I’ve noticed a clear trend in RFPs over the last year: compensation mandates.
Not suggestions or preferences, but rather mandates.
Most commonly: hourly only.
I understand the instinct. Hourly feels measurable, predictable, and contained. It fits neatly into a spreadsheet and makes cross-agency comparisons easier.
But when compensation becomes the first constraint in a partnership conversation, something subtle happens: the structure starts driving the strategy.
That’s rarely ideal.
The Assumption Beneath the Surface
When a compensation model is dictated upfront, it assumes something important — that we already know exactly what it takes behind the scenes to achieve the desired outcome.
That’s like telling a chef they have exactly ten minutes to roast a chicken. Technically possible? Maybe, but someone is likely to get sick. Not to mention, the results probably won’t be very tasty.
In media buying, the results rarely come from hours alone. They come from judgment and pattern recognition. From knowing when to push harder and when to pivot. From experience that prevents mistakes you never see because they never happen.
An hourly-only mandate subtly shifts the focus from “What will drive the best outcome?” to “How many hours are left?”
That’s not a small shift. It changes behavior.
From Outcomes to Activity
The best agency relationships are solution-oriented. The goal is clear: produce the right result, as efficiently and intelligently as possible.
When compensation is rigidly task-based, the psychology can change. Work may stop when the clock runs out — even if the insight is one conversation away. Or worse, work may continue simply because hours were allocated. Neither scenario serves the client.
The real objective isn’t activity. It’s performance.
Alignment Is the Real Lever
The best agency relationships are built on one simple principle.
You grow, we grow.
That’s why commission-based and performance-aligned models often create durable agency relationships. They scale naturally with investment and results. They remove the incentive to watch the clock and replace it with an incentive to maximize impact.
When incentives are aligned, trust builds. When trust builds, collaboration deepens. And when collaboration deepens, performance improves.
That doesn’t mean hourly structures are inherently wrong. In certain environments, they make perfect sense. But mandating them universally can unintentionally cap strategic upside before the work even begins.
A Better Starting Point
Procurement teams have an essential role. They protect financial integrity, enforce discipline, and ensure accountability. That’s not the issue.
The opportunity is simply this: instead of prescribing the compensation model, evaluate the rationale behind it.
Ask agencies how their structure drives performance, how it aligns incentives, how it shares risk, and how it scales. Then compare.
The compensation model shouldn’t be the constraint that limits the conversation. It should be a glue that strengthens it.
If the goal is long-term performance, efficiency, and partnership, the question isn’t, “What’s your hourly rate?”
It’s, “What structure best aligns us to win together?” This is the measure of partnership, and the foundation for a long and mutually beneficial relationship.