We dive into one of the most critical components of company building, recruiting product leaders (and executives in general), with Andrew Abramson of Riviera Partners -- one of the most elite search firms in silicon valley. We cover first how companies and founders should think about recruiting senior leaders, from knowing when you're ready to working with search firms. Then we dive into the other side, how product managers should think about managing and progressing in their own careers toward senior leadership roles. Thanks to Andrew for joining us and we hope everyone can take away something applicable for their own companies and careers!
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Great Founders think about the product; Exceptional Founders think about who should lead the company vs who should lead the product. They sound similar but they are very, very different. – Andrew Abramson, @AndrewA91
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Show Bookmarks:
[00:00] – Show intro and introduction of Andrew Abramson
[02:35] – What is Executive Search? Why, and how it works?
[08:50] – The recruiting process
[13:30] – How is the recruiting process managed?
[16:30] – How does the company and the candidate interact?
[21:55] – What separates from good and great in the Executive Search?
[28:50] – How does compensation work?
[33:35] – Where should a candidate start? How can a candidate determine if they’re ready?
[39:15] – What skills and jobs does a strong potential candidate have on their resume?
[43:20] – Common misconceptions in Executive Search?
People Worth Knowing:
Andrew Abramson
Meg Whitman
Jeffrey Katzenburg
Evan Spiegel
April Underwood
Tom Conrad
Kathryn Gould
David Beirne
Companies Mentioned in Episode:
Riviera
Snapchat
Dollar Shave Club
Safire Partners
WndrCo
Quibi
Pandora
Slack
Zoom
DropBox
Zillow
Foundation Capital
Benchmark
Episode Specific Terms:
Executive Search
Executive Recruiter
Product Management
Product Led Founder/CEO
Consumer Product vs B2B Product
Ben and David’s Affiliations:
Wave Capital, @WaveCapitalVC
Pioneer Square Labs, @psl
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What is ACQ2: The Acquired Interviews?
ACQ2 is Ben and David's conversations with expert founders and investors. Acquired the stories of great companies — and ACQ2 dives deeper into the lessons we can learn from them, often with the protagonists themselves.