Best Executive Assistant Recruiting Firms for Full-Time Hires (2026): 10 US Services Compared

By Sara Altuna, CEO of Base. Last verified October 19, 2026.

The best executive assistant recruiting firms in the US are the ones that place executive assistants as their main business rather than as one role among many. Most firms that advertise EA placement also staff nannies, estate managers, receptionists or accountants, and the fee you pay funds that whole operation. This guide compares ten US services that will find you a full-time executive assistant, sorted by how specialized they are, with fees, guarantees and timelines taken from each firm’s own website on October 19, 2026.

Base’s Select+ is listed first. It is the only service on this list where the EA works for you full-time before you decide to hire, and the only one where the hire itself carries no placement fee. Where a firm does not publish a fee or a guarantee, the table says so rather than guessing.

Key numbers

• Median annual wage for executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants in the US was $76,590 in May 2025 (BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook).
• A contingency recruiter charging twenty percent of first-year salary would bill $15,318 on that median; at twenty-five percent, $19,148; at thirty percent, $22,977.
• Select+ charges a one-time membership fee of $15,000 for a remote role or $20,000 for an in-person role, trial work at $50 per hour remote or $55 per hour in person, and no fee when you hire.
• Select+ presents first candidates within ten business days of intake, and trials run from one week to three months.
• Select+ refunds the membership fee if Base has not placed a trial candidate within six months.
• Average base salary for the Executive Assistant title was $95,377 in the 2026 US Administrative Professionals Salary Report, a survey of 2,560 full-time US administrative professionals published in August 2026; the median across all respondents was $90,000.
• In the same survey, average base salaries by city ran from $139,092 in San Francisco and $130,443 in New York City to $97,788 in Austin and $76,604 in Columbus, so a twenty-five percent recruiter fee ranges from $19,151 to $34,773 depending on the city.
• Of ten US firms compared, two publish a fee percentage, four publish a guarantee length, and four publish a time to shortlist.
• Of ten firms compared, two place executive assistants only: Base Select+ and Double’s placement product.

How the ten compare

Fees, guarantees and timelines were read from each firm’s own website on October 19, 2026. “Not published” means the firm’s site asks you to contact them for that term.

Why specialization matters when hiring an executive assistant

A recruiter who fills forty kinds of roles builds a general pipeline and screens for general traits. A firm that places only executive assistants builds a pipeline of people who have run a founder’s calendar, inbox and travel, and screens for the judgment that job needs. The household agencies on this list are strong at what they do, and an estate manager search is a different craft from an EA search.

Specialization also changes what the firm can promise. A generalist can promise speed, because its database is large. A specialist can promise fit, because its screening is specific. The sections below say which each firm offers.

1. Base Select+ — work with your full-time EA before you hire

Specialization: Executive assistants only. Base has matched executives with EAs since 2014 and does nothing else.

How it works: An intake call covers your work style, priorities and the role you need filled. Base builds a dedicated pool of EAs from that brief and presents first candidates within ten business days. Before any trial starts, Base benchmarks the salary for the role and pre-negotiates it with the EA, so the offer stage holds no surprises for either side. Each EA then works for you full-time during a trial of anywhere from one week to three months, billed hourly, and you can trial more than one candidate from the pool. When you decide, you hire the EA directly onto your own payroll, and Base pays their signing bonus.

Fees: A one-time membership fee of $15,000 for a remote role or $20,000 for an in-person role, due at signing, which covers the intake, the matching, the pool and the placement itself. During trials you pay $50 per hour for a remote EA or $55 per hour for an in-person EA, for hours worked. Hiring your EA costs nothing further.

Guarantee: If Base has not placed a trial candidate with you within six months, the membership fee is refunded. If a hire ends for cause within thirty days, Base provides new trial candidates with no second membership fee, with trial hours billed as before. After that window, a replacement costs $5,000 flat and restarts the full process.

Remote or in-office: Remote US-based EAs, or in-person EAs at the higher fee tier.

Choose Select+ if: you have been burned by a hire that looked right in two interviews and wrong by week three, and you want the hiring decision made on weeks of real work.

Compared with a contingency fee: On the May 2025 BLS median salary of $76,590, a twenty percent contingency fee is $15,318, within a few hundred dollars of the Select+ remote membership fee. The difference is what the fee buys. A contingency recruiter delivers a shortlist and an invoice at offer acceptance. Select+ delivers working trials with as many candidates from your pool as it takes, a pre-negotiated salary, and no fee at the hire itself.

2. C-Suite Assistants — executive support recruiting, nationwide

Specialization: Administrative support for senior executives. Roles listed include executive assistant, personal assistant, legal assistant, HR assistant, office manager, project coordinator and chief of staff. No household roles.

Fees: Contingency. You pay only when you hire a candidate they found. The percentage is not published; some searches use a small retainer.

Guarantee: If the placement does not work out within the first ninety days, a replacement search at no additional fee.

Timeline: A slate of two to three interviewed candidates, often within five days. Most searches close within three to four weeks.

Screening: Every candidate is personally interviewed; the firm says it reviews fifty to seventy-five candidates per role. Candidates are based in the US or Canada.

