Contract or Permanent? What We Tell Clients Hiring RF and Embedded Engineers

The question we get asked most

Almost every client asks us the same thing at some point: should this role be permanent, or should we bring someone in on contract? The honest answer is that it depends on the shape of the work, not on cost, and not on how urgently you need someone.

When permanent makes sense

• The role owns a product or system for the long term, not a single deliverable
• You need someone building institutional knowledge that outlasts one project
• Team fit and culture matter as much as the technical brief

When contract makes sense

• The work has a defined start and end, a specific integration, a certification push, a gap to bridge
• You need a specific, narrow skill set for a fixed period, not a generalist
• Speed matters more than long-term retention

Executive search is a different conversation entirely

For senior technical and commercial leadership, we run a retained search process rather than either of the above. It’s confidential by default, and it’s built around reaching people who aren’t actively looking, not people already on the market.

Getting the model wrong costs more than getting the timeline wrong

We’ve seen permanent roles sit open for months because the brief was really a six-month contract in disguise, and we’ve seen contractors churn through a role that needed someone who’d still be there in three years. If you’re not sure which one you actually need, that’s a five-minute conversation, not a guessing game, talk to us before the job spec goes out, not after it’s been live for a month.