The Executive Recruiter as a Trusted Advisor

In 1999, I made a significant and life changing decision to leave the practice of law and founded a legal search firm, Princeton Legal Search Group. I am often asked what about the business inspires me, motivates me and continues to energize me 16 years after founding and now leading a growth company.

The answer is found in my role as a trusted advisor to my clients and for the lawyer candidates our company represents. There is great meaning in the work that we do at Princeton Legal Search Group and my recruiting colleagues and I derive tremendous satisfaction from our role as trusted advisors. The work that we do as recruiters is important. On the client side, law firms, corporations and non-profit institutions want and need to make the right hire. People are the greatest assets of organizations and bad hires are costly. Hiring the wrong person is disruptive, results in lost productivity, and has a negative impact on fellow employees and customers. Getting it right matters. This is why our clients consistently entrust their searches to us and place great confidence in our ability to listen, ask questions, advise clients and present exceptionally qualified attorneys.

For candidates, the work we do as trusted advisors is of paramount importance. A career change or move to a new opportunity is a major life event, impacting personal life, family and even health. Mistakes are costly and a lawyer seeking a career opportunity wants and needs to make the correct decision. Our attorney candidates rely on us for counsel and advice so that they find the right career fit and continue on their career trajectory.

Serving as a trusted advisor means to move beyond transactional decision making to a more probing advisory role, asking the questions that have not been asked, and looking beyond the immediacy of the existing needs to what else may exist in the future for the company and the individual. It means exploring alternative possibilities when appropriate. As trusted advisors, our search professionals at Princeton Legal Search Group guide our clients and attorney candidates in considering the organizational relationship and the style and cultural fit for long term relationship continuum.

Our employer clients want to minimize risk when hiring for important attorney roles in their organizations. Our attorney candidates likewise want to minimize risk in their career decision making. But the reality is that career decision making for the individual lawyer and for the hiring organization requires levels of risk taking. Both parties want to succeed and feel confident and comfortable in their decisions. In our role as trusted advisors, we help both sides reach the point where they are empowered to move forward.

Can you imagine the positive energy in bringing two parties together whose goals and objectives, once aligned, can achieve their professional, and often, personal goals? The ultimate in career satisfaction is when the skills, competencies values and styles align with the hiring organization and management teams. That is when individuals, teams and organizations soar and an energy lift is experienced. It does not feel like work anymore. It is deeply rewarding to be at the center of some of the most important decision making by hiring organizations and by attorneys who are advancing their careers.

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