Encouraging Brilliance to Pull in Best Management Talent
Businesses that assume they can pull in awesome executive leaders in many cases are the ones that can’t make their very own business case to potential recruits and who fail to appeal to the best calibre management prospects in the first place.
As the late management thinker and author Peter Drucker once said, “The ability to make good decisions regarding people represents one of the last reliable sources of competitive advantage, since very few organisations are very good at it. ”
Making those great judgements, says TRANSEARCH’s Steven Pezim in Toronto, is all about bringing in the right field of talent in the first place. “An organisation’s capacity to appeal to top talent hinges on its traditions, the quality and standing of its products and services, and, basically, ‘the sex appeal’ of its career growth potential, ” Pezim contends. “That being said, there are no gimmicks. The organisation’s authenticity, its identity will shine through or not. If you’re seeking to fill executive jobs within Ferrari or Apple, the reaction would be tremendous. The exact same position with a food wholesaler, however, may very well be a problem filling. ”
Russel Reeves a partner in Watermark Search, the TRANSEARCH International executive search firm office in Sydney, agrees with that assessment. “The very best talent only really wants to work for the most thriving, high-profile, firms, ” he says. “Creating and projecting that reputation can be a key strategy in marketing executive job opportunities, through stimulating an industry’s finest to seek and approach the company or being open to approaches every time they come. ” That does apply in business much in the same way great athletes with a team attitude drive championship performance. “The roi that comes from having the very best talent will be maximised by having industry best talent who work in a constructive, usually values-driven, team environment, ” Reeves says. “It stands to reason that within a very competitive industry, a company staffed with the ‘best’ talent will build up a competitive edge over others. ”
Looking to the future, Bob Lewy, also a partner in the Sydney office, says the rules of attraction are shifting with regard to the way dynamic firms connect with and ultimately recruit up-and-coming executives from the so-called ‘Generation Y. ‘ “Generation Y executives, particularly, are keen to sign up to an organisation that is environmentally sensitive and considered to be a caring, corporate citizen, preferably engaged in assisting community and not-for-profit organisations, ” Lewy says.
So the bar on what it takes to captivate the very best talent is pushed higher still. When and how employers identify that and whether they stay or get in the game are issues that will surely redraw the competitive business landscape for years to come.
Note to Editors: About TRANSEARCH International
Executive search firm TRANSEARCH International has representation in most of the major economic centres of the world with 59 offices in 37 countries. TRANSEARCH International was founded in 1982 and is a leading international executive search firm.
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