A few years ago I placed a senior leader into a newly formed practice at a well-regarded firm. He came from a strong background, fit the brief well, and the process ran cleanly. Fee paid, everyone happy. Normal.
What happened over the following eighteen months demonstrates the importance of focusing on relationships.
By the time I next spoke seriously with that leader about a hiring need, he had already suggested to his managing director that I come and present to the company's national director group. I hadn't pitched for it or asked. He had decided on his own that I was someone worth introducing.
That outcome came from what happened after the placement.
Most recruiters drop off. The deal closes, the fee lands, and contact becomes sporadic at best — an occasional check-in, a happy birthday message, maybe a LinkedIn like. The relationship that took months to build gets abandoned the moment it stops generating short-term revenue.
How it begins: be straight from the first word
The first conversation I had with this particular candidate was cold outreach. No referral, no warm introduction. When he asked directly whether someone had referred me and which firm I represented, I answered both questions honestly — including acknowledging that nobody had referred me.
That's a moment where a lot of recruiters hedge. They give a half-answer that protects their positioning. They sense the question is a screening test and try to pass it without full disclosure.
The problem is that candidates notice. And the relational norm you set in the first exchange tends to hold. If you start evasive, you invite guardedness. If you start direct, you invite candor back.
Over the months that followed, this candidate shared compensation history, internal politics, personal timelines and open uncertainties, without my asking, because the standard had been set early. Honesty in the first conversation was the foundation of everything that came later.
Show your advocacy
During the offer stage, I got ahead of something I knew would matter to the candidate — a specific cost he'd be absorbing during his transition. I resolved it with the employer before he'd raised it, and sent him a short message letting him know.
His response was two words and two exclamation marks.
But the effect on the relationship was larger than any amount of explaining my value could have produced. Every recruiter tells candidates they are advocates. The candidates who trust that claim are the ones who've seen evidence of it.
In every process there is at least one moment where you can act on your candidate's behalf before they know to ask. Find it. Do the thing. Make sure they know you did it.
Stay present: consistently and lightly
After the placement, I kept in touch with this leader roughly once a month. Sometimes it was a message about something happening in his market. Sometimes it was a relevant profile I thought he'd find useful. Sometimes it was following up on something personal he'd mentioned — a family trip, a goal he'd set, something his team was working on.
None of these touches required much. But they were consistent. I wasn't manufacturing reasons to stay in contact; I wanted to know how things were going.
Over eighteen months, something accumulated. By the time a hiring need emerged, I already understood the comp philosophy, the team dynamics, the competitive landscape, the internal culture. I could write a brief that a transactional recruiter — one who'd had a single briefing call — couldn't have matched. Because I'd been listening for a year and a half.
The other thing that accumulated was something harder to name. This person had become someone I enjoyed talking to. We'd found shared interests and shared humor. When things went well for him, I was pleased for him, and he could tell.
You cannot manufacture that. But you can create the conditions for it by showing up consistently, sharing something of yourself, and following up on what people tell you about their lives. A relationship that is purely transactional is always one bad experience away from ending. One with warmth in it lasts far longer.
When things go wrong, own your part directly
Not everything in an extended relationship goes smoothly. At one point in this particular relationship, a process I was managing stalled. There was a candidate involved who was in a difficult personal period. I had been buying time, hoping the situation would resolve, and communicating less than I should have in the meantime. My contact eventually reached out to the candidate directly, having heard nothing from me.
I had to acknowledge that I had been less than fully transparent, and that my delay had put him in an awkward position.
I said what had happened, owned it, and apologized clearly. The relationship absorbed it. I don't think it would have, had I deflected.
Setbacks damage trust when people are dishonest about them. A client or candidate who sees you handle a failure with directness tends to trust you more afterward. They've learned that you tell the truth when it costs you something.
Play the long game deliberately
The invitation to meet the national director group arrived out of nowhere from my perspective — a message letting me know that my contact had flagged me to his managing director and suggested I come and present when I was next in the city.
It came from eighteen months of being present, being honest, being useful, and being human. The return didn't arrive in a straight line. It arrived all at once, and it was disproportionate to any individual investment along the way.
Relationship capital in this business accumulates through consistent investment in people you find interesting and worthwhile, with no guaranteed return and no specific timeline.
The recruiters who build careers on referrals and repeat business do the same things as everyone else, more consistently, for longer, without expecting immediate return.
Most of their competitors give up too early. Usually just before the moment it would have paid off.
The eight things that built the relationship
Looking back across that eighteen-month span, here is what I think made the difference — stripped of everything that sounds like advice and reduced to what happened:
I was honest in the first conversation when a deflection would have been safer. I moved past friction without making it a story. I acted for him before he asked me to. I stayed in touch when there was nothing immediate in it for me. I was curious about his world. I let the relationship be personal as well as professional. I owned the moment I got it wrong. And I kept showing up long after the fee had cleared.
None of it was particularly sophisticated.
The placement is where the interesting part begins.
John Lyle is the founder of Lyle Alexander Consulting, a specialist search and advisory firm focused on accounting, finance and professional services. If you'd like to talk about how we work — or about a search you're running — get in touch.
