Let me share a quick story about a client.
His name was Mat (Spelled with one 't')
He was in a contract role that he liked but didn't love. The team was good and they had talked about a permanent hire conversation, but things never progressed past talking.
On the other side, we have Dave - He was a cyber security director who was desperately trying to bring his company's technology and practices up to modern standards.
(Spoiler alert - there were security vulnerabilities spread across the network like a slice of swiss cheese)
I first met Dave during a contract role that I worked in between being terminated from my corporate career and my current mission of helping leaders to build world-class teams.
Dave's team had a difficult task to accomplish. They needed to lead a 100+ year-old company through a digital revolution where the business practices were completely transformed while simultaneously closing an enormous list of cyber security vulnerabilities.
Mat was having anxiety over whether he would need to find yet another contract role since the company he was working for cut off contractors after 2,080 hours.
Dave was trying to figure out how to address the churn his organization had experienced in recent months. Not only were they losing engineers, but they were also seeing directors leave to become CIO or CISO for smaller companies. He was stuck in the middle of a resignation tornado and needed some stability.
Like most hiring managers, Dave was working through HR and following a traditional process to find new resources.
His company had a policy of only working with outside agencies if they were unable to source a role internally. This meant that they didn't come to me until their internal efforts had already fizzled out.
What I Did ...
I used the framework that we discussed earlier in this conversation to find Mat the exact kind of role he wanted and land a top-notch high character engineer for Dave.
Mat showed me that he was more than a typical job hopper. He demonstrated the depth of understanding and character that made him a perfect fit for Dave's team.
The alignment between what Mat and Dave were looking for was nearly perfect. It was less a matter of figuring out whether it would work ... Once I knew what Dave wanted and screened Mat, it was immediately obvious that this was the right match.
The team is now thriving. Security vulnerabilities are being addressed and the digital transformation is accelerating.