Sourcing talent

August 02, 2024

by a searcher in London, UK

Has anyone had particularly positive experiences with specific methods for finding and recruiting management talent for an acquisition? Any success stories or lessons learned you'd be willing to share?

I find myself in a situation where we like the business and would buy it, but with the owner moving on, we don't do the deal until we have someone lined up to run it first. I don't want to fill this role myself in the interim.

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Reply by a professional
from Queen's University in Toronto, ON, Canada

Hi Hardy - this is a huge challenge. Other than your personal network / network of other partners in the business.. We run a fractional operations support business, and find that specialized recruiting firms tend to work best, even though it is an expensive option (success-based works on a 20-30% fee of Y1 comp). Our experience is that most of the top talent is typically not in the market / reading job boards. We don't do the recruiting ourselves, but help vet the right partner.

Reply by a professional
from University of Southern California in North Palm Beach, FL, USA

Look to the trade associations and especially their magazines/newsletters and the authors that specialize in whatever niche interests you. My clients have found lots of leads by asking those people who we could contact about managing an upcoming business acquisition. There's lots more to this tactic which we could privately discuss on zoom after you've made some headway with what I've already suggested.

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