Executive Recruiter News, April 2000, p. 1, 4 - ©2000 by Kennedy Information LLC - This is as good as it gets, right?
That question was on the minds of nearly all the 230 executive recruiters/spouses/exhibitors who attended the recent Association of Executive Search Consultants' 2000 annual conference, The Changing Competitive Landscape, at La Quinta Resort and Club in Palm Springs, California.
While the recruiters basked in the sun and tried to keep par with the desert resort's pro-level golf courses, they also basked in the success they've enjoyed in the recruiting game over the past few years - a moment in time that may come to be know as the Golden Age of Executive Search.
And why not celebrate? Demand for executive talent is forcing many of today's leading firms to turn away business. Recruiters are raking in huge fees, thanks in part to the equity many have been given in emerging companies. The insight and consultative value that each offers its clients and top candidates is becoming increasingly understood by corporate HR heads, the media and Wall Street investors.
So go ahead, have another drink, plan that long summer vacation and sign the lease on that new roadster. After all, there's still untold upside to be realized from the burgeoning War for Talent.
"This is our time," says SpencerStuart co-chairman Dayton Ogden, and one that through a combination of luck and hard work has positioned executive recruiters from large and small firms on the frontlines of their clients' most important considerations - their people. "I think we can have a fantastic run doing [search] with openness and integrity."
Hobson Brown Jr., president and CEO of Russell Reynolds Associates, says the best is yet to come for executive recruiters. He says search is a growth industry and one that'll be even more competitive in the future, but adds that it'll be even more valuable 10 years from now, despite any perceived threats from on-line recruiting. "You can't build machines that think like people - it's a judgment business."
Nicholas Donatiello Jr., a former Senate campaign strategist for eventual New Jersey presidential contender Bill Bradley, offers his advice to search firms that have yet to sign their first dot-com or venture-funded, emerging growth company as a client. "Go get one, even if you have to give away your services," he says, because what recruiters learn from these startups will provide valuable lessons that'll help guide firms' work with much bigger, more-established companies in the near future.
Conference attendees voiced broad consensus about the impact technology has had on the identification of top-notch executive candidates, as some firms can now complete that task in a fraction of the time it once took. But negotiating the right deal for the candidate while sticking to the terms of an engagement with a client company may become even more a challenge in the near future.
"Finding the fish isn't the problem," says Colin C. Durand, managing director of The Insight Group in Sydney. "Getting them into the boat is the big problem."
Some urge today's recruiters to keep their focus on quality, ethical search work, rather than be blinded by the new gold rush. "It's easy to grab the money. It's easy to be greedy," says Janet Jones-Parker, principal of Jones-Parker/Starr, who cautioned some of her colleagues not to get caught in what she described as "situational ethics." Boyden president Christopher J. Clarke also lobbies fellow AESC members not to relax ethics in favor of a hot market.
And as for the state of off-limits in today's search market? "The clients are driving the ethical issues of off-limits," says Dale Winston, chairman and CEO of Battalia Winston Int'l Inc./Accord Group. Ogden adds, "We cannot, I don't think, be rigid on off-limits."
Durant A. "Andy" Hunter, president and CEO of Pendleton James Associate, Inc. of New York and Boston, says the key to doing good search work today is much the same formula as it has been through the history of the industry: building relationships and connections with people, and executing well. Asked if he has any fears for the executive search profession, Hunter replies: "I don't really have any fear for this industry other than arrogance."
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