Latest / Executive Careers with Fexingo: VP, C-Suite, and Senior Leadership Career Strategy / How Senior Leaders Use Recruiters Without Being Passive
Transcript
- Lucas: So I had a conversation last week with a chief revenue officer I've known for about eight years. She told me the best career move she ever made started with a recruiter message she almost deleted. Luna: Almost deleted — why? Lucas: Because it came from a recruiter she didn't know, at a firm she'd never heard of, pitching a role she wasn't remotely qualified for — on paper. But instead of trashing it, she replied with something like, 'I'm not your candidate for this role, but I'd be happy to be a source on the market.' And that one reply turned into a six-year relationship that eventually placed her as VP at a competitor. Luna: So she flipped from candidate to intelligence asset. That's a really specific move. Lucas: Exactly. And I think most senior leaders misunderstand what executive recruiters actually want from them. It's not a resume. It's market access. If you can be a credible source on talent, on competitors, on industry trends, you become someone they keep calling — not just for one search, but for years. Luna: But doesn't that feel transactional? I mean, if I'm a senior leader, I don't want to be used as a free informant. Lucas: Fair pushback. But the data suggests the best recruiters view it as a genuine relationship, not a transaction. A 2025 study by a top executive search firm found that nearly 40 percent of C-suite placements happen through recruiters the candidate had a prior relationship with — not the recruiter running the current search. That's huge. It means the recruiter you helped six years ago on a completely different search might be the one who calls you about your dream role. Luna: So the ROI on being helpful early is real. But how do you actually build that relationship without being passive? Because I think a lot of senior leaders wait for the recruiter to come to them, and then they're in reaction mode. Lucas: That's the core problem. Most executives treat recruiters like a job board — they wait for inbound and then scramble. The better approach is proactive positioning. I think of it in three phases. Phase one: pre-relationship positioning. Before you ever talk to a recruiter, you need to be findable in the right way. Luna: What does that look like practically? A polished LinkedIn profile? Lucas: More than polished. It's strategic signaling. You want your profile to answer three questions for a recruiter who has thirty seconds: What is your current scope? What is your unique expertise? And what kind of role would you be a logical fit for? If your headline just says 'VP of Sales,' you've told me nothing. But if it says 'VP of Sales | Built $200M enterprise channel from scratch | Expert in SaaS ramp-ups,' now I know exactly who to call when I need a channel leader. Luna: So it's about making the recruiter's job easy. What's phase two? Lucas: Phase two is what I call conversation management. Once you're in a dialogue with a recruiter, most senior leaders make the mistake of oversharing. They treat it like a therapy session — 'I'm unhappy, I want out, here's everything wrong with my current company.' But that kills your leverage. Luna: Because the recruiter then knows you're desperate. Lucas: Exactly. Instead, you want to be curious but guarded. Ask about the role, the team, the challenges. Share enough to show you're credible, but hold back your motivations. Let the recruiter do the selling. And if they ask directly why you're looking, have a prepared answer that's forward-looking, not reactive — something like, 'I'm always open to conversations that stretch my skill set, but I'm not actively looking.' Luna: That's a tightrope. You're being honest but strategic. What's phase three? Lucas: Phase three is reference orchestration. This is where senior leaders often fumble. When a recruiter asks for references, they typically give three names from their past — bosses, peers, direct reports. But the smarter move is to pre-brief those references on exactly what you want them to emphasize. Luna: You mean you actually tell your references what to say? Lucas: Not in a manipulative way. You say, 'Look, I'm exploring a VP role at a company that values innovation and turnaround experience. When they call you, could you highlight the time we restructured the Southeast region and turned a 15 percent loss into profit in eighteen months?' That gives your reference a specific story to tell, rather than a vague 'Oh, she's great.' And it aligns your narrative across every touchpoint. Luna: That's smart. But I wonder — does this approach backfire if you come across as too calculating? I mean, recruiters are people too. They can smell a performance. Lucas: I think the risk is real, but it's mitigated by authenticity. If you're genuinely open to the right opportunity and you're just being thoughtful about how you present yourself, that's not calculating — it's professional. The recruiters I respect most actually appreciate when a candidate is well-prepared. It signals that you take the process seriously. Luna: So the key is to be strategic without being manipulative. Let me ask you about the other side — what about senior leaders who want to proactively approach recruiters? Is that ever productive? Lucas: It can be, but you have to do it the right way. Cold-emailing a recruiter with your resume attached and saying 'I'm looking for a new role' is almost always ignored. But if you send a note that adds value — 'I noticed you placed a CFO at X company last year. I've been following their growth and I have some thoughts on the talent landscape in that sector' — you're positioning yourself as a peer, not a supplicant. Luna: That's a much higher bar. Most people won't do that work. Lucas: Which is exactly why it works. Senior leaders who treat recruiter relationships as long-term intelligence networks — not transaction pipelines — consistently land roles that never hit the open market. I've seen it happen again and again. Luna: Speaking of things that