Remote or in-office: On-site, hybrid and fully remote, across nineteen named US metros.

Choose C-Suite Assistants if: you want an in-office or hybrid EA in a major metro and a traditional search with a published guarantee.

3. Double — full-time EA placement service

Specialization: Double’s placement product places executive assistants only. The parent company’s main business is subscription remote assistants.

Fees: $1,000 deposit plus twenty-five percent of the EA’s annual salary.

Guarantee: If you are not satisfied within three months, Double refunds the fee or finds you a new EA.

Timeline: Two EA profiles to review “within days.”

Screening: Double says fewer than 0.7 percent of applicants are accepted.

Not published: Whether the placed EA is W2 or contractor, and where placed EAs are located.

Choose Double if: you want a fast shortlist from an EA-only pipeline and prefer a refund guarantee to a working trial.

4. Palo Alto Staffing — boutique executive support, since 1979

Specialization: Executive assistants, chiefs of staff, and administrative and operations professionals. Bay Area or nationwide.

Fees: Direct hire is a one-time percentage of first-year base salary, quoted per engagement and put in writing in the first conversation. The percentage is not published. Temp-to-hire carries a conversion fee that steps down as hours are billed.

Guarantee: A replacement guarantee; length not published.

Screening: Recruiter interviews, a skills and scenario assessment, and reference checks on every direct-hire shortlist candidate.

Choose Palo Alto Staffing if: you are in the Bay Area and want a temp-to-hire path with a long-tenured boutique.

5. Bloom Talent — EAs and admin for high-growth companies

Specialization: Executive assistants and other administrative and operations roles, including chief of staff, office management, people ops and recruiting coordinators. Markets: San Francisco, Silicon Valley, New York, Los Angeles, Austin and Seattle.

Fees, guarantee, timeline: Not published.

Choose Bloom Talent if: you are a venture-backed company in one of its six markets and want a recruiter who knows startup admin roles.

6. Pocketbook Agency — domestic and corporate support

Specialization: Domestic roles (directors of residences, estate managers, chefs, butlers, family assistants) and corporate support roles (chief of staff, executive assistant, office manager, legal and marketing assistants). Works across the US and Canada.

Fees: Not published; described as “competitive with industry standards.”

Guarantee: A placement guarantee; length not published.

Published figures: Pocketbook states a ninety-six percent retention rate and twelve years in business on its site, without stating the period or cohort behind the retention figure.

Choose Pocketbook if: you need a hybrid executive and personal assistant who also coordinates household matters.

7. The Calendar Group — household staff and executive support, since 2002

Specialization: Household staffing, executive support (chief of staff, executive assistant, office manager, family office administrator) and C-suite search. Works nationally.

Guarantee: Six-month replacement guarantee on every placement, the longest standard replacement window among the recruiters on this list.

Fees, timeline: Not published.

Choose The Calendar Group if: you want a long published replacement window and are staffing a family office or private household alongside the EA.

8. Career Group Companies — multi-division staffing, six US offices

Specialization: Administrative staffing is one division among hospitality, creative, HR, finance, tech, events and private household.

Fees: Bill rates vary by position and employment type; not published.

Trial option: Temp-to-hire. The candidate starts as a contract employee for a trial period, then you decide whether to convert. Length and conversion fee not published.

Choose Career Group if: you want temp-to-hire through a large agency in Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Miami, Dallas or Greenwich.

9. Frontline Source Group — generalist with a published fee range

Specialization: Administrative and executive assistants alongside accounting, HR, legal and other professional roles. Dallas headquarters; US only.

Fees: Direct hire runs twenty to thirty percent of first-year base salary, contingent.

Guarantee: A five-year placement warranty: a pro-rated credit toward one replacement, with exclusions for layoffs, closures or changes to the role.

Published figures: 98.94 percent of executive placements in role or promoted at one year, by the firm’s own internal tracking.

Choose Frontline if: you want a generalist with published pricing and a long warranty, and you are in Texas or one of its other markets.

10. Robert Half — the largest generalist

Specialization: Executive assistant is one role under business administration, alongside customer service, HR, data entry and office support.

Fees, guarantee: Not published.

Timeline: Candidates “often in as little as 48 hours,” with a recruiter call within one business day for qualified submissions.

Choose Robert Half if: speed and office coverage matter more than EA specialization.

What a full-time executive assistant earns by location in 2026

Most recruiting firms charge a percentage of first-year salary, so the fee you pay depends on where the EA works. The 2026 US Administrative Professionals Salary Report, published in August 2026 by EA How To and The Admin Wrap from 2,560 full-time US administrative professionals, puts the average base salary for the Executive Assistant title at $95,377, or $100,556 with bonus. Senior Executive Assistants in the same survey average $115,820 base, Executive Business Partners $127,516, and Chiefs of Staff $132,079. The median across all respondents is $90,000 base and $93,000 with bonus.

That survey reads higher than the BLS figure of $76,590 cited above. The BLS number is an employer-reported median for every executive secretary and executive administrative assistant in the US, while the salary report is self-reported by professionals who opted in, more than half of whom carry an executive assistant title. Use the BLS figure as the floor for the occupation and the survey as the benchmark for the senior, executive-facing EA a recruiting firm is likely to place.

