Hiring is a daunting task no matter the role you’re looking to fill. In today’s job market, when candidates have their choice of open jobs, there’s no room for error. Even companies with plenty of resources to lure candidates are struggling to recruit. Hiring for executive-level roles, in particular, can be a challenging task for a number of reasons.

Not only are executive candidates generally more difficult to find and interview – the stakes are also far higher than for a mid-level manager, for example. The best executive candidate can foster a healthy work culture, make smart strategic business decisions, and offer a significant financial return for the company. An executive who isn’t the right fit may leave the company, make costly financial decisions, or even disrupt normal business operations. When it comes to executive talent, you should trust your search only to an executive search firm.

1. Active vs. Passive Candidate: Why it Matters

One of the reasons the executive talent search is lengthy and challenging is because executive talent isn’t on the job hunt. Executives, with their extensive personal and professional networks, don’t need to use the same tools to search for a job that lower-level employees do. You won’t find them combing through job boards or applying for open positions on company websites. Instead, they network with contacts who already know them personally or by reputation to discreetly and easily find a suitable position.

Executives are too busy managing their current workload to spend time searching for a job manually. They also know that most executive-level jobs just aren’t posted on those sites, so they’re better off saving their energy for a tactic that actually works. They may not even be actively looking for a new job – but that doesn’t mean the right candidate can’t be lured away from their current position with an attractive offer from the right company.

2. Free Up Time and Resources

For all the reasons we’ve discussed, executive recruitment is tough, even for seasoned recruiters. It’s time-consuming and requires a different set of skills than most general recruitment efforts. It may take an internal recruiting team several months of work to find a few solid executive candidates. Your organization may not be able to spare that kind of HR manpower for this purpose.

Working with an executive search firm can free up time and resources so that your HR team can focus on onboarding, training, and non-executive recruitment.

3. Executive Search Experience

Our executive search team has decades of experience connecting qualified executives with the companies that need them most. This is our specialty, and it shows in our track record and glowing customer referrals.

4. Professionalism and Discretion

Anyone recruiting executives needs to operate with the highest possible standard of professionalism and discretion. As we’ve mentioned, executives who are thinking about pursuing a new job, search quietly while they remain working in their current role. If their existing colleagues or employees knew about their plan to take another job, it could cause conflict in the workplace.

For this reason, it’s critical that executive recruiters contact and interview prospects with subtlety and discretion. Our team of executive recruiters knows how to approach executives to prioritize confidentiality in the hiring process. To prevent information about your search from leaking to the public, we can conduct a search without revealing the identity of your company until we’ve reached a final short list of candidates. Not only is this beneficial for company confidentiality and protecting any executive who may be replaced by this new candidate, it’s also good for maintaining workplace harmony, avoiding gossip, and ensuring a quick and easy transition once the right candidate is secured.

5. Consultative approach

An executive search firm acts in a consultative role with your organization. That means that our resources are at your disposal. You have access to our recruiting services and expertise in terms of executive search and placement. We offer an objective, outsider’s perspective to the recruitment process, which is an advantage in trying to select the best candidate possible. With our perspective as external recruiters, we understand and characterize both your role and your company culture to prospective candidates. This insight helps us ensure that candidates have an accurate understanding of what their role and duties will entail.

Partner with the Experts

The “Suite” Experience

When you partner with PeopleSuite, you get the “suite” experience. PeopleSuite pairs you with an experienced talent expert who combines a scientific approach to sourcing the very best talent for your open role with the art of building a relationship with you. 

We’re passionate about the clients we serve. Every search is independent, proactive, and strategic. We assess each candidate on skill set as well as personality and culture fit for your business so that you’re presented with the right candidate at the right time.

Executive Search Expertise

Our executive search team includes former CEOs, search firm entrepreneurs, and past industry executives – each with decades of experience working with, working for, or leading the type of impeccable executives you seek. We understand the impact of every role because we’ve been there.

Performance-Based Billing

The typical retainer model is a sunk cost. If for any reason you need to cancel the engagement, you’re billed for any unpaid costs. At PeopleSuite, you rely on us to get the job done right and we hold ourselves accountable by billing in 25% installments based on performance metrics. You will be billed ¼ when the contract is signed, ¼ when candidates are presented, ¼ when interviews are conducted, and the final ¼ when the offer is accepted. We want you to be confident in our ability to source the best talent for your open position and believe that is done by proving ourselves to you at each step of the process.

Personal Talent Experts

PeopleSuite is an established talent agency with a reputation for getting results. We value a personalized process to hiring talent, which is why you receive a personal talent expert who will get to know your business and hiring needs and will proactively work to deliver on meeting those expectations. 

PeopleSuite is here to provide you with the best search experience possible. Connect today for a free employer consultation to see how we can support your hiring needs.