An insight to hiring senior executives

There is another ingredient that is important and often disregarded, and it is one of sensitivity. Company success and career satisfaction are indivisible, company success is often contingent upon the provenance of key executives, but in a region like the Middle East, provenance and sensitivity are often disregarded.

Hiring the right executives is important, because for company performance within a rapidly changing business environment, one that is competing with the best international and regional players, demands having the best people in place to manage the business.

Quite often, hiring criteria concentrate on easily identifiable factors including; 'relevant experience', skills and competencies and, often appear to overlook the fact that hiring crieria must encapsulate complex combinations of traits and capabilities that are situation relevant.

To demonstrate this point, a few years ago I was mentoring a client who was an operations director for a major 'high street' wine retail chain, with outlets located across the United Kingdom. He successfully made a transition to another position within a larger group, taking on a role that was fundamentally different yet related.

The new role was that of operations director and required someone with the ability to drive the business development programme and ensure it operated efficiently. A simple statement for a complex role that involved; brand protection through managing issues and mitigating their effects on the reputation of the company, ensuring a reliable operating process across the retail chain to deliver a consistent experience to the customer, delivering a cost efficient business platform that supported the profitability of the company and of importance, the ability to support the company through a fast rate ramp-up against demanding performance targets.

He was discreetly approached by a head-hunter who was looking for an operations director to manage the north half of the UK, a particular type of individual with relevant experience, business acumen and importantly - provenance. Use of a headhunter was a significant clue to setting the interview strategy. Often, for sensitive appointments where shareholder value could react adversely to any announcement of the disposition of key executives, head-hunters are engaged to manage the hire.

The hiring company although in the same category, managed themed pubs and bars and was attempting to create a new consumer experience. This entailed investment and we quickly found out that it was venture capitalist backed to the tune of several hundred million US$ with plans to go IPO in about 6 months.

These factors imply a variety of traits and a level of professional ability within the new executive. The very fact that this company were developing a unique service concept as part of their business strategy and, were floating the business made it extremely unlikely that they would find someone with direct relevant experience.

If we analyse the business need, we get a clue to the profile of the ideal candidate. The business is venture capitalist backed, is scheduled for IPO on the London Stock Exchange and they are going through a service delivery transformation creating a 'case of first instance' business profile.

The interview strategy was complex and comprised four distinct phases. The initial headhunter contact was to determine suitability against client brief and the client objective was to sell their benefit, avoiding the pitfalls of package discussions at this stage.

Company interviews included the Chief Executive who would act as the final hiring decision maker subject to board acceptance. Herein lay the first major difficulty, meeting the board that contained his future counterpart for the southern region, who felt threatened.

This is where the issue of sensitivity and relationship building was of paramount importance. Demonstrating professional capability is one thing, but ensuring a cohesive board was vital to success and, sensitivity to the people within the board would be necessary to ensure that they performed as a single, focused unit. Time and efficiency were critical factors.

Provenance was a major consideration due to the high level of funding being invested in the business and this forged the need for a 'formality meeting' with the venture capitalist company. They afterall, had to be comfortable that the new incumbent was able to deliver against their requirements. Often, at the top of a venture capitalist's stipulated requirements for investment, will be a workable exit strategy and to deliver against this they require high annual return rates.

The decision to hire was made against four major criteria; professional capability as demonstrated through past experience, business know-how supported by experience and qualification, the ability to work within a high ramp-up environment and at the same time ensuring a cohesive senior management team and finally, provenance - that comfort factor to the financial backer.

Hiring must take into account far more than skills, competencies, education and language skills, for the Middle East now demands the best if it is to be successful in the international business arena.