hit the open market — or don't — I'm curious about the role of AI here. How is artificial intelligence changing recruiter-candidate matching for senior roles? Lucas: It's a huge shift. More and more executive search firms are using AI to scrape public data — conference presentations, board memberships, published articles, even podcast appearances — to identify potential candidates before any human recruiter picks up the phone. So your digital footprint matters more than ever. If you haven't spoken at an industry event or published a thought leadership piece in the last two years, you're essentially invisible to the algorithm. Luna: That puts pressure on senior leaders to be visible in ways they might not have considered before. But it also democratizes access — if you have the expertise, you can be discovered without needing a personal introduction. Lucas: Exactly. And that's why I think the old model of 'work with one retained recruiter and hope they think of you' is dying. The new model is about being discoverable across multiple channels, so that when a search kicks off, your name surfaces organically. Luna: You know, I think a lot of our listeners might be in that reactive mode right now. What's one concrete thing they can do this week to start shifting to a proactive approach? Lucas: One thing: audit your digital footprint. Google yourself. Look at your LinkedIn profile from the perspective of a recruiter who doesn't know you. Does your headline tell a story? Do your 'About' and 'Experience' sections use keywords that a recruiter might search for? If not, spend an hour this week rewriting them. That single change can dramatically increase the number of relevant inbound inquiries you receive. Luna: And if they don't get inquiries even after that? Lucas: Then they need to start planting flags. Write a short article on LinkedIn about a challenge they solved. Speak at a virtual conference. Publish a case study on their company's website. The goal is to create breadcrumbs that lead recruiters to them. Luna: Alright, Lucas, I want to pivot slightly — but staying on the same theme. We've talked about how senior leaders can work with recruiters, but what about the opposite? How should senior leaders handle it when a recruiter reaches out about a role that's clearly a step down or a bad fit? I've seen people get offended or dismissive. Lucas: That's a mistake. Every recruiter outreach is a data point. Even if the role is wrong, the fact that they called tells you something about how you're perceived in the market. I always recommend responding politely, saying 'Not a fit for me, but I appreciate you thinking of me,' and then asking if they'd be open to staying in touch. You never know when that relationship will pay off. Luna: That's a good reminder that every interaction is either building or eroding your reputation with that recruiter. Lucas: Exactly. And I've seen senior leaders burn bridges by being rude or dismissive to a recruiter who called with a bad fit. That recruiter may remember that five years later when they're working on a search that is perfect for you. Luna: You know, this reminds me of something we've talked about before — the idea of a career moat. Building unique expertise that makes you hard to replace. But I think your point today is that even the best moat doesn't help if no one knows you have it. You need recruiters as distribution. Lucas: That's exactly right. Your moat is your expertise. Recruiters are your market makers. And the smartest senior leaders I know are the ones who invest in both — deepening their expertise while also cultivating a network of recruiters who can surface opportunities that never get advertised. Luna: I'm thinking about the asymmetry here. A senior leader might have a handful of recruiter relationships. But a top recruiter at a major firm might have hundreds of senior leaders in their network. So if you can be one of the ones they think of first, you've essentially outsourced your job search to someone who's working for you for free — until you land. Lucas: That's a great framing. And it's why the effort you put into those relationships — the coffees, the market intel you share, the referrals you send — pays off disproportionately. It's a classic case of high-leverage activity. Luna: Alright, so before we wrap, I want to circle back to something you mentioned earlier about the power of small, consistent actions. And it makes me think about how much of this podcast is built on that same principle. A couple of dollars a month from listeners who find value in these conversations genuinely keeps us ad-free and able to explore topics like this without commercial pressure. If you've gotten something out of this episode — or any episode — buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. It's a small gesture that makes a real difference. Lucas: Yeah, and we mean it. No big sponsorship deals, no annoying ads. Just listeners who appreciate the show and want to keep it going. Thanks to everyone who's already contributed. Luna: So, Lucas, let's end with a forward-looking question. How do you see the recruiter relationship evolving over the next five years? We've talked about AI, but what about other trends? Lucas: I think we'll see more specialization. The generalist recruiter who covers multiple industries is going to be replaced by hyper-specialists who know one sector deeply. And senior leaders will need to cultivate relationships with multiple niche recruiters rather than one generalist. Also, I expect to see more direct sourcing — companies bypassing agencies and building internal talent communities, especially for senior roles. So the senior leader's job is to be visible in those communities as well. Luna: So the playbook is shifting, but the fundamentals remain: be findable, be helpful, be strategic. Lucas: Exactly. And the one thing that never changes is that the best opportunities come through relationships, not applications. Luna: Well said. That's a great note to end on. Thanks, Lucas. Lucas: Thanks, Luna. And thanks to our listeners. We'll see you next time.