June 7, 2024
14: Why Executive Recruiters Might Not Be Interested and What To Do About It
Not getting much love from executive recruiters? Finding that they just don't "get" your skills and experience and how good fit you'd be for the job? Host Doug Lester draws on his experience as a senior associate at a top executive search firm to explain why you might feel like you're running into a brick wall — and what you can potentially do about it.
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Transcript
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As a coach with a background in executive search, I was a senior associate at a top firm for almost four years, a lot of the people I work with want to talk about executive recruiters and how to get on their radar screens.
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And in those conversations, my clients often express frustration.
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The common complaints I hear are: Recruiters aren't calling for the roles I want.
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They only call for the roles that are like my current one or the roles I've had in the past.
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Recruiters don't respond when I reach out to them.
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When I do get time with recruiters, they don't seem to get my transferable skills or my fit for the positions they're working to fill.
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And the most frustrating of all for my clients: While I've managed to get past an initial screen and maybe even a round or two of interviews, I'm never the finalist in a search run by an executive search firm.
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If any of these common complaints sound familiar or maybe you've even said them yourself, I understand your frustration.
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In this episode, I'm going to explain why this is the experience of many of my clients and why it might be your experience, too.
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And I'm going to give you something you can potentially do about it.
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So stay tuned.
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So you think that executive recruiters and executive search firms could play a big role in your career advancement, but you don't feel like you're getting enough or even any traction with them.
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And it's frustrating.
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Before I get to what might be the underlying reason for this, I want to clear up a common misconception about executive search.
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Executive recruiters, they're not career coaches.
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While they may take some time out of their jam-packed schedules to get to know a high-potential person they can add to their network, they generally don't have the time or the interest to serve as career coaches to job seekers.
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They're hired by companies, their paying clients, to fill critical roles in their clients' organizations.
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Recruiters are under a lot of pressure to do that well and to do it quickly.
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Any time they spend just getting to know someone is taking them away from their core paid work.
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So if you're reaching out to executive recruiters for career guidance, you're barking up the wrong tree.
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Reach out to your own network, advisers and people like me for that kind of help.
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With that out of the way, let's assume that you're trying to get consideration for roles that recruiters have already been hired to fill and you're hitting a brick wall.
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The first question you should be asking yourself is whether you're a, and I'll put this in quotes,"traditional" or a"non-traditional" candidate.
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It's going to matter.
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A lot.
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When I use the terms traditional and non-traditional, I may be thinking about them a little differently than you might at first.
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What I'm really talking about is the risk level an executive recruiter may assign to you as a candidate in a search and ultimately as a potential finalist who gets the job.
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In a recruiter's mind, you're a traditional candidate when you're less risky to present to their client or to back as a or the leading candidate in one of their searches.
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You might consider yourself a traditional candidate to a recruiter when you have the expected or desired type of experience that the recruiter or their client thinks they need for the role they're filling and you have the right amount of it.
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It's not much more complicated than that.
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If you read the job description, challenge statement, or scope, that's what we called that often lengthy job description when I was a recruiter, there's usually a section that starts with the phrase"the ideal candidate will have" or something similar to that.
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Read that section carefully to get a sense of whether or not you're a traditional candidate.
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You don't have to take it literally, point by point, but it's a pretty strong indication of what the recruiter expects in a candidate and in the finalist who ultimately will get the job.
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The more closely your experience aligns to that description, the more traditional you're going to be in the recruiter's mind.
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And the greater chance of you being successful in the role they're filling if they place you in it.
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Again, this is all in the recruiter's mind.
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And while past performance is no guarantee of future returns, executive recruiters prefer a career that features a consistent, steady climb that seems to inevitably lead to the role that they're tasked with filling.
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It just seems less risky.
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And who could blame them for presenting and then backing a candidate with the expected background and experience.
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In other words, the ideal candidate.
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On the flip side, you're a non-traditional candidate in the recruiter's mind, and more risky to present or back, if you don't have the exact type of experience in the types of settings that the recruiter and their client were expecting for the role.
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You could also be a non-traditional candidate, meaning more risky to present or place, if you haven't already operated at a similar level of seniority relative to the role the recruiter is filling.
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Quite simply, the role might be a bit of a stretch and it would take a leap of faith to place you in it.
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Or maybe the role has people management at a scale that's meaningfully bigger than anything you've managed effectively to date.
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No matter what the reason might be for you presenting as a non-traditional candidate, the fact that you are one makes you a risky proposition for the recruiter and for the client.
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The deck is already stacked against you.