The table below takes the survey’s average base salary by city and shows what a twenty percent and a twenty-five percent contingency fee would cost on it. Cities marked with an asterisk in the source report as having lower-than-average responses are left out.

Salary figures are the survey’s 2026 city averages for all administrative titles reported in that city; the Washington, DC figure is the District-level average. Fee columns are arithmetic on the base salary and are illustrative only.

At the state level, the five highest average total compensation figures in the 2026 survey were New York at $137,739, Massachusetts at $129,359, California at $128,824, Washington at $110,134 and Illinois at $108,096. Texas averaged $101,422 and Florida $92,079.

Two things follow for anyone comparing recruiting firms. A percentage fee grows with the market: on the New York City average, a twenty-five percent fee is $32,611, more than double the Select+ remote membership fee of $15,000 and well above the in-person fee of $20,000. In Columbus, a twenty percent fee of $15,321 lands within a few hundred dollars of the Select+ remote fee, so the flat fee is close to neutral there. The second point concerns remote hiring. In the 2026 survey, fully remote respondents averaged $109,776 in total compensation against $87,282 for those in the office every day, and respondents in the office two days a week averaged the most at $110,463. The report presents this as a correlation within its respondent pool, and a remote arrangement should not be priced as a discount. For a remote hire, the salary conversation starts from where the EA lives and works, which is why Base benchmarks the salary before a Select+ trial begins.

How to evaluate an executive assistant recruiting firm

Ask every firm the same seven questions and write down the answers:

1. What share of your placements last year were executive assistants?
2. What is the fee, as a percentage or flat number, and when is it due?
3. How long is the replacement guarantee, and what voids it?
4. How many candidates will I see, and by when?
5. Who interviewed each candidate before I did, and for how long?
6. Can I work with the candidate before I commit, and what does that cost?
7. If the hire fails in month four, what do I pay to start again?

A firm that places executive assistants only will have sharp answers to the first and fifth questions. A firm with a working trial will have the sharpest answer to the sixth.

Frequently asked questions

What do executive assistant recruiting firms charge?

The two firms on this list that publish a rate charge twenty to thirty percent (Frontline Source Group) and twenty-five percent plus a $1,000 deposit (Double) of first-year salary. On the May 2025 BLS median of $76,590, that range is $15,318 to $22,977. Base Select+ charges a flat membership fee of $15,000 for a remote role or $20,000 for an in-person role, with no fee at hire.

How much does a full-time executive assistant earn in 2026?

The 2026 US Administrative Professionals Salary Report, a survey of 2,560 full-time US administrative professionals, puts the average base salary for the Executive Assistant title at $95,377 and the median across all respondents at $90,000. City averages across all administrative titles in that survey range from $139,092 in San Francisco and $130,443 in New York City to $97,788 in Austin and $76,604 in Columbus. The BLS employer-reported median for executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants was $76,590 in May 2025.

Which recruiters place only executive assistants?

Of ten US services compared in October 2026, two place executive assistants exclusively: Base Select+ and Double’s placement product. C-Suite Assistants, Palo Alto Staffing and Bloom Talent specialize in executive support but also place office managers, chiefs of staff and operations roles.

Can I try an executive assistant before hiring full time?

Yes, through Base Select+, where each candidate works for you full-time for anywhere from one week to three months at $50 per hour remote before you decide, and you can trial more than one candidate. Several staffing firms offer temp-to-hire, where the EA works as the agency’s contractor first and you pay a conversion fee to hire them.

How long does a recruiter take to find an executive assistant?

Published timelines range from candidates within forty-eight hours (Robert Half) to a shortlist within five days and a closed search in three to four weeks (C-Suite Assistants). Base Select+ presents first candidates within ten business days. Most firms on this list do not publish a timeline.

What guarantee should I expect on an EA placement?

Published replacement windows range from thirty days (Base Select+, new trial candidates at no new fee) to ninety days (C-Suite Assistants) to three months (Double) to six months (The Calendar Group). Frontline Source Group offers a pro-rated credit over five years. Base Select+ is the only service on this list that refunds its fee if no trial candidate is placed, with a six-month window.

Is a remote executive assistant placement as good as an in-office one?

It depends on the role. Base Select+ places remote US-based EAs and in-person EAs at a higher fee tier. Double places remote EAs. C-Suite Assistants, Palo Alto Staffing and Robert Half place on-site, hybrid and remote. If your EA needs to be in the room, choose a firm that lists in-office placement in your city.

Related guides

• What is a fractional executive assistant?
• Fractional executive assistant vs full-time hire
• Best executive assistant services compared
• Executive assistant pricing compared
• Should I hire an executive assistant or a chief of staff?

All provider fees, guarantees and timelines were read from each firm’s own website on October 19, 2026. Base Select+ terms are from Base’s Select+ service schedule. Salary data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook, May 2025, and the 2026 US Administrative Professionals Salary Report (EA How To and The Admin Wrap, August 2026, 2,560 respondents). Base will re-verify this page in January 2027.