Executive search: find your next permanent leader

“Why would a sitting executive look at us?”

Because there is something to build, and because you say precisely what it is. A direct approach is won on the content of the brief, not on the advert.

A succession, a newly created function and a reorganisation tell different stories. Say what led to the search, what the team has already built and what is left to do. A sitting executive changes company for a remit, not for a title.

Give an example of a decision the person will have to take in their first six months: an investment, an organisation to rework, a market to open, a team to build. That is what turns an approach into a conversation.

“How do I judge someone who interviews well?”

By leaving the narrative for the decisions. Ask for one precise problem, who they involved, what they settled and what they adjusted afterwards.

At this level everyone tells a good story. The difference shows in the execution details: who pushed back, what data was missing, what cost more than expected, what the person would do differently today. An executive who has never changed their mind about anything has probably never led anything difficult.

Functional expertise still decides. Leading finance, HR, legal or internal audit calls for neither the same counterparts nor the same constraints. For an IT, technology or data and AI leadership role, the questions are about architecture choices, investment and the team to build.

Separate the experience you cannot do without from what can be learned in the role. A candidate who meets four criteria out of five exists; the perfect one is usually no longer on the market.

“Who should meet them, and in what order?”

Few people, in an order agreed in advance. A process that drags or contradicts itself loses the strongest candidates before the end.

Say who decides and who advises. Founder, shareholders, other directors, international headquarters, board members: each has a place, and the candidate needs to understand whom they will be deciding in front of once in post. Companies that lose candidates are rarely the ones that chose badly, they are the ones that let it drag.

Plan feedback after each meeting, in both directions: points of agreement, open questions, people to see again. It also prepares the arrival, since the first quarter's subjects are the ones already discussed.

“How do I stop them leaving after a year?”

By writing down before the signature what they can decide alone, with what resources and in front of whom. Most early departures start there.

An executive leaves when the remit announced is not the one they find: decisions that travel back up, a budget that does not exist, a team already promised to someone else, a predecessor still in the organisation. None of these is discovered well six months in.

Name the resources: budget, hiring allowed, geographic scope, signing authority. Name the subjects governance keeps for itself as well. A serious candidate prefers a narrow, clear remit to a broad, vague one.

For a short assignment with a defined scope rather than a lasting appointment, interim management is the answer, and the conversation is a different one.