Director-level hires are never just a resume match.

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Not only do you have to vet for experience and industry knowledge, but you need to ensure they are a culture fit, that they can coach a rep through a stalled deal, and then turn around and present to leadership. It’s a role with a ton of nuance and a variety of soft skills to vet out.

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On top of all of that, typically the talent you want isn’t out looking for your role. They’re already running a team somewhere else, hitting their number, and getting paid well to stay put. That’s hard to compete with…so we didn’t try to on this search.

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We recently ran a US Sales Director search for one of our clients: a family-run, Montreal-based pharmaceutical and medical distributor with commercial teams across the US and Canada. The seat had been open so long that the sales strategy leader was covering pieces of it on top of her own role.

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What actually moved the search forward was not a bigger stack of resumes, but a direct conversation with the leader managing the open seat. That conversation surfaced what the seat actually needed: a leadership style that would balance out the management approach already running elsewhere in the company. From there, every candidate got screened against that, not just the initial job description.

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The hiring funnel moved fast after that: 22 candidates sourced, a small handful actually put in front of the client, and one finalist who made it all the way to a live presentation in front of the client's 10-person US sales team.

That finalist crushed the hiring process: he rebuilt his deck twice to get the message crisp for a room of reps, not executives, and that room is what actually closed the hire.

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Here’s where things could’ve gone south.

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He had another offer on the table, one with a much higher OTE. He turned it down. Our team knew he wasn’t looking to make a move solely based on comp. He wanted the rest of his career to be at a company that felt like family, and that mattered more to him than a bigger number.

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14 weeks, start to finish.

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If you're not asking candidates where their current role is falling short, you're missing the question that actually predicts whether they'll take the job.

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The lesson: Not everyone makes a move for comp. Top talent varies in what’s most important to them in a role. Knowing their “why” is a crucial part of getting the right person in the right seat.

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If you want someone figuring out the candidates "why" for you - reach out to us here.

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