CHICAGO, Dec 12, 2011 (GlobeNewswire via COMTEX) — Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc., the leadership advisory firm providing executive search and leadership consulting services worldwide, announced today it has named Eric Olson to the role of Global Practice Managing Partner of Leadership Consulting. He will serve on the firm’s operating committee and report directly to CEO L. Kevin Kelly.

“Eric possesses a rare combination of functional experience, client focus and a true passion for people. Over the past decade he has successfully led several international leadership consulting firms and will have a strong business impact on both our firm and clients,” said Heidrick & Struggles’ Chief Executive Officer L. Kevin Kelly. “Under Eric’s direction, our global Leadership Consulting team will be in a solid market position for strategic growth.”

Olson joins Heidrick & Struggles from Oliver Wyman Leadership Development, where he led their European consulting operations. As an accomplished business strategist, Olson has worked closely with many Fortune 500 companies. He also served as CEO of Health Address, a UCLA-based company providing online specialty services between the US and international medical centers in the Middle East. In addition, Olson has taught several change and complexity courses at UCLA and UC Irvine Business Schools.

Olson holds a PhD in Clinical Psychology from the Fuller Graduate School of Psychology in Pasadena, CA, an MA in Complexity and Organizational Change from the University of Hertfordshire in England, and an MS in Counseling Psychology from Central Washington University.

About Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc.

Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc.,  is the leadership advisory firm providing executive search and leadership consulting services, including succession planning, executive assessment, talent retention management, executive development, transition consulting for newly appointed executives, and M&A human capital integration consulting. For almost 60 years, we have focused on quality service and built strong leadership teams through our relationships with clients and individuals worldwide. Today, Heidrick & Struggles’ leadership experts operate from principal business centers globally. For more information about Heidrick & Struggles, please visit www.heidrick.com .

Forbes.com | Guest post written by Jeffrey S. Sanders

Jeffrey S. Sanders is Vice Chairman and Managing Partner of the North American CEO Practice for Heidrick & Struggles, an executive search and leadership consulting firm.

While we all know stories of legendary CEOs who seem born to the role, most CEOs are not born, they are made. People who aspire to the role have to seize the opportunity and set a path: to manage their career choices and craft their experience to make them a likely CEO candidate.

Interestingly, consulting, at four percent, ranked as the least common early career experience among CEOs. Nevertheless, some highly successful CEOs have come from that world. John Donahoe, CEO of eBay, started as an associate consultant at Bain & Co. and rose to become the firm’s Worldwide Managing Director. DirecTV’s CEO Michael White, after graduating from Johns Hopkins’ School of Advanced International Studies, worked at Andersen Consulting and then spent five years at Bain. Both Jerry Storch, CEO of Toys ‘R’ Us, and Russ Fradin, CEO of SunGard, worked at McKinsey, and Indra Nooyi spent six years at The Boston Consulting Group in the beginning of her career (she was eventually appointed CEO from the CFO position).

Settle In – Eventually – and Climb the Ladder

More than three-fourths of today’s top leaders were appointed internally. When evaluating CEO candidates, companies tend to favor internal appointments, as opposed to external appointments, because internal candidates understand the company culture, are familiar with the key stakeholders, and are known to the board members and other members of the executive team. Given that internal executives know and are well-known to the company, promoting the internal executive often poses less of a risk than hiring someone from the outside.

However, while more than three-fourths of today’s top leaders were appointed internally, less than a third of CEOs were “lifers” (people who spent nearly their entire careers at the company they now lead). The average time to CEO appointment for those who rose through the ranks at
their company is 16 years, but the average age at time of appointment is 50. Therefore, when executives reach their early thirties, they begin to settle in at one particular company to rise through the ranks. While companies value executives who understand the company culture, they also recognize the importance of executives who have spent time at multiple companies. Experience at several companies provides CEOs with an outside perspective and enables them to draw best-in-class practices from a broad range of companies.

Time to CEO Appointment

While the average time to CEO appointment is 16 years, it differs from industry to industry. Not surprisingly, technology appears to offer the fastest path to the CEO chair, while industrial companies appear to offer the slowest. Technology companies make up about 10 percent of the Fortune 500, but comprise 15 percent of the CEOs appointed before age 50. Industrial companies, making up about 37 percent of the Fortune 500, have only 30 percent of the under-50 appointments. Similarly, average time to CEO appointment for internal appointments at technology companies is close to 14 years, whereas average time to CEO appointment for internal appointments at industrial companies is closer to 18 years. Also of note is the fact that technology companies appoint almost 20 percent more external CEOs than industrial companies.