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Some of the reasons are obvious, some less so.
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Here's one of the less obvious reasons.
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Recruiters generally guarantee their searches.
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When I was a recruiter we did.
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Let's say I placed you in a role and you didn't work out in the first year and it wasn't because the client did something awful or illegal.
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Then my firm, my partner and I were on the hook to redo the search for free.
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Consider that for a minute.
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I've experienced it, and it was a nightmare.
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First, the candidate I placed was generally upset with me and the firm, even if it was their fault that they didn't work out.
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Second, the experience strained the relationship with our client who had, after all, invested a lot of time, energy, money and trust in the recruiting process.
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That trust needed to be earned again, and the client, meanwhile, was short a critical member of their team for potentially an extended period of time.
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Third, my personal reputation in the firm took a hit.
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While people expressed sympathy and support: Oh, Doug.
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I heard you have a do-over.
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I'm so sorry.
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They were probably also questioning my judgment.
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Couldn't I have figured out that the candidate was a potentially risky choice?
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Great judgment, Doug.
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Fourth, when I reached out to the firm's network to fill the role again, people were understandably curious.
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They typically said something to the effect of: Wait, didn't we talk about this one a few months ago?
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I thought you placed someone in the role.
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What happened?
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Often this line of questioning led to a suspicion that something was wrong with the client, especially if the person I was speaking with knew or knew of the candidate and had a good opinion of them.
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This friction made pulling a new candidate pool together even harder than it was the first time, assuming, of course, that we didn't have a back-up.
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Sometimes there was one of those ready to go, but not always.
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So the networking phase of the search, in other words, assembling a new candidate pool, would take longer than the first time around, which was especially troubling given the fifth reason that a do-over was so distressing.
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All the work to redo the search was for all intents and purposes unpaid.
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Remember the search was guaranteed, so the additional work was not generating any additional revenue.
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As a result, a do-over was often added on top of your regular workload as a recruiter, which made it even harder to manage.
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So does this all mean that if you're a riskier non-traditional candidate without the expected type or depth of experience for a role that you have no chance at all to be considered for or even to be chosen as the finalist in a search conducted by a search firm?
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No, but it will be an uphill battle.
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And one that you can't fight on your own.
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You're going to need back-up.
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You're going to need references.
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Recruiters live and die by references and for one key reason: They reduce risk for the recruiter's clients and for the recruiters themselves.
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Think about it.
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When someone who the recruiter and the client respect and trust says that you'd be a good match for a role, then that reduces the perceived risk of presenting and then placing you in the role, and the perceived risk of the recruiter ultimately having a do-over.
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So if you know or even expect that a recruiter might view you as a non-traditional candidate for a search they're leading, then start lining up your references and line them up early.
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And rather than hoping the recruiter won't notice that your background and experience aren't exactly on spec for the role, take the bull by the horns and bring it up yourself.
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I've said this in more coaching sessions with clients than I can count, and I probably already said it on this podcast.
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Indulge me.
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Don't hope that recruiters won't notice the potential weaknesses in your candidacy.
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They will.
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It's their job to find them.
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And they have a strong economic incentive, avoiding a do-over, that compels them to follow through on every doubt about you they may have.
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So acknowledge the elephant in the room and say something to the effect of: You know, if I were you, I'd be wondering about my experience with X.
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It's not so easy to tell from the roles I've held or my resume that X was actually a critical component of my work at Company A and Company B.
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I can tell you about it.
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And if you'd like to speak to someone who's familiar with my work there, I can connect you with them.
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No problem.
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At some point, the recruiter is probably going to ask the question.
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So instead of taking a defensive posture when they do, why not go on offense?
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You'll seem more confident of your abilities.
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Recruiters usually respond well to that kind of approach.
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It's an indication that you'd be able to handle yourself if their client were to question you or challenge you.
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And again, it reduces the perceived risk associated with your potential candidacy.
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So if you're a candidate in a search led by an executive recruiter, take a moment to consider if you're closer to a traditional or a non-traditional candidate.
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It's not always clear.
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You could be somewhere in the middle.
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But if you think you're closer to being non-traditional, then reduce the risk for everyone, including yourself.
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Line up references who can help you defuse concerns you think the executive recruiter might have.
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And don't hesitate to offer a few of them early.
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It might just help you get a spot in the candidate pool for the search and help propel you over the finish line as a finalist.
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And if you think you need to think through your candidacy for a search or how you might approach pulling together a reference list, sign up for a Career Strategy Session with me at careernarratives.com/strategy.
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I'd be happy to help you do a little de-risking.
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