Simon Mullins explains how executive search differs from high-volume hiring: it's high-touch, low-volume work focused on mission-critical roles and underrepresented talent areas. Recruiters need consulting skills and emotional intelligence, work irregular hours under CEO and board scrutiny, and act as mentors and sponsors rather than process managers.
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I would say the difference when it comes to a tactical or practical level is literally a super high touch white glove. We used to say, you know, low volume, high intensity and those are the differences. Now that's where. And actually back to kind of the overarching premise. Keep using the word overarching today. That's where, you know, it goes back to the first commentary as it doesn't necessarily mean it has to be cxo, you know, chief, whatever officer. It can be that it's a space, it's really, really critical to one's organization and that could be underrepresented groups, diverse groups, whatever it might be. Or it could be, as I said before, you know, new talent in a new space. You know, we're in the, we're in the car making business and we want to get into chocolate and we don't know anything about chocolate. So we're going to start bringing in chocolate focused talent which is critical to the organization. So it's less about, it's a certain band of hiring, although it is in many cases, but it's not necessarily always about that. It's more about the high touch white glove, strategic impact, low volume and high intensity, which are, you know, very glib statements. But to practical side of it, you know, the amount of times I used to hear you make how many hires, how few hires? I should say a year, you know, I'm making 200, 300, my team's making three, six, you know, a thousand hires a year and you're making 50. You know, and I get that it's complicated, but it is a very high pressure situation. It's super exhilarating to have the CEO or the board or something looking over your shoulder. But it's also exhausting. You know, there's no, there's no kind of time off. I mean, in my experience anyway, maybe not everybody's, there's a lot of weekend work. We have to be available whenever the talent's ready to talk and so on. So, you know, I'm waffling a little bit, but you know, it's all about long term. It's about high touch, sometimes opportunistic hiring. So not necessarily when there's an open wreck, there's a lot of gray and trying to figure things out. But it's all these things take vision, long term perspective, mentorship, sponsorship and so on. But much less about process and technology, much more about consulting and empathy and EQ and so on and so forth. I threw a bunch of words in there. Hopefully some of them will stick.
