“Junior” Executives—Executive Search at the Director Level
Executive search is often evocative of the highest decision-makers in an organization: CEOs, CFOs, Presidents, and Board Members. There’s an aspect of elitism that permeates the understanding of our work and sometimes unnecessarily pigeonholes client expectations of our capabilities.
Over the past four years, we’ve seen a consistent representation of “director-level” projects as a substantial portion of our search workload. There is a general trend away from exclusively operating at the highest levels of an organization and reapplying our same methods and techniques to bring in talent at other levels of a company.
What is a director-level position?
Naming conventions vary from business to business and sector to sector, but generally speaking, a director generally sits at the cusp between managers (who have a handful of direct reports) and vice presidents (who have broader functional or domain responsibility). Directors generally operate as leaders of a “team of teams” to coordinate more granular movements or initiatives.
Directors also generally sit in the middle of the tactical-strategic continuum. Unlike the highest-level executives, who deeply consider strategic priorities but can typically delegate tactical details, directors sit at the bleeding edge of ideation and implementation. These leaders get a “hand on the ball” regarding business strategy, taking time to process and understand the broad, organization-wide mandates being passed down while processing the implementation details and ultimately bringing the plan to life.
Last, directors tend to lean into a domain-specific skill or knowledge base that keeps them focused on a particular niche. It can be useful to have a director with a depth of knowledge within a subfunction (e.g., a Director of Compensation reporting to a Vice President of Human Resources) that can offload the cognitive load of nuance, especially as the world and economy increasingly require specialization.
What are the benefits of hiring a director?
We often provide search services for director-level searches for a variety of reasons:
- The growth of an organization requires a single person to help coordinate a team-of-teams situation.
- An existing director has left, and a company or organization has no meaningful way or reason to let the gap in reporting persist.
- A unique business case or vertical requires a leader to coordinate a specialist initiative (e.g., targeted talent acquisition, business development, or supply chain leaders.)
Whatever the case may be, if there are no suitable managers or team members ready to step into this position, companies are forced to look elsewhere for leadership talent.
An added benefit of placing a leader at this level is the ability to grow this individual over time. A “junior leader” has time to grow and evolve, often helping to shape the business and people they are leading. They become excellent assets and candidates for succession over time. In theory, a director becomes a vice president, then an executive! Three leaders for the price of one.
What are the challenges?
Executive searches around directors are not without their challenges, including a few common ones:
- Inexperience with Recruitment Processes: Directors are generally promoted into their current positions, and experience with recruiters can be limited. Partnering with an executive search firm may feel daunting or drawn-out given the various stakeholders in decision-making.
- Difficulties Relocating: If a search becomes national, or even regional, it can often be difficult to make a compelling case for relocation for a sitting director. They might be waiting for a VP-level title for their next role and prefer to “wait it out” before taking the effort to uproot and move a family.
- Misaligned Client Expectations: An executive team sometimes expects a great deal from a director (as they should!), but sometimes these professionals are just now stepping into broader leadership roles. Directors can have more gaps and weaknesses due to a lack of experience.
How Do We Overcome These Challenges?
- Service-Oriented Processes: Creating a relentlessly positive experience is very attractive to junior leadership. They get the chance to hone their interview presence, executive persona, and career narrative against real-life scenarios, and most welcome the opportunity to do so with a small, boutique firm that places a premium on direct, human engagement.
- Understanding and Creating Broader Alignment: A better understanding of “where the puck is headed” for a potential candidate’s career can help to overcome inertia for many candidate objections, including relocation. Combined with a seamless candidate experience, emphasizing career goals helps candidates see alternative (and appealing) growth trajectories.
- Having a Growth Plan: Interviews should serve as both validation and assessment; candidates who bring all the right pieces to solve the pressing problems still likely have room to grow. By incorporating those items into a candidate’s growth plan once they transition over, the company follows through on a commitment to continue that leader’s growth, making them sticky and long-lasting at a given placement.
How do you know you need an executive search firm to find your next director?
Ask yourself the following questions:
- Do I need specialist, domain experience when evaluating leaders driving a use case in a functional subspecialty?
- Does our current organizational growth require additional support around leadership hiring?
- Have we never hired for this role before? Do we want guidance on how to bring in the right talent?
If the answer to any of the following is “yes,” contact us so we can explore a search solution tailored to your business and leadership needs.