Consider the org chart for a moment, as we solve this strategic dilemma.  Whomever your hiring manager is, they always have someone to report to. As you build your plan to protect your fees and your business with your key account, you MUST be able to win and hold credit for MORE than merely tactical values...NOT ONLY with your hiring manager, BUT ALSO with his or her immediate superior.

Picture the following encounter...

"Mr. or Ms. Hiring Manager, may I ask what the measures are that you'll be reviewed by?  You have targets for those measures, of course, and in your annual review, you'll surely be brought under the spotlight for them, yes?

"Here's why I ask, if we're doing our job right, you and me, each and every hire we complete should rapidly if not instantly catapult your performance - your own personal management performance - toward or past every one of your key objectives.

"What I hope you will let me do is look at those measurements with you.  More, I hope to grade each of the people we place together by their performance in moving your goals forward.  And last, what I hope to learn over time is precisely which performers move you forward the most, which not so much, etc."

Can you see how in this conversation you explode the strategic value you deliver to the firm?  The more you work on your hiring manager's performance measures, the more guaranteed it is that his or her superior will see this rising performance.  When you provide that kind of true friendship to your client, they want to talk about you.  Their superior will hear all about you, to be sure.

Now then, can you see how the out-of-the-loop CFO, who is surely gunning for your fees if not to fire you altogether, is addressed by this?  Your ultimate protection is the strategic values you provide.  When the CFO contacts you, you will be ready to turn to your allies and call upon their help with this negotiation. 

You want both your hiring manager and his or her superior explain to the CFO that if they start questioning the deal, you may well be tempted to raise your prices in light of how wildly profitable your service is!  That is your goal.

Oh, and tactically, if the CFO, never having experienced anything like this before is a bit thick headed and can't quite break his or her pre-programming without a few real knocks upside the head...the answer is to raise your rates.

You read that right.  You should never - at least not when you're under attack - surrender and agree to change the deal to the downside for yourself.  We have to linger on this note, as well. 

There are great times to play with prices.  When you're price is under attack is NEVER one of those great times! 

I truly don't care what percentage of a year's income is your fee; or if you charge a low flat rate or grade your fees against volume levels.  Whatever your deal is, that's your deal.  Another time we can analyze one form of deal over another.  Our starting point here is your basic account structure, whatever it is.  From that starting point your goal is to deliver massively greater value - many times over - BEYOND what your clients pay you. 

Your goal is for your service to be so valuable strategically that your clients would be brilliant to pay you for that alone, having nothing to do with placements. 

Of course they won't do that, and you don't want them to do so.  But you do passionately want, no, you desperately need and absolutely MUST ensure that your clients gain so much strategic value that the tactical fees for placements are simply inconsequential in comparison.