Board Experience

About 45 percent of CEOs served as non-executive directors on public company boards before being named chief executive of the Fortune 500 companies they lead today. Executives typically look to join boards before becoming CEO because they view board experience as a form of professional development. Serving on a board provides them with the opportunity to learn from other high-caliber executives, see the CEO role through the board’s lens, and gain corporate governance experience. While serving on a board can often help with an executive’s professional development, there is also an opportunity cost associated with joining a board given the time commitment required. Executives who would like to become CEOs should be mindful of this and should join a high quality board where they can develop their experience, exposure to corporate governance, and visibility.

While this portrait of a CEO could shift in the coming years, most of the attributes reflected in our findings are likely to become only more pronounced with the passage of time: financial acumen will continue to be important in an increasingly globalized and economically interdependent world, companies will place a high value on organizational and cultural knowledge, and an increasing number of executives will look to board service as a way of gaining a broader perspective prior to becoming CEO.

What does that path look like? To find out, the CEO & Board Practice at Heidrick & Struggles analyzed the careers of all current Fortune 500 CEOs.

Here’s some of what the study discovered:

Develop Financial Acumen

About 30 percent of Fortune 500 CEOs spent the first few years of their careers developing a strong foundation in finance. This is by far the most common early experience of today’s CEOs. As the second-largest constituent, CEOs who started out in sales and marketing roles account for only about 20 percent of the current big company CEO population.

The prevalence of CEOs with a strong financial background points to the fact that large companies prefer CEOs who can create value for the company and who understand the company’s financial drivers. Typically, companies are looking for CEOs who can develop a strategy and understand the financial ramifications of business decisions.

A foundation in finance is an important building block for a career. However, only about five percent of these CEOs were promoted directly from the role of CFO – more than half were appointed from the role of COO or President. Though the prevalence of Fortune 500 CEOs with strong financial backgrounds underlines the importance of developing financial acumen, above all, companies value a strong operator.

For example, while Oshkosh’s Charles Szews spent the majority of his career in a variety of finance roles, prior to his appointment as CEO in 2011, he spent three years as COO. Similarly, Patricia Woertz began her career as an accountant, and then rose through the ranks in the finance departments at Gulf Oil and Chevron before she was rotated into broader operating roles and eventually appointed CEO of Archer-Daniels-Midland in 2006. At the other end of the spectrum, the CEO of Pfizer, Ian Read, began his career in the finance department, but transitioned into general management after a comparatively short 10 years in finance roles.

With a few notable exceptions, such as Marcel Smits at Sara Lee and Bill Delaney at Sysco, executives very rarely move directly from a finance role to the CEO position. Rather, over three quarters of these CEOs came from an operating role. Though they often began their careers in finance, the executives who have made it to the top are those who have successfully used their financial expertise to become excellent operators.

3 years after graduating from college I accepted a position as a Design Engineer with a company that built custom HVAC equipment. I had been invited by an Engineering Manager who had also just joined the company but had many years of experience in the industry. 

In our first staff meeting he began talking about changes in the department. He spoke of creating design standards and changing the way we did things towards a more structured approach that would foster continuous learning and improvement. Half way through his speech one of the guys that had been there for a long time interrupted him and began to say “In my 10 years of experience…”, and that was really as far as he got before he was interrupted and harshly told “Jack (let’s just call him that), before you continue, let’s get this straight: You have one year of experience and then just 9 more doing the same thing. At some point you’ll learn the difference”. Uncomfortable silence followed and the meeting continued. 

It was a truly unforgiving statement but with a lot of truth in it. Forcing ourselves to learn continually is hard and we tend to gravitate towards our comfort zone. 

In his book Talent is Overrated, Geoff Colvin mentions Noel Tichy’s illustration of concentric learning circles. Tichy, former chief of GE’s Crotonville management development center, labels the inner circle the “comfort zone,” the middle circle the “learning zone,” and the outer one the “panic zone.” It is well documented that we acquire knowledge and experience by developing activities in the learning zone, but this is only one part of the equation. 

Getting back to the career theme, learning for the sake of learning can be a waste of time and learning as a simple reaction to what we face can lead us in the wrong direction. 

Consider every lesson, every interaction, every position and every experience as a building block of your potential. High performers build on solid foundations that allow them to focus on elements that average performers don’t even consider or notice. They begin to make decisions and execute at a higher level. 

