The Work Starts Before the Brief
by Martin Mvelle, Search Associate
Unsuccessful senior searches often find themselves drifting, as assumptions go untested and the hire is recruited into a version of the role that cannot hold in practice. The instinctive pre-emption is to polish a clean briefing document, tightening scope and adding detail in the hope that precision will remove risk. This familiar rhythm assumes the work begins when a vacancy appears and a briefing meeting is booked, yet mandates are rarely successfully formed in one clean moment.
Why a well-written brief can still produce the wrong hire
In many organisations, the biggest hires are made while the business is moving. Strategy shifts and leaders recalibrate what they can tolerate as much as what they want to achieve. In that context, the brief is not a stable foundation. It is a snapshot of what can be said safely at that moment, often before the organisation has resolved what the role is there to do. The shift the industry needs is not a capability contest between internal teams and external partners. It is a move from brief-led execution to embedded partnership, where the partner understands the organisation well enough that each search reflects that reality.
The difference between running a search and holding the context
A senior brief reflects the story an organisation is comfortable telling about itself. It is rarely dishonest, but it is often incomplete because it is shaped by internal dynamics and the fact that leaders are time-poor. It can be accurate in scope and still miss the forces that decide whether a leader succeeds once they arrive, because those forces are harder to name without friction. Searches then go wrong in ways that look like execution issues but are context issues. The candidate can be strong, and the decision can feel unanimous, yet the hire struggles because the organisation was not ready for the mandate, or because the mandate was never fully agreed. The consequence is a more cautious organisation next time, with defensive briefs and less honest processes.
Why the real product is representation, not the shortlist
Reducing mis-hire risk is not about inflating the brief until it contains every detail. It is about clarifying the mandate by understanding the organisation enough to see where the document describes aspiration rather than operating reality. That is the difference between running a search and holding the context. Brief-led work is episodic, so the partner keeps reconstructing the organisation and relying on what leaders can articulate in a compressed conversation. Even with good intent, it produces a thin version of fit because it is built from what is said rather than what is consistently true.
Why landing the search is the wrong goal
An embedded partnership is built on continuity. Over time, the partner learns how decisions are made, how disagreements are handled, and what the organisation rewards or punishes under pressure. That knowledge changes the judgement the partner brings to future mandates, especially the ones that look straightforward on paper but sit on top of unresolved complexity. When the partner holds that context, briefing becomes calibration about what is changing, what must remain stable, and what kind of leadership will be accepted while change is underway.
What this paradigm shift looks like in a grown-up industry
This matters because clients do not just need access to candidates. They need to be represented well in the market, and representation is not a flattering story. It is a credible explanation of the mandate that aligns with the organisation’s capacity to support it. Senior candidates decide whether to engage based on whether they trust the mandate and the conditions around it. When the client trusts that you can carry their intent responsibly, they share information earlier, including the parts that would otherwise be softened or delayed, which improves the market conversation and the decision.
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