The labyrinth of executive search is one riddled with potential biases and ever-shifting goalposts. Whether you’re a startup in the nascent stages of your journey or an established powerhouse on the brink of expansion, the quest for the right leader is complex. To shed light on this nuanced journey, I sat down with Axel Sedlmeier, a Munich-based maestro in the realm of talent acquisition with a rich history at companies like Personio, Intel, and Comites.
Axel now lends his talent to DEDIQ, navigating the delicate waters of investment in burgeoning mid-sized enterprises. With nearly a decade of experience, he’s seen the good, the challenging, and the transformative power of strategic hiring. Here’s what we learned.
The Bias Puzzle in Executive Search
Understanding the ‘why’ is just as crucial as the ‘who’ in executive search. Axel points out that defining the executive position, the objectives, and the company’s current state is a journey laden with introspection.
The Bias Challenge: Removing bias is perhaps the biggest hurdle in executive hiring. Our conversation revealed that biases aren’t always conspicuous; they lurk in the shadows of our assumptions and expectations.
Learning on the Go: According to Axel, the hiring process is a revelation in itself. It’s through the myriad conversations that clarity emerges, sometimes reshaping the entire profile of the sought-after executive.
Dynamic Targets: Axel notes that hiring for an executive role is an iterative process. The ‘perfect’ candidate at the start of the search can look vastly different from the ideal hire as the process unfolds and the company’s needs crystalize.
Executive Search Across Company Stages
The company’s stage dictates the DNA of its leaders. Axel’s experience underscores that the executive search must harmonize with the company’s developmental phase.
Early-Stage Vs. Established: In early-stage companies, the search is for a polymath – a visionary who’s hands-on and can scale mountains from molehills. These candidates must be agile, ready to build and optimize structures from the ground up.
Growth and Scale: When a company hits its growth stride, leaders who’ve “been there, done that” are pivotal. They need the expertise to navigate through scale while being hands-on enough to understand and refine the basic structures.
Leadership at Scale: For established companies, Axel highlights the need for executives capable of helming large teams and leading through a lens of extensive experience and strategic acumen.
In our engrossing dialogue, Axel Sedlmeier peeled back the layers of executive search, revealing the complexities of matching leadership talent to the stage and specific needs of a company. From the nascent pre-seed tech startup to the IPO-ready giant in the DACH market, the right leadership isn’t just about the candidate’s resume; it’s about their fit with the company’s trajectory and the flexibility of the hiring process itself.
Axel’s insights are a clarion call to CEOs, CTOs, co-founders, and HR leaders in the tech sector to re-examine how they approach the art of executive search. The key? Be clear on your ‘why’, expect to learn and adapt, and choose a leader not just for what your company is, but what it aspires to become.