Consider the analogy of learning to play hockey. You need to start by knowing how to skate. Understand the objective of the game, the rules and the broad strategy. As you keep learning you start to develop speed and instinct that allow you to react at a high speed and at some point, at a high level, predict.  If any of us mortals is placed in front of a hockey goal and we are asked to block a shot, it’s very likely that we will focus on the puck. A professional will be looking at the shooter’s eyes, shoulders and hip movements. He will know where the puck is going the moment it is touched by the stick.   

These same principals apply to business. To achieve a certain level in an organization or as a business owner you need to know where you want to go, how you need to “build yourself”, understand the building blocks and most importantly take continuous and persistent steps towards getting it done. 

I’ll make an emphasis on continuous and persistent because it does not happen overnight. In fact, it will not happen over a few years. Studies have shown that people on top of their game have been focused on it for more than a decade. 

If you are not paying attention and not working towards a firm goal, by the time you realize it, you may find yourself with scattered building blocks of knowledge and experience that are no where close to being aligned to where you wanted to be. 

So, do you or will you:
a) Have 10 years of experience
b) Have one year of experience, and 9 more doing the same thing
c) Have 1 year of experience in 10 unrelated things.  

According to Merriam-Webster Talent is a noun. But bottom line, talent while defined as a noun is really more a verb, it’s about execution and performance.

Definition of  TALENT: “General intelligence or mental power : ability”

Definition of ABILITY: “Competence in doing : skill”

Definition of SKILL: “The ability to use one’s knowledge effectively and readily in execution or performance”

AESC, January 2011.- Optimism in the senior recruitment market continues with executive search consultants 68% positive and 30% neutral for the year ahead. The 2011 Outlook, released today by the Association of Executive Search Consultants (AESC), showed a peak in industry confidence since its low point at the end of 2008.

AESC President, Peter Felix, commented, “The New Year outlook by our members is most encouraging and confirms the renewed demand for executive search services that we witnessed in 2010. Our members are more confident about their pipeline of assignments and although not all markets around the world are recovering at the same pace the underlying trend is strong. This creates more positive planning support for the expansion of resources that in many cases were severely depleted in 2009.”

66% of respondents indicated that their search practices are planning to hire more consultants in 2011 – rising 18% from mid 2010 results – and 44% plan to hire more researchers.

Felix continued, “As the world economy recovers from the financial services trauma so the scarcity of executive talent in many sectors and regions of the world has become apparent again. This is most pronounced in the booming economies of China, India and Brazil where the talent gap is of critical proportions. However, the scarcity of talented general management executives persists even in the developed countries. Given these conditions the outlook for executive search consulting is bright.” Global findings revealed that the Industrial, Energy/Natural Resources and Financial Services sectors are expected to see the most growth in executive hiring in 2011. Consultants in the Americas held particular optimism (over other regions) for Financial Services, Technology/Telecoms, Energy/Natural Resources, Not-for-Profit, Private Equity/Venture Capital and Real Estate/Construction.

China, India and Latin America are expected to see the greatest scarcity of talent in the year ahead, while the functional outlook places General Managers, CEOs, Chief Operating Officers and Board Directors in strong demand in 2011 – suggesting an increase in high level search assignments as reported in the AESC’s third quarter 2010 industry report.

The 2011 Association of Executive Search Consultants (AESC) Member Outlook Survey of December 2010 totaled 210 responses from AESC executive search consultants worldwide, including 52% from EMEA, 30% from the Americas and 15% from Asia Pacific. A full copy of the report is available upon request to AESC members and the press.

The current challenge is to identify where you can be a ‘speed factor’ in your position, product and market and continue to build on what you have to increase your impact in a company or organization. 

Every day as I walk into my office I face the dual phenomenon of calls from talented people who do not have a job and of clients who are struggling because we can’t find the right talent. There once was a time when a good sales person was a good sales person. Now when clients call us they want a good sales person but with solid product and application knowledge and proven success in a specific market or channel.

There is no way around it. Companies want people that will come in and hit the ground running. They want great talent with experience in the position, the product and the market with little room for a learning curve. It has become more difficult, for both talented people and companies to match, as each one of those elements become more and more specialized.

According to Delloite Research in 1998 the average time to market for a new product was 18.1 months and on average a company’s revenue from new products was around 21%. In 2007 the average time to market had dropped to 12.8 months and the average revenue had increased to 34%. The reliance on new products and innovation is evident in every single industry. As Jason Jennings’ book title reads “It’s not the BIG that eat the SMALL, It’s the FAST that eat the SLOW”.

Fast and the speed of having ‘been there, done that’ is currently shaping the demand for talent. Fast learning is very important, but with a strong, solid knowledge and experience base.

