By: Dawn Smith, Partner

If you are searching for new executives, consider this:

• As much as 80% of employee turnover can be attributed to bad hiring decisions.
• The cost of replacing a bad hire can possibly cost you two and one-half times (or more!) of the person’s salary.

These statistics from The Harvard Business Review illustrate the importance of matching skill sets and culture fit when hiring. Finding highly qualified and fully verified candidates is essential to a company’s continued growth and success.

The Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) reports that the more senior the person’s position and the longer they remain in that position, the more it will cost to replace him or her. And, more importantly, there is an impact to your team’s morale, efficiency and productivity. Team dynamic disruption has the potential to cause a 32 percent decrease in morale, according to Undercover Recruiter. This translates directly to your bottom line and performance results. A bad hire can also negatively influence your single-most important asset, your reputation.

So, how do organizations hire the best leaders? Many companies use internal recruiters to support their executive search needs. However, these teams are primarily designed to hire from an active job market and often lack the time necessary to thoroughly assess senior level talent for leadership roles. Selecting a proven search partner is your best defense against the bad hire. Executive search firms have the knowledge, contacts and tools in the industry to find the best talent for you. Truly great recruiters will invest many hours of time up front to fully understand your culture, role expectations and current business challenges and opportunities. Equally important is time spent with potential candidates to deliver the best options the market has to offer. This trusted partnership approach will produce unparalleled results by recruiting and hiring an outstanding candidate for your team.

If you are conducting a search for top talent, consider enlisting our support. We partner with organizations to identify, attract and retain key leaders at all levels. Using a proven, network-based approach to search, we expertly evaluate and confirm high performers for our clients. The candidates we place produce consistently exceptional results for our clients.