How to choose an
executive search firm.
Choosing a search firm comes down to four things: whether they understand the role well enough to argue with your brief, how they will build the longlist, what they send with each name, and who actually runs the mandate. Sector reputation and firm size matter far less than any of them.
Start by testing how they handle the brief
The most useful signal arrives in the first meeting, before any commercial discussion. Describe the role and watch what the firm does with it.
A firm that takes the brief at face value, agrees enthusiastically and moves straight to fees has told you how the search will run. A firm that pushes back on the brief is doing the part of the work that decides whether the appointment succeeds.
- Good firms ask what the person has to achieve in the first year, which is a different question from what the job description says.
- They ask what would count as the wrong hire, a question few clients have faced before, and one they find surprisingly clarifying.
- They ask who else the role depends on, because a leadership appointment that has to work alongside a difficult peer is a different search.
- They tell you where your package sits against the market, including when the answer is inconvenient.
We have taken briefs at face value and regretted it. A role described as a head of operations turned out to be three jobs the organisation had been unable to choose between, and we spent a month finding excellent candidates for a job that served the client badly.
Ask how the longlist gets built
Every firm claims to headhunt. The question that separates them is where the first fifty names come from.
| Answer you hear | What it means | Suits |
|---|---|---|
| "We have a strong database in this sector" | The longlist starts from people already known to the firm | Roles with a deep pool where speed matters |
| "We will map the organisations doing this well" | The longlist is built from the market rather than from history | Scarce roles, and roles where the obvious candidates have been approached before |
| "We have relationships with everyone at this level" | Possibly true, and worth testing by asking for the reasoning behind three names | Small, well-defined markets |
Follow up with a specific question: how many of the people you approach will be employed and settled where they are. A low number means the shortlist will come from people already looking, which is a smaller and different population from the one you are paying to reach.
Ask what arrives with each name
A shortlist is where a firm shows its work, and the format tells you how much work there was. Ask to see a redacted example from a comparable mandate before you sign.
- An assessment against the agreed criteria, written down, including where the candidate falls short. A list of strengths alone is marketing.
- Current compensation and notice period, so the offer can be shaped before it is made rather than renegotiated after.
- Why this person would move, which is the judgement that decides whether an approach converts into an appointment.
- References taken by the firm rather than supplied by the candidate, and taken before the shortlist rather than after the offer.
Four names with a covering paragraph each is the market standard. It is also the format that keeps all the reasoning with the firm, where it is useless to you when the board asks why this person ahead of the other one.
Establish who actually runs the mandate
The most common disappointment in search has nothing to do with method. The partner who wins the work and the consultant who does it are frequently different people, and the gap between them is where mandates quietly deteriorate.
Ask three things and have the answers written into the engagement letter.
- Who runs the research? Name them. Ask how many mandates they carry at once, because a researcher on twelve searches is doing something different from one on four.
- Who makes the approach calls? A senior candidate approached by someone junior and underbriefed often declines on the first call, and you rarely hear that it happened.
- Who will be in the room with us? Continuity from brief to offer matters more than the seniority of whoever attended the pitch.
Sector specialism, and when it works against you
Deep sector knowledge is the most commonly advertised virtue in search and the most double-edged. It buys real things: the firm knows who is good, which organisations develop people well, and what the numbers should look like.
It also brings a constraint clients rarely ask about. A firm embedded in your sector has placed people into many of the companies you would want to recruit from, and each of those placements carries an off-limits agreement. The reachable market may be considerably smaller than the total market.
- Ask which organisations the firm is currently unable to approach, and for how long.
- Compare that against the list of companies where the work you need is done well.
- Where the overlap is large, a generalist firm with a rigorous method may reach more of the market than a specialist with restrictions.
What should make you walk away
Five behaviours, any one of which is worth more weight than a strong pitch.
- Instant agreement with the brief. A firm that has run comparable searches will have questions about yours. Enthusiasm offered in place of interrogation means they intend to work the brief as written, including the parts that are wrong.
- Candidates offered in the first meeting. Names produced before the criteria are agreed come from a database and were on someone else’s shortlist last week.
- Reluctance to name the consultant who will run it. The single most reliable predictor of a mandate that deteriorates after signature.
- A fee well below the market. Search economics are simple: a mapped market takes research hours. A firm charging half the going rate is doing half the work, and it will be the half that stays invisible to you.
- Vagueness on off-limits. Every established firm has restrictions. One that claims otherwise either has few clients or is about to surprise you.
Against those, one behaviour is worth more than any credential: a firm that tells you early that the role as written will be hard to fill, and explains why. That conversation costs them the easy sale and saves you a wasted quarter.
The commercial terms worth arguing about
Five clauses account for most of the disputes that reach a difficult conversation later. All five are ordinary, and a reasonable firm will discuss each one openly.
- The fee base. Percentage of base salary, or of total first-year compensation including bonus and equity. At senior level the difference is material.
- The replacement term. Length, and what triggers it. Resignation only, or any departure inside the window.
- Off-limits. How long the firm agrees to leave your people alone after a placement. Twelve months is common; two years is achievable.
- Cancellation. What is owed if the role is withdrawn, paused, or filled internally.
- Ownership of introductions. How long a candidate they introduced remains theirs, and what happens if that person is hired into a different role later.
Reluctance to put any of these in writing is itself the answer, and it arrives cheaply at the point where you can still walk away.
Frequently asked questions
How they will build the longlist, what arrives with each name, and who personally runs the mandate. Those three answers predict the outcome better than sector reputation, firm size or fee level. Ask to see a redacted shortlist from a comparable search.
Large firms bring reach and process; boutiques bring partner attention and fewer off-limits restrictions. The practical question is how much of your target market each can actually approach. A large firm with many clients in your sector may have a smaller reachable population than a boutique with a clear field.
Watch what they do with your brief in the first meeting. A firm that argues with the brief, asks what would count as the wrong hire, and tells you when your package sits below the market is doing the work. One that agrees with everything and moves to fees is selling.
On a scarce role it usually produces a worse result. Competing firms optimise for speed over fit, candidates receive duplicate approaches that damage your reputation in the market, and disputes over who introduced whom are common.
A commitment by the search firm to keep its own clients off its recruiting list for an agreed period. It protects you after a placement, and it constrains the firm before one. Ask which organisations are currently off-limits to them, and compare that with where your candidates would come from.
A quarter to a third of the appointed candidate’s first-year total compensation. A fee materially below that range usually signals a database search rather than a mapped one, which is fine for some roles and a false economy for scarce ones.
On contingency, they are paid nothing. On a retained mandate, the staged fees already paid are usually retained by the firm. Establish before signing whether those stages are credited against a future mandate, and what happens if you fill the role with an internal candidate.