The current challenge is to identify where you can be a ‘speed factor’ in your position, product and market and continue to build on what you have to increase your impact in a company or organization. 

Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc., (Nasdaq:HSII) is the leadership advisory firm providing senior-level executive search and leadership consulting services, including succession planning, executive assessment and development, talent retention management, transition consulting for newly appointed executives, and M&A human capital integration consulting. For almost 60 years, we have focused on quality service and built strong leadership teams through our relationships with clients and individuals worldwide. Today, Heidrick & Struggles’ leadership experts operate from principal business centers in North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia Pacific. For more information about Heidrick & Struggles, please visit www.heidrick.com

Portafolio (Colombia – Publicado el 19 de noviembre de 10)

Por Jose Ruiz

Alrededor del mundo, el papel que cumple el presidente de una compañía es determinante para orientar la misma al éxito en cada proceso, y que sus funciones trasciendan en óptimos resultados logrados frente a las demás organizaciones. Tanto en empresas del sector privado como del público, en donde el presidente, por cualquier circunstancia que se presente, deba ser reemplazado, es difícil pensar y determinar quién será su sucesor, debido al alto nivel de exigencia, responsabilidad y diferentes competencias que debe reunir el nuevo candidato para enfrentar los retos estratégicos de la compañía.

Un buen interrogante en cuanto al sector público es, ¿cuál debería ser el papel de un presidente en este entorno? Dicho tema ha despertado gran interés actualmente, ya que la persona que venga a ocupar un cargo con tal visibilidad, necesita tener un amplio grado de conocimiento de la empresa, y habilidades que le permitan manejar situaciones complejas y lograr los resultados esperados. Cuando en un país se presenta esta situación de estar frente a una vacante para la presidencia de una entidad pública, a la ciudadanía le agrada y siente mayor confianza que estos altos cargos se le designen a un ‘peso pesado’ por su trayectoria y experiencia; sin embargo, de acuerdo a una investigación realizada entre 250 presidentes, un poco más de la mitad afirmaron que prefieren promover a un ex CEO que a una persona extraña dentro del gremio.

Por otra parte, se debe tener en cuenta que los ex directores generales no serán siempre la mejor opción, y no todos cuentan con las competencias necesarias para ser presidentes, pues este debe ser una persona visible, que está de cara al público y a los accionistas, mientras que un director general trabaja en la solución de uno o varios problemas; ciertamente, ser muy bueno en esta labor no necesariamente implica serlo en las demás competencias de un presidente, para ser su sucesor.

No se debe dejar de lado que el presidente debe anteponerse a la solución de los problemas, realizando y promocionando estrategias en conjunto con otros ejecutivos de alto nivel y actuando como enlace con los accionistas y la junta directiva, la cual debe tomar un papel cada vez más activo dentro de cualquier organización. En este sentido, unos consideran que el director financiero puede ser el mejor candidato para suceder al presidente, por las competencias que desarrolla en su cargo, por su naturaleza de asesoramiento y por su conocimiento de la compañía y el entorno. Cada vez será más difícil reclutar a los mejores candidatos para cargos de tan alta importancia. Por ende, es creciente la necesidad de que las empresas inviertan en la gestión y el desarrollo del talento interno, estableciendo planes de sucesión bien estructurados, alineados a los objetivos estratégicos de la organización, pero flexibles ante los cambios del ambiente empresarial.

Actualmente, ni los ex presidentes quieren regresar al trabajo, y si lo hacen, no son necesariamente la mejor opción. Conocer bien a sus talentos internos, tener claridad de la dirección estratégica y cumplir con antelación las etapas de los planes de sucesión son las únicas formas de minimizar los riesgos de equivocarse a la hora de elegir el nuevo CEO.

The term globalization has been thrown around for decades but it has never applied as much as it has in recent years as organizations become more focused and specialized within a specific industry or product, and reach beyond their traditional regions of business. Globalization has evolved from being a commercial exchange to a multifaceted integration of many aspects of the business.  This trend has created a need for strong leaders who can manage a complex environment with a high level of interdependence.

When we looked at background of the top 100 CEOs in Mexico our analysis showed that fifty-four percent of the newest CEOs have performed assignments outside of Mexico and 53 percent hold Master’s degrees from institutions outside of Mexico. But Robert Grosse, Dean of EGADE Business School, cautions: “overseas experience is not the same as overseas business experience…Mexican executives could still benefit from more overseas experience in business activities”.

Executives who have been successful in international assignments have usually excelled in understanding the environment, leading visionary change and results, as well as mastering complex business problems. These competencies, coupled with already acquired industry expertise, translate into a small learning curve and quick results.

