Head Office Strat and Planning Official for NY Client

The Challenge

Find a uniquely qualified individual for a strategy planning role reporting directly to the Head of Strategy and the CEO. A leading energy client with head offices in New York City retained Magellan to find the right individual to expand the strategy group during a period of dramatic strategic change.

The Approach

Tailor the Hiring Case
Experiences we shared with our client enabled us to focus the hiring case productively from the start. Our client has a unique culture where the CEO is interactive on a daily basis with the strategic planning group and requires a specific hands-on approach to be effective.

To accurately represent the firm’s culture to candidates, we spent several days in our client’s offices speaking with current and past members of the strategy and planning team to discuss their working styles as well as their goals, expectations, and concerns for the new hire.

Develop a compelling Career Case
The time spent with our client helped us to understand their unique culture and pinpoint a persuasive selling proposition that generated significant interest in the candidate pool. Our first-hand experience with the energy sector enabled us to help the candidates validate our client’s strategic position in the global market and demonstrate how great the career value of this role was for them.

Locate and secure the best candidates
As is our practice, the partner that sold the work led the team throughout the search. Using the firm’s extensive network in the energy sector as well as having worked himself in a large integrated oil company for ten years we were able to quickly develop a short list of highly qualified candidates. From there, we moved quickly to coordinate interviews and narrow the field to the top candidates.

The Magellan Difference

• Developed a compelling hiring case which advantaged our client and attracted exceptional candidates
• Worked with client hiring authority and HR manager to reconfigure an attractive compensation structure to entice candidates accustomed to a different salary and bonus structure
• Quickly (within 3 months) vetted and delivered

The Results

A results focused set of role expectations clarified interest for the top candidates for our client’s head office position
Magellan’s focus on building a strong objectives and results focused hiring case for the strategy group yielded impressive results. Over 80% of the candidates we identified called us back to learn more about the position, even before knowing the name of our client. Candidates from established consulting firms and competitive firms with established positions pursued the opportunity to join our client, despite its lack of a track record.

Our efforts generated a list of over 50 qualified candidates with a short list of 5 possible candidates which were extensively vetted for skills and cultural fit. The quality of the remaining candidates was so high that the firm hired a second candidate later on.

New hires that hit the ground running
We surpassed our client’s expectations by completing this search more quickly than expected and our client has been very pleased with the performance of the candidates Magellan identified. They have integrated well into the unique and very different culture of the firm.