Executive Search
Blog Category ArchiveExecutive search, informally known as headhunting, is a specialized recruitment service that identifies, profiles, qualifies, and ultimately delivers senior-level executives and technologists. In her blog, The Good Search CEO Krista Bradford shares her insights on executive search firm selection and executive recruiting best practices of C-Level leaders. What follows is a list of her posts about executive search.
Executive Search Firm Selection
1.1 When Should I Use an Executive Search Firm?
1.2 12 Reasons to Hire a Headhunter
1.3 What Does Executive Search Cost?
1.4 Is Your Executive Search Firm Ready for Big Data?
1.5 How to Select the Right Search Firm Type
1.6 Idiotic Questions Not to Ask Executive Search Firms
1.7 What are the Steps of the Executive Search Process?
1.8 How to Build Your Own List of Top Executive Search Firms
1.9 What Are the Top Executive Search Firms in NYC?
Executive Search Best Practices
2.1 How to Recognize Great Talent in Executive Search
2.2 Executive Search and the Art of Finding Your Person
2.3 Executive Search Choice Paradox
2.4. Why You Need a Chief Data Officer
2.51 To Recruit Rock Stars, It Helps to Know Them
2.52 Recruit A Players | Steve Jobs Quote
2.53 Genius Candidates
2.6 How to Hire Top Digital Executives Despite Talent Crunch
2.71 Why Do Executive Recruiters Fail?
2.72 Why Executive Searches Fail and What to Do About It
2.8 How to Make Executive Search Easier
2.9 How to Take Executive Search to The Next Level
When Should I Use an Executive Search Firm?
Employers use an executive search firm when a search is important enough to warrant the investment. I use the word “investment” for a reason. A retained executive search will likely cost you a minimum of $50,000 and averages $100,000 or more — typically one-third of a candidate’s first-year total cash compensation.
Top Executive Search Firms List: How to Build Your Own
A short list of the top executive search firms is readily available in the minds of most CEOs, Chief People Officers, Heads of Talent Acquisition. But what’s a company to do if that short list comes up short?
To Recruit Rock Stars, It Helps to Know Them
Headhunters say they recruit rock star executives, but few know what that really means. They have never met a rock star backstage. The experience shapes your understanding of what it takes to be at the very top.
Recruit A Players | Steve Jobs Quote
Set a strategy to recruit the best-of-the-best senior executives and you will be channelling Apple founder Steve Jobs. There’s a vast difference between simply qualified and exceptional. Jobs understood that, which is why he focused on recruiting A players.
Selecting the Right Search Firm Type
There are two traditional search firm types in the world of executive search — contingency and retained. Contingency search firms are not paid to do the work of recruiting. They are only paid if and when they make a placement. Retained search firms charge a retainer to do the work of recruiting.
Executive Search and the Art of Finding Your Person
In executive search, candidate finalists start to resemble one another. They all are incredibly accomplished. They all have stellar reputations. All should have a track record of outperforming their peers. Everything else being equal, candidate fit ends up being the determining factor — how well the candidate fits in and how well the candidate clicks with the senior leadership. At the end of the day, if you are a CEO, it comes down to finding your person.
Genius Candidates
As an executive search consultant that specializes in technology, I frequently encounter genius candidates. It is my job to determine which ones are top performers. While it is easy to be blinded by brilliance, genius candidates have to do more than think.
Why Do Executive Recruiters Fail?
There is, in executive search, such as thing as too much candidate data. Few recruiters understand how to wrangle it. They lack the necessary deep data expertise to gather, parse, and analyze data to make executive search smarter.
Why Executive Searches Fail and What to Do About It
It doesn’t matter whether executive searches are conducted internally or externally. The rule holds true either way: executive searches will continue to fail at high rates because the recruiting industry has not invested in the kind of expertise required to find good candidate data.
How to Recruit the Right Executive
I have recruited top executives and technologists for the past decade and a half. Over that same period of time, I have also made hires to my own team. I can tell you with absolute certainty that one of the most devastating mistakes a business can make is picking the wrong person for the job.
Executive Recruiting Challenges | How to Make Executive Search Easier
Executive recruiting challenges are all too common. That is why we decided to write a post about How to Make Executive Search Easier. Executive searches often take too long and far too many searches end in frustration. In addition, executive search challenges don’t stop when an executive opening is filled.
How to Hire Top Digital Executives Despite Talent Crunch
A growing number of companies have come to the realization that it has never been more important to hire top digital executives. These days, a company’s ability to compete — and even to survive — depends on it.
How to Recognize Great Talent in Executive Search
Learning how to recognize great talent is the key to making amazing hires in executive search. While it is pretty easy to tell who’s good while seated court-side in Madison Square Garden watching the New York Knicks play, it is not so easy for Chief Executive Officers seated in the C-suite.
What are the Steps of the Executive Search Process?
The executive search process varies little from retained executive search firm to retained search firm. In fact, the basic steps of the retained search process are described by the Association of Executive Search Consultants (AESC), an organization that represents retained search firms.
12 Reasons to Hire a Headhunter
If your company is experiencing dramatic growth or is in the midst of a corporate turn-around, chances are you need to hire a headhunter. The reason is simple: senior executive searches are simply too important.
6 Signs an Executive Candidate is a Waste of Time
In executive search, it is important to spot the signs that a candidate is not viable. To be effective, one must close out problematic candidates early on to avoid wasting everyone’s time, including the candidate’s.
Idiotic Questions Not to Ask Executive Search Firms
If you are seeking a retained search firm to conduct an important executive search, one needs a list of questions to screen and assess prospective search firms for selection. However, today were going to talk about what not to ask retained executive search firms.
Why You Need a Chief Data Officer
If knowledge is power, hiring your company’s first Chief Data Officer (CDO) may be the shortest path to a competitive advantage. According to a recent article in Harvard Business Review, you hire a Chief Data Officer in order to compete with data. That Chief Data Officer will likely need data scientists, and eventually a data lab, and a data factory — respectively one place to do longer term, innovative, out-of-the box thinking, and the other place to do more process-focused data analytics aimed at more immediate results.