How we work
Our process borrows from the discipline of retained executive search and applies it in proportion to how much the hire matters. Here is what that looks like from your side.
Who the role serves, what the business needs from it, who has a say, and what you honestly offer the person who takes it.
Agree on what success looks like and which tradeoffs you would make. Sometimes we bring a few anonymized market profiles to test the brief before we search.
Identify the realistic talent market, including the people who are not looking and would never answer a posting.
Approach people with a truthful picture of the job and your company, and listen to why they would or would not move.
Ability, track record, motivation, practical constraints and the likelihood of a fit that lasts. You see a few credible people, each with a candid brief.
References in proportion to the role, support through offer and acceptance, and staying in touch after the start. What we learn goes into the next search.
For direct-hire roles, we do our best work on an exclusive engagement with a clearly defined search. It lets us commit real time to mapping the market and recruiting people who are not looking, and it gives you one accountable process instead of competing stacks of résumés.
Applicants who find you on their own, employee referrals and internal candidates can all come through the same process. You keep the final decision, always.
Exclusive search or contingency? A plain comparisonUseful work product, not activity reports.
Each search teaches us something about your company: your managers, how you interview, how you pay, what candidates object to, who succeeds and why people stay. We keep that knowledge and use it, so the second search starts further ahead than the first, and the tenth further still. That is why we work with a small number of clients for a long time.
Tell us about the role and the business behind it. We will tell you honestly how we would approach it, and whether we are the right firm for it.