Talent advisory: The value of a different perspective

Running a business rarely leaves much room to step back and reflect. Yet some leadership decisions benefit enormously from a fresh perspective.

Leadership teams spend most of their time in the thick of it. Problems to solve, decisions to make, while everything has to keep moving.

People decisions sit a little differently. The way a role is shaped, the kind of leaders you need for what's next, and how the market will respond to that opportunity all start influencing the outcome well before anyone speaks to a candidate.

Those conversations rarely belong to recruitment alone. They touch the way the organisation is built, the strength of the leadership team and the kind of capability the business is trying to grow into over the next few years.

This is where talent advisory can be genuinely helpful. It brings a view of the wider leadership market and a bit of distance from the day-to-day, so the brief can be sharpened and the conversation around an important hire becomes more considered.

Certain moments in a company's life tend to bring these conversations into sharper focus.

1. When the next phase of growth calls for different leadership

Every business eventually reaches a stage where the leadership that built the company may need to evolve with it.

You see it most clearly in roles that develop without anyone formally redefining them.

A sales leader who once managed a handful of accounts now finds themselves responsible for multiple regions. A brilliant product builder suddenly has to run a large organisation of engineers, designers and delivery teams.

The title hasn't changed, but the job has.

At that point, hiring becomes an exercise in being precise about what the role actually is and what the business will need from it next.

That's where talent strategy can be helpful. It gives leadership teams the space to rethink the brief before going to market.

Some useful questions to explore at that stage:

• If this role were created fresh today, would we design it the same way?
• What kind of leadership would genuinely raise the standard of this function?
• Are we solving today's pressures, or building the capability the company will depend on three years from now?

2. When leadership depth becomes a strategic risk

Most leadership teams know the names of the people who carry the most weight in the organisation.

The commercial leader who holds key client relationships. The engineering lead who understands the architecture better than anyone else. The operator who quietly keeps several moving parts aligned.

As companies grow, the question that often emerges is one of resilience.

How dependent is the business on a small number of individuals? And what would happen if one of those people stepped away?

This is where talent strategy starts to move into succession and leadership depth, identifying where the organisation may be exposed and developing the people who could take on greater responsibility in future.

Leadership teams sometimes explore questions such as:

• Which roles in this business would genuinely worry us if they were vacant for six months?
• Do we have credible successors developing behind our most important leaders?
• Are we investing enough in leadership development before we actually need it?

These conversations are much easier to have while the people concerned are still sitting around the table.

3. When strategy creates capabilities the business does not yet have

Some of the most interesting talent questions appear when the strategy of the business moves ahead of its current capabilities.

Entering a new geography. Launching a different product model. Moving from founder-led sales into a more structured commercial engine.

Each step forward asks the organisation to do something it has not done before.

The challenge is understanding what kind of experience or leadership will help the business make that transition successfully.

Talent advisory becomes valuable here because it brings perspective from outside the company. You can look at leaders who have made similar transitions elsewhere and the patterns of experience that tend to matter at particular stages of growth.

The conversation often revolves around questions like:

• What experience would genuinely shorten the learning curve for this next stage?
• Which capabilities will determine whether this strategy succeeds or stalls?
• Where would fresh leadership thinking most strengthen the business?

The discipline behind great leadership decisions

Most companies spend enormous amounts of time refining strategy, improving products and allocating capital carefully. The strongest organisations bring that same discipline to leadership decisions.

Over time, the people around the table shape how a company thinks, how it solves problems and how confidently it moves into the future.

That is the real value of thinking deliberately about talent. It creates the space to define roles properly, test assumptions and ensure the people joining the organisation strengthen the direction it is heading.

For many leadership teams, those conversations are simply more productive with an experienced outside perspective in the room.

Bring a different perspective to your next people decision

If you're considering a pivotal leadership appointment, succession, a change in organisational structure or the capabilities your next stage of growth will require, we can help you work through the questions before they become a recruitment brief.

Explore Denholm's Talent Strategy & Delivery Models, learn more about our approach to Executive Search, or explore the specialist markets we work across.

If you'd value an outside perspective on a leadership or talent decision, call us on 03303 359 818 or email connect@denholmassociates.com.

 

You might also be wondering...

When should talent advisory happen in relation to a recruitment search?

Ideally, before the brief is fixed. That creates room to question the shape of the role, understand what the market can realistically provide and decide whether hiring is actually the right answer. Those conversations can continue throughout a search as market feedback gives the leadership team new information.

What if the leadership team disagrees about the person the business needs?

That disagreement is useful to uncover early. Ask each stakeholder what they expect the person to achieve, which problems they need them to solve and what success should look like after 12 or 24 months. Differences in the answers help reveal that the organisation needs greater understanding and continuity around the role before approaching candidates.

How can you test whether the salary for a new leadership role is realistic?

Look at comparable roles in the relevant talent market, considering the scale of responsibility, sector, geography and scarcity of the experience required. Market mapping can also show whether the people you would realistically want to approach sit within the remuneration range you have in mind.

Should you benchmark your existing leadership team against the external market?

It can be useful when handled carefully and for a clear reason. Understanding how responsibilities, experience and remuneration compare with the wider market can inform succession, retention and organisational design decisions. It can also reveal where existing leaders have grown into roles that would now look very different if recruited externally.

What happens if market insight challenges the original hiring brief?

That's valuable information. You may discover that the combination of experience you want is exceptionally scarce, that the remuneration is out of step with the market or that candidates with the strongest backgrounds would expect a broader mandate. The brief can then be adjusted before months are spent searching against assumptions that were unlikely to hold up.

Can talent advisory help when you aren't ready to hire yet?

Yes. Some of the most useful conversations happen well before a vacancy exists. Understanding the external talent market, succession risk and the experience your future strategy may require gives you more time to develop people internally, build relationships externally and make better decisions when the moment to hire eventually arrives.