By Jeremy Bossenger of BossJansen Executive Search.
When seeking to hire a vital new member of your company’s C-suite, its ideal to have a retained executive search firm handling both the search aspect, and the vetting process. Further, the sooner you partner up with such a firm, and get to the point where the relationship is forging ahead without effort, the sooner you’ll reap the many strategic benefits.
We all remember the stresses of times past, when overstretched managing directors and chief financial officers had to handle all the managerial and operational matters that were charted up in their job descriptions – and also oversee the attempts of often-junior human resources teams to hire much-needed new recruits.
Fortunately, times have evolved for the better in that MDs and CFOs can now strike up a partnership with a specialist executive search company; and, over time, this firm can go on to act, without much prompting, in the very best interests of the company, its culture, and any unique hiring requirements it may have.
The pressure of hiring critically needed executives for the C-suite is then left to the executive-search experts; at the same time that it is lifted off an often over-encumbered MD or CFO, and their administratively overloaded HR team.
Just three of the many benefits to be enjoyed when your senior-level hiring is handled in this manner, include:
1. A brand does well when it partners up for the long termÂ
This refers not only to customers and suppliers, but also to partners – such as your executive search team – who will rapidly become brand advocates when they see how you work, like it and go on to send the very best talent your way.
A good example of this is priming a new executive secretary with all the information they need, from early days, to handle all of your work and personal administrative matters, and the ability to sit back after six months because it is now being accomplished, just as you like it, without needing much input from you.
2. A brand does well when its network is ever-growing
An important bonus of a retained executive search team is the vast network of high-level business folk that they gather as a matter of course. This network offers on mentoring, guidance, knowledge and experience, so that your recruitment partner can seek and find the very best handful of candidates in as confidential a manner as possible.
Then, its just a case of convincing this individual, or three, to move across from a position where they are settled and well remunerated – to one in which they will still need to settle, will be paid quite a bit better, yet the work they will be doing will likely resonate with them as being all the more meaningful.
3. A brand thrives when a hiring partner puts discretion on a pedestalÂ
There are times when an HR manager, or contingent agency that gathers CVs, cannot be trusted with the level of discretion required when hiring for the C-suite. This is especially the case when a replacement executive is being wooed, while the former employee is still onsite and filling the current position.
Outsourcing the task means that workplace secrecy remains a no-brainer, and the process can be accomplished as swiftly and strategically as possible – without putting any in-house staff members in the firing line.
There are also three reasons why your executive search partner can’t be beaten by anyone else in-house or out in the marketplace:
4. They hire for the long term, by ensuring each candidate is a best-in-class fit for the role and company at hand;
5. They think further than the day-to-day, meaning that even if your CEO, MD and CFO are bogged down with massive to-do lists, there’s a team out there lining up a succession plan; and
6. They may be better versed in matters of equity and diversity than your in-house HR team or favoured contingent agency, so that not just the right candidate – but also the one that matches the B-BBEE scorecard towards which you are working – can be groomed and placed to best effect.
While striking up the most effective working relationship with the head individuals at your executive search firm will involve a great deal of talking and sharing on your side, so that they are 100 percent au fait with how you think and what you want; it will also be vital that you understand the very involved process they work through to shine the light on the three or four people who are most suitable, throughout a sector or due to a specialised skillset, for a specific senior role.
The process, which is probably best illustrated diagrammatically, moves through as many as four complex and detailed stages. These are:
• the planning phase (conduct research, establish your expectations, create a profile, carry out market mapping, formulate a search strategy);
• the discovery phase (identify target environments, woo prospective candidates, conduct preliminary evaluations – including any form of qualification testing, report back);
• the assessment phase (establish a benchmark, create a shortlist, conduct the first round of interviews, carry out candidate vetting); and
• the hiring phase (structure an offer, assist with negotiations, hire and place the choice candidate, help them to onboard as smoothly as possible – including relocation if required, and schedule regular follow-ups to keep their working life a happy and successful one thereafter).
In conclusion, I can’t stress highly enough the need to establish a close and long-term relationship with your executive search team or partner, so that on the third or fourth placement they make for you, there is little need to meet for hours or to elaborate too much on specific requirements.
At this point, they should be able to carry out the magic at which they are most talented, by offering a prospective candidate complete transparency and a positive – even exciting – hiring process; and simultaneously act in your company’s best interests by protecting the brand you have worked hard to establish in the marketplace.
