The producer pipeline is the engine of organic growth — and the hardest thing for an agency to build. The 2022 data is the baseline against which the next two years' decline is measured. This is the producer-sourcing slice of the Best Practices strategic context; the year's narrative is the 2022 context, and the industry-wide pipeline picture is the talent deficit.
§ 01 · Hiring & successWho hires, and who sticks.
Hiring cadence scales steeply with size — from 22.6% of the smallest agencies hiring a producer in the year to a near-universal 97.8% of the largest. Counterintuitively, in 2022 the smallest agencies posted the highest average success rate (65.9%): they hire rarely, often through referral, and their hires stuck. The top-quartile success rates are uniformly strong (74–100%), confirming that hiring quality — not size — is the success variable.
| Producer pipeline (2022) | % hiring | Success (avg) | Success (top quartile) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under $1.25M | 22.6% | 65.9% | 100% |
| $2.5M–$5M | 37.7% | 64.0% | 100% |
| $5M–$10M | 60.0% | 54.2% | 92.9% |
| $10M–$25M | 68.3% | 53.8% | 84.5% |
| Over $25M | 97.8% | 50.4% | 73.7% |
§ 02 · Development practicesThe maturity ladder.
Recruiting and development practices scale cleanly with size. Outside recruiters, mentorship programs, and team selling are near-universal at the largest tier but rare at the smallest — the operational infrastructure that makes a producer pipeline repeatable.
| Practice adoption (2022) | Under $1.25M | $5M–$10M | Over $25M |
|---|---|---|---|
| Social-media recruiting | 60.0% | 74.5% | 93.2% |
| Mentorship program | 33.3% | 70.6% | 93.2% |
| Outside recruiters | 13.3% | 64.7% | 88.6% |
| Team selling | 40.0% | 66.7% | 81.8% |
§ 03 · Where producers come fromMostly outside the industry.
At the small and mid tiers, the majority of new producers come from outside the industry — roughly three-quarters of the smallest tier's hires. The largest agencies recruit far more experienced industry talent, with "under-35 from outside the industry" being the rarest source category overall. The implication: entry-level industry producers don't meaningfully populate the hiring funnel, which is why the build path is slow and uncertain.
- Hiring scales with size. 22.6% of the smallest tier hired a producer; 97.8% of the largest did.
- Small agencies' hires stuck. The smallest tier's 65.9% average success was the highest of any band in 2022.
- Quality, not size, drives success. Top-quartile success rates run 74–100% across tiers.
- Development infrastructure scales. Mentorship and outside recruiters near-universal at the top, rare at the bottom.
- Most hires come from outside the industry. ~75% at the smallest tier; large agencies recruit experienced industry talent.
The benchmark is the baseline, not the price.
Best Practices benchmarks don't value an agency — they're the operating baseline a valuation is built on. Producer success rate is a leading indicator of book sustainability: a target above its tier-average is materially de-risked, and one with a top-quartile pipeline (85%+ at the larger tiers) is a defensible reason for an above-average applied multiple. Development practices — mentorship, team selling, assigned accounts — read as operational maturity; their absence flags single-producer-relationship risk.
How producer quality flows into a valuation is the financial & transactional mechanics reference; the decline from this baseline is the 2024 producer data.
What BPS measures. The Best Practices Study tracks the operating and financial results of top-performing agencies, segmented by revenue tier. This brief reflects the 2022 producer-hiring and development section (282 agencies, calendar 2021 results).
Producer success rate. The share of producers hired in the past five years still producing for the agency; top-quartile is the top 25% of agencies, not producers.
Smallest-tier caveat. Sub-$1.25M figures rest on a small sample and carry higher year-to-year variance; the multi-year direction is the robust signal.
Frequency. The study publishes annually. Milly Books refreshes this brief with each new edition.