You found the perfect candidate. Great track record. Culture fit. Excited about the role. Then somewhere around the third interview, you casually mention the office location, and you watch their face change.
“Wait—Irving? I just bought a house in Frisco.”
And just like that, your top pick is gone.
Look, when energy companies in DFW hire C-suite talent, they obsess over the usual stuff: comp packages, culture, growth opportunities. But there’s this other thing—the commute—that quietly kills more executive placements than anyone wants to admit. And in a metro area covering nearly 9,300 square miles with over 8.3 million people, where someone lives relative to your headquarters matters way more than most hiring managers realize.
“We’ve seen countless executive searches stall or fail entirely because the commute conversation happened too late in the process,” says Jim Hickey, President and Managing Partner at Perpetual Talent Solutions, a Dallas-Fort Worth executive search firm. “When you’re recruiting a CFO or VP of Operations for an energy company, you need to understand their tolerance for drive time from day one. It’s not just about whether they can physically get to the office—it’s about whether that commute is sustainable long-term.”
DFW Traffic Is… A Lot
Here’s the reality. According to the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, DFW commuters lost an average of 69 hours to traffic congestion in 2024. That’s up four percent from the year before. Dallas ranks in the top ten hardest commutes nationally—averaging nearly 30 minutes. Fort Worth comes in just under 27.
But those are averages. And averages lie.
For executives driving from the northern suburbs to downtown Fort Worth? Or from Dallas proper to energy corridor offices in Irving? Double those numbers during rush hour. Easy.
The evening commute is especially brutal. Between 4 and 5 p.m. on weekdays—Friday afternoons in particular—every six-mile trip adds an extra four minutes of crawl. For executives already working long days, that’s not just inconvenient. It’s a quality-of-life issue that compounds over months and years.
Why This Keeps Derailing Good Hires
“In the energy sector, we’re often recruiting executives who’ve spent years in Houston, Midland, or even overseas,” Hickey explains. “They might be drawn to DFW for the quality of life, the lower cost of living compared to Houston, or the concentration of corporate headquarters here. But if they settle in Frisco because of the schools and your offices are in downtown Fort Worth, you’re looking at a potential 45-minute to hour-long commute each way. That’s a deal-breaker for many top candidates.”
And the problem is getting worse, not better.
DFW is now the only metro area in the country with two cities over a million people. Fort Worth officially crossed that threshold in 2024. The region added nearly 178,000 new residents last year alone. More people. More cars. Longer commutes. And executive talent scattered across an increasingly sprawling geography.
The Hybrid Work Complication
Here’s where it gets tricky. About 72 percent of executives now prefer hybrid work arrangements. They’ve tasted flexibility, and they’re not eager to give it back.
But energy companies? Many of them need leadership on-site. Operational assets. Trading floors. The nature of the business often demands physical presence in ways that tech companies or professional services firms don’t face.
“We’re seeing a real tug-of-war in executive hiring right now,” Hickey notes. “Energy companies often need their executives on-site more than other industries because of the nature of the business. But the candidates who would be perfect for these roles have gotten used to flexibility. If you’re requiring five days in the office, you’d better make sure that commute is manageable, or you’ll lose top talent to competitors offering hybrid arrangements.”
Some companies are throwing money at the problem—premium comp for full-time office presence. Others have gotten creative, arranging for executives to fly in weekly rather than relocate. Neither approach is perfect. Both require honest conversations much earlier than most hiring processes typically allow.
Thinking Geographically About Your Search
If you’re an energy company in DFW, you need to understand where executive talent actually lives. The sector here is robust—major natural gas distributors in Dallas, independent oil and gas operators clustered in Fort Worth. But candidates aren’t evenly distributed across the map.
“When we’re conducting a search for an energy company client, we map out where the strongest candidates currently live and work,” Hickey says. “If you’re based in the Alliance area of north Fort Worth, you’ll have an easier time attracting candidates from Keller or Southlake than you will pulling someone from Richardson or Plano. Understanding these geographic realities helps set realistic expectations.”
The Alliance corridor, by the way, has some of the longest commute times in the Fort Worth area—over 33 minutes even under normal conditions. And roughly 76 percent of Tarrant County workers drive alone. No carpools. No rail. Just you, your car, and a whole lot of other people trying to get somewhere.
What Actually Works
The recruiters and HR leaders who navigate this well tend to do a few things consistently. They bring up commute tolerance and current residence in the initial screening call—not after three rounds of interviews. They’re upfront about in-office expectations and whatever flexibility does or doesn’t exist. They include relocation assistance in executive packages for candidates willing to move closer. They explore satellite offices or flexible reporting locations when feasible. And they think about commute sustainability as a retention issue, not just a hiring checkbox.
None of this is rocket science. But it requires intentionality that’s easy to skip when you’re excited about a candidate.
The Bigger Picture
DFW isn’t slowing down. The region has the fourth-highest concentration of Fortune 500 companies in the country and keeps attracting corporate relocations. Infrastructure improvements are in the works—there’s talk of high-speed rail connecting Fort Worth, Arlington, and Dallas eventually. But that’s future tense. For now, you’re working with the roads you’ve got.
“At the end of the day, you’re not just hiring an executive—you’re asking them to build a life here,” Hickey says. “The best placements happen when companies think holistically about what they’re offering. A competitive salary means less if someone is spending three hours a day in their car. The companies that win the talent war are the ones that take commute seriously from the very first conversation.”
So before your next executive search kicks off, pull up a map. Look at where your office sits. Think about where your ideal candidates probably live. And start that commute conversation early.
It might feel awkward. It might seem premature. But it’s a lot better than watching your perfect hire walk away because nobody talked about the drive.
