Best Recruiters in PR

Originally published September 2015. Updated September 29, 2026.

Senior PR talent is the most contested hiring market in marketing services right now, and eleven retained and contract search firms handle most of that traffic: Heyman Associates, Joel Paul Associates, Karen Tripi Associates, Travaille Executive Search, JBC, Lipman Hearne, Ascendo Resources, Capitol Communicator Job Bank, Higher Group, Taylor Bennett, and VMA Group. Holding-company consolidation is creating exits. AI Communications is creating roles that did not exist eighteen months ago.

1. Heyman Associates

Founded by Bill Heyman in 1989 and based in New York, Heyman Associates is the dominant retained search firm in communications. Maggie Cohen is President. Its searches run from senior corporate comms officers and agency CEOs through IR-comms hybrid roles.

2. Joel Paul Associates

Founded in New York in 1990 by Joel Paul, this is a long-standing PR-only retained search firm with a strong agency-side practice, placing senior account directors through agency CEOs.

3. Karen Tripi Associates

A New York boutique PR search firm led by Karen Tripi, working mid-to-senior agency placements and corporate comms roles, with long-standing relationships across the holding companies and the independents.

4. Travaille Executive Search

Operating out of San Francisco and New York, Travaille covers communications, marketing, and public affairs, with a strong tech-sector PR placement record that is proving useful in the current AI Communications hiring cycle.

5. JBC

JBC is a creative and marketing executive search firm with a serious PR and brand-communications practice alongside its broader creative-industry work.

6. Lipman Hearne (The Lipman Group)

Lipman Hearne runs communications search with particular strength in education, nonprofit, and corporate marketing leadership roles.

7. Ascendo Resources

Ascendo handles contract and full-time PR placement across the mid-market and corporate comms, moving on a faster cycle than the retained-search firms above it.

8. Capitol Communicator Job Bank

Based in Washington D.C., this is not a retained recruiter but a deep talent pipeline for the public-affairs market, covering PR and public-affairs roles across the capital.

9. Higher Group

Higher Group, headquartered in London, covers PR, public affairs, and corporate communications across the UK and EMEA, and is particularly strong on agency CEO and MD placements.

10. Taylor Bennett

One of the longest-running communications search firms in the UK, London-based Taylor Bennett places across PR, internal comms, and public affairs.

11. VMA Group

VMA Group is a London-headquartered, globally operating firm covering communications, marketing, and digital, with a strong corporate-comms-officer practice.

Where the hiring heat is

First, AI Communications roles. Heads of AI Visibility, Heads of GEO, and AI-fluent senior account leaders are new roles with a thin candidate pool. Every retained recruiter on this list has at least one of these searches open right now.

Second, holding-company exits. The Omnicom-IPG consolidation, the WPP Burson combination, and the Stagwell restructuring have all created senior practitioner movement, with independent firms as the buyers. See PR's Second Wave: Six Months After Omnicom-IPG.

Third, corporate Chief Communications Officer searches at AI companies, fintechs, and post-IPO scaleups, Anthropic's external comms build under Sally Aldous, OpenAI's open CCO search, and Lovable's commercial growth among them. The recruiters above are where those searches sit.

Related Everything-PR Coverage

• The Direction PR Pros Are Going
• PR's Second Wave: Six Months After Omnicom-IPG, the Jobs Are Moving
• Omnicom Swallowed IPG. The Real Question Isn't Scale.
• Weber Shandwick After the Omnicom-IPG Merger
• Omnicom Public Relations Group (OPRG): Networks and 2026 Restructuring
• PR Salary Negotiation: How to Ask, Anchor, and Counter