Hire a CEO: leadership search by Vinay Pasricha.
A CEO sets direction, allocates capital and attention, builds the leadership team and carries the organisation’s relationship with its board and owners. No other hire shapes as much of what happens below it.
Frame the mandate. Then discover the person.
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01
Frame the mandate precisely
Is this CEO being hired to grow what exists, to turn something around, to professionalise a founder-led company, or to prepare it for a new stage? Each is a different person, and the brief should say which.
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02
Understand the organisation’s frequency
How decisions are actually made, the pace the organisation runs at and what it rewards. A capable CEO in the wrong environment looks mediocre; that is a mismatch, not a verdict on character.
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03
Discover, do not advertise
The leaders who fit are rarely looking. The search goes to them, through discovery and relationships, instead of waiting for applications to a posting.
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04
Validate under pressure
Candidates are tested against the real mandate, with questions generated from the case and held under Socratic pressure. A resume records the past, and an interview tests performance, not fit.
Organisations comparing CEO search firms, or founders looking to hire a CEO for a startup, usually ask how quickly a shortlist can arrive. The more useful question is whether the mandate is understood before anyone is approached.
This describes an approach, not a guarantee. The doctrine behind it is set out in Organizational Frequency.
Setting the pay for this role? The India Leadership Pay Benchmark puts published CEO pay figures from named surveys side by side, with every source linked.
Begin with the mandate.
Vinay Pasricha is the founder of GoodSpace AI, a hiring company based in Noida that has served about 1,200 corporate customers over seven years. Send the enquiry through the leadership search page, or write or call directly.