Why Search Strategy Matters
A common failure pattern in executive search: the search is opened, outreach begins, candidates are contacted, and three months later the client asks why no one suitable has been found. The answer is usually that the strategy was wrong from day one — wrong ICP, wrong channels, wrong messaging, wrong market mapping. By the time this becomes visible, the best candidates in the target pool have already been contacted and declined.
Majhi Group designs the search strategy explicitly before sourcing begins. This means the first outreach is not the start of learning — it is the execution of a strategy that has already been tested for logic and alignment.
The Strategy Design Process
Mandate Intake
A structured session — not a job description review — that establishes what the role actually requires, what success looks like at 90 days and 12 months, what the hiring manager genuinely values (vs. what the JD says), and what organizational context the candidate will be working in. The intake brief produced from this session is the foundation of the search strategy.
Market Mapping
Before sourcing begins, we map the addressable candidate universe: how many candidates exist who meet the functional criteria, where they are currently employed, how saturated the outreach channels are (have these candidates already been contacted by other firms on similar searches?), and what their likely motivations are. Market mapping prevents the most common sourcing error: contacting candidates who are already exhausted by outreach.
ICP Definition
The Ideal Candidate Profile is more specific than a job description. It specifies the types of companies and contexts where the right candidate likely exists, the career patterns that correlate with success in this role, the scale and complexity of problems they should have solved, and — critically — the ICP boundaries: who to exclude, not just who to include. A narrow ICP sources more precisely. A broad ICP wastes outreach on candidates who can't meet the bar.
Channel Strategy
Different roles require different sourcing channels. A CFO search at a late-stage startup requires different channels than a VP Sales search at a Series B. We select channels based on where the ICP population is reachable and which channels will produce the best response rate for this specific search. LinkedIn is rarely the only channel — and often not the most effective one.
Timeline Modeling
Before outreach begins, we model the expected timeline: how long market mapping will take, when we expect to have a qualified shortlist, when we're projecting first interviews, when we expect an offer. The model is shared with the client — not as a commitment, but as a communication framework. Slippage against the model is a signal to review the strategy, not just wait longer.
"41 days to close a $275K VP search that two firms had worked for 60+ days each. The difference wasn't harder work. It was a different strategy — one that was designed before the first outreach was sent."
Ongoing Strategy Review
The search strategy is not set-and-forget. Majhi Group conducts a strategy review at week 3 and week 6 of every search. If shortlist approval is below threshold, the intake brief is revisited. If response rates are decaying, the ICP and messaging are revised. If the timeline model is slipping, the cause is diagnosed and addressed.
This is what weekly status reports actually report: not just what happened, but whether the strategy is still sound — and what is being adjusted if it isn't.