Director – Corporate Relations for Globally Reputed European BSchoolExecutive Search
Top ranked global business schools are building deeper engagements with Asian corporates. This premier BSchool is looking at strengthening its corporate relations and provide campus placements comparable to top tier IIMs.
EduShine assisted this top ranked european premier BSchool in securing Director – Corporate Relations.
The Institution
The BSchool of a globally renowned university is consistently ranked among the top 20 business schools in the world.
This business management school, is one of the few triple accredited AACSB (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business), EQUIS (European Quality Improvement System), and AMBA (Association of MBAs) BSchool in the world. These prestigious international accreditations provides an affordable yet globally renowned management education.
Search Objective
This prestigious Italian BSchool has been present in India for about 10 years and by now it is known name in India. The BSchool has been able to showcase it’s academic rigour and has been well respected in India. The earlier Director – Corporate Relations has been successful for establishing the brand image of the BSchool and after 4 years tenure he moved out to join another premier BSchool.
In current scenario, the BSchool has been able to build it’s brand image in the asian market and has been able to place it’s students at the roles and compensation comparable to second tier IIMs. Now this top ranked BSchool wants to adopt more aggressive consultative sales approach in building corporate relations and eventually wants to place its students at the roles and salaries comparable to top tier IIMs.
To achieve this objective, the BSchool wanted to hire a seasoned corporate relations and BSchool placements leader who can use his existing relations and aggressively place the students in leading corporates.
The Challenge
EduShine initiated the search in the first week of March and within few days COVID stuck. So the position went on hold for few month. Eventually, the search restarted in the month of July and the whole objective of this search changed.
Being the first search for EduShine (And the BSchool too) during Covid time, the search strategy evolved while conducting this search.
Search Strategy
This search being the first search during Covid time, it was by far the most challenging search.
As a search firm, EduShine generally uses 3 layered mapping (industry segment, target organisations, and target candidates), long listing and shortlisting process. However, due to Covid, first the search went on hold then the position became super urgent for the BSchool as two of the members in the corporate relations decided to move on.
In the changing scenario, EduShine conducted the search with rapid iterative search strategy. Rather than mapping all the target segments and target organisations, EduShine, based on its expertise of conducting 10+ searches for corporate relations leadership role, identified 15 candidates’ long list and initiated assessment process. On the other hand, we conducted rapid mapping and identified 7 more candidates.
After first round of assessment, we identified 8 candidates and based on geographical constraints (new normal in Covid era) we presented 5 candidates to the BSchool leadership. BSchool conducted 5 rounds of selection process online and finally selected 1 profile.
The Outcome
After rigorous global selection process consisting of 2 rounds of online selection process and 2 board presentations, the client selected a Director – Corporate Relations.
The candidate came from a leading BSchool, promoted by group of corporate houses, where he was heading Corporate Relations. Prior to this he headed corporate relations for one of the premier BSchool and headed Northern India corporate relations for ISB.
Impressed with the EduShine’s bespoke rapid search process, the client assigned a project for conducting new searches.