ask how they have run complaints and what they measure.

A chief customer officer when the customer problem crosses functions and needs an executive owner. A chief commercial officer (CCO on this site) when the problem is revenue. A customer success director when the job is running the customer success team below the executive.

Sometimes. CCO can mean chief customer officer, chief commercial officer or chief compliance officer. On this site CCO means the chief commercial officer; this page covers the customer seat. Write the full title in your brief.

When the job is designing the function, setting measures and joining up teams, rather than running them every day. Our fractional chief customer officer page sets out that route and when an interim one fits better.

It can, if they work through their own company. Status depends on how the engagement runs in practice, contract by contract, and a medium or large client makes the determination (HMRC). We set out each candidate’s IR35 position on the shortlist.

Book 15 minutes · shortlist of 3–5

Bring the brief. We architect the team.

A shortlist of 3–5 with day rate, availability and IR35 position set out, after five-stage vetting.

Book a call →Submit a brief