How to hire a sales director · consulting firms · part-time sales leaders · no UK entity
Hire a Sales Director · permanent or part-time
To hire a sales director, first write down the sales problem the seat must fix: a founder who still closes every deal, a team that misses target, or a forecast nobody believes.
Then choose the route (permanent, fractional, interim or part-time), set the pay split, and test every candidate on your own pipeline.
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.
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
Worth reading before you choose between a permanent sales director and a part-week one. Leaders here set out when a fractional executive suits a defined job and when the seat needs someone in it every day.
15 minutes · video or phone
Book 15 minutes to hire a sales director
Tell us the scope and the days a week. We come back with Sales Director 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
Pick a day that suits · live availability
On the board · last 3 months
Sales director roles jobs on the board
No Sales director roles roles on the board right now.
We only show real vacancies from the last three months, each marked whether we could confirm it is still open — we never pad the board. New Sales director roles roles appear here as our pipeline finds them.
Current sales leadership roles
Fractional recruiting starts with the brief, not the CV pile. Send a Sales Director brief and we come back with a shortlist of three to five candidates, each through five-stage vetting.
01/ the role
Hire a sales director: decide what the seat owns first
A sales director owns the sales number and the people who hit it.
That means the targets, the pipeline and the weekly forecast, the sales process, the commission plan, and hiring and coaching the sellers.
Whether the search reads "hire sales director" or "hire sales leaders", the first question is the same.
Which number will this person answer for, and who will report to them?
Signs the business needs one
The founder still wins most of the work, and sales stops when they are busy.
Or there is a team of sellers but no one sets targets, runs the pipeline review or owns a missed quarter.
Write the scope into a sales director job description before anyone is approached.
The seat above, and the seat below
If one leader must own sales, marketing and customer success together, the seat is a chief revenue officer: hire a CRO instead.
If the job is building and running a first small team, a search to hire head of sales may fit better.
If the real gap is meetings in the diary rather than leadership, start lower: hire an SDR and give an existing leader the pipeline.
02/ scope
How to hire a sales director: the steps
1. Write the brief around the revenue gap
Set out what the sales director inherits (team, CRM, pipeline, key accounts) and what should be different after twelve months.
"Grow sales" is not a brief; "move from founder-led selling to a team that hits a forecast" is.
2. Choose the route
Permanent, fractional, interim or part-time: the table below sets out which fits which situation.
Decide this before you set a budget, because the cost basis differs.
3. Set base, commission and OTE
Agree the split between base and variable pay, and what the variable pay is measured on, before the first conversation.
Candidates will ask, and a vague answer loses the strongest ones.
For an employee, Acas says commission entitlement belongs in the written statement of employment particulars.
The contract should also say what happens to commission earned when employment ends.
4. Search beyond the people who are looking
An advert mostly reaches people already on the move.
Many strong sales leaders are hitting their number in post, so someone has to approach them.
5. Test on your own pipeline
Give every candidate the same task: review last quarter’s pipeline and forecast, say which deals they would drop, and set out the first ninety days.
Ask for the numbers behind their own record, then check them with a CEO reference.
CIPD’s guidance on selection notes that clear, objective, structured and transparent processes are fairer for candidates.
The Institute of Sales Professionals’ Sales Capability Framework sets out the skills and behaviours to score against, by role.
6. Check, then make the offer
Take two references yourself rather than relying on the ones offered.
If you will employ them, check their right to work before they start.
What we do on a 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/ economics
What a sales director costs by route
IT Jobs Watch puts the median advertised sales director salary at £100,000, from IT-sector permanent job ads in 2026.
Exec Capital, an executive search firm, puts base pay from £70,000 at smaller businesses to £220,000-plus at enterprise level in its 2026 guide, with on-target earnings typically 1.5 to 2 times base.
On a permanent hire, employer’s National Insurance is 15% on earnings above £5,000 a year for 2026 to 2027 (HMRC).
Pension and benefits come on top.
Exec Capital, a firm that sells fractional sales leadership, publishes £500 to £1,000 a day for a fractional sales director, commonly four to twelve days a month.
Those are a provider’s figures, not a survey; base and OTE in more detail are on our sales director salary page.
On every brief we set out each candidate’s own pay or day rate on the shortlist.
04/ comparison
Permanent, fractional, interim or part-time?
Four ways to put a sales leader in the seat. Choose by how much of the week the work needs, and for how long.
05/ vetting
How we vet sales directors
What we undertake on every brief, before a candidate reaches you.
- 01
Qualification screen
Verify Sales Director 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
06/ hire a sales director for a consulting or professional services firm
Hire a sales director for a consulting firm: partners who sell, or a leader who organises
To hire a sales director for a consulting or professional services firm, start from how work is won today.
In most firms the partners sell, because clients want to meet the people who will do the work.
A sales director rarely replaces that.
The useful one builds what sits around it: a pipeline the partners update, a bid and proposal process, account plans for the largest clients, and a forecast the firm can run on.
So decide which you are hiring.
A seller who wins work alone suits a firm with a repeatable product; a leader who makes the partners’ selling visible and forecastable suits most consultancies.
In an LLP, be clear whether the role is a member or an employee.
GOV.UK notes the LLP agreement sets how profits are shared and who agrees decisions, and each member pays tax on their share of the profits; a sales director on the payroll is not a partner, whatever the title.
If the firm only needs this one or two days a week, a fractional sales director is the usual route.
To go that way, hire a fractional sales director.
Test candidates on your own pipeline and proposals, and ask for a firm like yours where partners kept their relationships and the forecast still improved.
Then call that firm’s managing partner.
07/ hire a part-time sales leader
Hire a part-time sales leader: employed part-time, or fractional
To hire a part-time sales leader, choose first between two contracts.
A part-time employee works a fixed part of the week on your payroll; a fractional leader usually works agreed days through their own company, often for other clients too.
A search for "hire part-time sales leader" usually comes from a smaller team that needs leadership, not five days of it.
A fractional head of sales suits a first team under a founder; a sales director suits a team that already exists and needs an owner for the number.
If the leader 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.
If the seat is empty and needs someone full-time for a fixed term, the interim route fits better: hire an interim sales director.
08/ hiring a senior sales leader in the UK without a UK entity
Hiring here without a UK entity: the three routes
A startup based abroad has three clean ways to put a senior sales leader in the UK: a third-party employer, a contractor, or its own UK presence.
Which is cleanest depends on how you will manage the person and whether you plan to build a team here.
A third-party employer, often called an employer of record, employs the leader in the UK and runs payroll, while the leader works for you.
It fits a leader you will manage like an employee.
GOV.UK notes that an employer with no UK presence is not required to operate PAYE but can choose to, which is the gap this route fills.
A contractor works through their own company and invoices you.
If the client is wholly overseas with no UK connection, HMRC’s manual says the medium and large client off-payroll rules do not apply, and the worker’s own company should consider whether IR35 applies instead; a UK branch brings the client back into scope.
A UK presence means registering a UK establishment of the overseas company, or incorporating a UK subsidiary, and employing directly.
GOV.UK says you must register an overseas company with Companies House if you set up a place of business in the UK, and that a company with no UK base may still need to register for Corporation Tax.
For a first senior hire with no UK office planned, a third-party employer is usually the cleanest: the leader is employed and on payroll, and you are not setting up an entity for one person.
Set up the entity when you plan to build a team here.
Whoever employs the leader must check their right to work before they start.
Take tax advice on your own position before you choose.
09/ questions
Hire a sales director FAQ
The questions people ask before bringing in a sales director.
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.
