What separates the most effective partners in executive search from the rest?

Any CEO/business leader/HR professional, involved with leadership hiring at the highest level understands that their relationship with executive search partners is one of interdependence, trust and respect. In my career, there are a couple of questions that have found their way to me multiple times over the years; are search professionals who’ve been career executive search professionals more effective, or do folks who’ve spent a considerable amount of time in the industry and well experienced in leadership roles make better search professionals, once they’ve made the switch? 

In my experience, I have actually found that it doesn’t matter - whether you’re a career search professional or an industry domain expert who has transitioned into the world of executive search, what does matter, is how you are able to balance domain expertise/exposure and process expertise in executive search into delivering effective outcomes to your client.  Some partners in executive search firms tend to get this balance better than others and that makes them really effective with their clients. Am often asked how to spot the ones who manage to have a better balance from others.

Having anchored hundreds of searches across sectors as a client and worked in tandem with more than fifty different partners in global executive search firms, I’ve observed a number of qualities that appear to be a common thread when it comes to the most effective partners in executive search firms as against the rest. Here are some qualities these partners display most consistently:

They have a childlike enthusiasm & intensity for every mandate they engage with.

No matter how long you’ve been in the game, one thing that never goes out of vogue is your hunger & enthusiasm for more. Maintaining the same amount of curiosity, interest and energy for any project, be it looking for a CEO of a big business or a country head of a relatively small business, is crucial to them. Living the excitement of how the role could contribute to the business life cycle of the company drives their approach to mandates. They are totally committed to making a contribution to the client’s future – big or small. They will invest the same time, energy and effort to present your organizations story to candidates immaterial of the seniority or heft of the search.

They swear by deep primary research & leveraging their network equally.

Expecting that the search universe is calibrated right is a given with good search partners. What makes the really effective partners in search firms stand out is their long lists. You know it when you receive one. It’s not just that their research is always top-notch: every inch is covered, every piece of information is relevant. I usually receive three kinds of long lists –

a) Longlists heavily dependent on secondary research / just pulled together by someone in the team by going through the firm’s internal database of candidates.

b) Longlists well dependent on secondary research /pulled together by someone in the team by going through the firm’s internal database of candidates and having had the benefit of the research and associate teams network intelligence baked in.

C) Longlists well dependent on secondary research /pulled together by someone in the team by going through the firms internal database of candidates and having had the benefit of the research and associate teams inputs plus the partners own network intelligence baked in.

Most searches where I have worked with the third category of longlists as well as high quality crisp inputs from the partner in the process of funnelling it into a shortlist have given outstanding results. The quality of this discussion actually sets the pace for the overall search. Rest of the search process post this is usually a breeze.

They are master influencers and never act like a salesperson.

Most senior level professionals usually are pretty good at assessing the impact, scope, and span & how a role will propel their career. You don’t go too far with them if you are salesy in your narrative. It’s more of how you influence them into considering a perspective that they otherwise may not pay attention to or think of as a big deal. Making them appreciate the finer nuances of an opportunity and giving them the liberty to arrive at their conclusions yet getting them thinking about the possibilities of a new opportunity in a different way is what the effective partners of search firms truly excel at. Every search firm I know will have tales galore of how some of their partners “converted the unconvertable” in various searches as part of their folklore. If there was an equivalent word for what valour stands for in the battlefield, in executive search parlance - “influencing” would be a good synonym.

They are emotionally super intelligent.

Let’s face it, when you are dealing mostly with high quality talent either from the clients end or at the candidate pool end – things tend to get quirky. It’s natural that a wide range of opinions and thoughts are at the heart of a healthy search process. A lot of folks I know believe that - more the debate the better the process and outcome. Some of the best partners I know are just not judgemental. They treat folks and their ideas from both sides with reason. They treat talent as talent no matter what, they indulge them and encourage them. They help organizations see possibilities for the future with different kinds of talent-sets.

They are master multitaskers and develop a strong team around them.

Executive Search is a time consuming process, those who can organize themselves and multitask really well are a rare breed.

On a particularly rainy day in Mumbai many years ago, I had a morning and afternoon “longlist” discussion session booked in my calendar. Turns out we were discussing two searches with diagonally opposite search universes and research teams but the same partner. Despite being two searches on opposite ends the partner was at his intellectual best both in the morning as well as the afternoon session. That evening he concluded a complex negotiation with a candidate. This is normal life for really effective partners in search firms – they juggle business development to overseeing research to managing candidate’s day in and day out.

Many of the really effective partners in executive search firms that I have worked with, are also genuine trees with deep roots - who love to nurture branches. They heavily invest their personal time in helping their teams develop and grow. Most partners who are part of this club often proudly share with me stories of their associates becoming partners and so on. They have a real interest in paying it forward.

They are good human beings.

Not surprising that most of the effective partners in executive search firms genuinely care about the world and its wellbeing. They are sensitive and have a genuine passion for the world to be a better place. They quietly but consistently do their bit, be it in the area of environmental sustainability, education and health for the poor, or in areas like equality, diversity and inclusion etc.

There are a few other qualities that effective partners in executive search firms demonstrate, those that go beyond the ones I’ve mentioned above (like having a very strong business acumen, astute negotiation qualities or being an effective judge of human abilities/behaviour - like assessment etc.).  I have taken the liberty to prioritize the ones I have called out above. Failure rates at executive positions is not a new concern that the corporate world is facing today. This has been an ongoing concern for the last few decades including the price organizations have paid for not getting the right kind of executive talent for thier business. Executive search partners play a pivotal role in this process as much as clients themselves. Given this context, it feels important to articulate the qualities that successful partners in executive search firms demonstrate consistently even though these qualities seem simple and obvious. The more we are able to add to the list of effective partners in search firms the better it will be for the business ecosystem overall.