According to research performed by William W. Maddux, Adam D. Galinsky, and Carmit T. Tadmor (Harvard Business Review, September 2010, p24) people who have international experience or identify with more than one nationality are better problem solvers and display more creativity. This based on measuring the ability of these managers to see and integrate multiple perspectives on different issues. In these studies bicultural managers scored higher than monoculturals. Their research also suggests that people with international experience are more likely to create new businesses and products and to be promoted.

Senior executives of successful organizations are a more diverse group than ever before and the impact goes beyond the leadership teams. Middle managers and staff members are being exposed to global management techniques, metric-driven environments and matrix organizations that are preparing them to be the next generation of leaders.

Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc., (Nasdaq:HSII) is the leadership advisory firm providing senior-level executive search and leadership consulting services, including succession planning, executive assessment and development, talent retention management, transition consulting for newly appointed executives, and M&A human capital integration consulting. For almost 60 years, we have focused on quality service and built strong leadership teams through our relationships with clients and individuals worldwide. Today, Heidrick & Struggles’ leadership experts operate from principal business centers in North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia Pacific. For more information about Heidrick & Struggles, please visit www.heidrick.com

Q:

I understand the importance of branding and social networking; however, what I find difficult to understand is that any recruiter or C-level hiring manger can fully grasp a candidate’s brand through online presence. I could be wrong, but in my opinion it’s the recruiters who need to fall in love with a candidate’s brand because the hiring companies have their trust. How do we build our brand with recruiters?

JR:

There are three key things that must be considered:

1. Branding, by definition, is the creation of an identity for a specific product. You build your product and your brand through every element of your personal and professional experience. What you do with social media is present and promote the brand, but the key lies with you – your product.
2. What you do online and with social media will help attract the attention of executive recruiters. It is part of the initial selling point that should get you in the door. By no means will an online profile replace the evaluation process that will help a recruiter identify if you are the right fit for a specific position or a specific organization.
3. In direct response to the question, it starts with having an online profile that will provide visibility for executive recruiters to find you, but you will need to build a relationship in order to build your brand WITH them. Nothing can take the place of the relationship. Going back to the brand-product analogy: The recruiter needs to know, understand and, as you say, love the product to help you brand it for a specific client and a specific position. You don’t achieve this by just sending a résumé, selling yourself and calling every month to see if a position is available. It is built on valuable interaction regarding trends and issues that affect the disciplines and industries that you work in helping the recruiter stay on top of what is happening in that space. This level of interaction helps you and the recruiter build knowledge and expertise making the relationship valuable for both beyond the specific transaction of a single job opportunity.

ExecuNet.com

Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc., (Nasdaq:HSII) is the leadership advisory firm providing senior-level executive search and leadership consulting services, including succession planning, executive assessment and development, talent retention management, transition consulting for newly appointed executives, and M&A human capital integration consulting. For almost 60 years, we have focused on quality service and built strong leadership teams through our relationships with clients and individuals worldwide. Today, Heidrick & Struggles’ leadership experts operate from principal business centers in North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia Pacific. For more information about Heidrick & Struggles, please visit www.heidrick.com

Q:

What is my better option when a job is posted on the company’s website and also advertised by the recruiter? Should I apply through the recruiter or on company’s website? 

JR:

Your chances are improved if you work with the recruiter and let him/her present your resume. These are the reasons:  

a) If it’s a contingent search the recruiter will not be paid if the client (company) already has your resume (obtained via the website). You might burn a bridge with the recruiter. 

b) If it’s a retained search the company will most likely not put much effort into reviewing resumes from their website.

c) You will have an edge if you talk to them, discuss the requirements and get a better understanding of what the company is looking for. You will get specific feedback on your resume and help grooming it to reflect what the company wants to see. 

d) Discussions with the recruiter will help you manage expectations and eliminate potential frustration if the position is not a true fit. It really beats sending your resume into the black hole that is a website resume database. 

This is assuming that your background and experience are a potential match for the position. You might not get the recruiters attention if they are far from what the client (company) is looking for. 

ExecuNet.com

Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc., (Nasdaq:HSII) is the leadership advisory firm providing senior-level executive search and leadership consulting services, including succession planning, executive assessment and development, talent retention management, transition consulting for newly appointed executives, and M&A human capital integration consulting. For almost 60 years, we have focused on quality service and built strong leadership teams through our relationships with clients and individuals worldwide. Today, Heidrick & Struggles’ leadership experts operate from principal business centers in North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia Pacific. For more information about Heidrick & Struggles, please visit www.heidrick.com