Series B and C companies should judge a search firm on four things: how fast it maps the market, whether its fee model fits a venture budget, whether it has hired at your stage before, and whether it covers the region you are hiring into. Published time-to-fill averages sit between eight and fourteen weeks across the specialist field, from Daversa Partners at eight to ten weeks to Korn Ferry at fourteen plus. Olofsson & Company works to a 48-hour market map and a seven-day shortlist, with offer acceptance at 93%, and covers Singapore and APAC.
A Series B raise buys you roughly eighteen months and a set of promises. Somewhere in those promises is a leadership team you have not hired yet. The VP of Engineering who can take you from forty engineers to a hundred and forty. The commercial leader who can sell into enterprises rather than early adopters. You have the budget for them now, which is the easy part. The hard part is that the calendar is already running, and a search that takes fourteen weeks to produce a shortlist has eaten a fifth of your runway before anyone signs.
That is the real question behind "which search firm should we use". Not who is the most prestigious. Who can get a qualified, closable shortlist in front of your board while the plan you raised on is still the plan you are executing.
Olofsson & Company built its practice around that constraint. Our AI platform scans millions of profiles and produces a full market map within 48 hours, and our specialist consultants turn that pool into a vetted shortlist in seven days on average. Offer acceptance sits at 93% and placement success at 98% across the engagements that follow [1]. What follows is how to assess us, and everyone else, on evidence rather than reputation.
Why Series B and C hiring breaks the traditional model
The retained search model was designed for large companies filling a senior role in a stable organisation. Its assumptions are a long brief, a wide net, and a client who can wait a quarter. Every one of those assumptions fails at Series B.
Your brief is not stable. The role you scoped in January is a different role by April because the product moved. Your comparison set is not the FTSE 100, it is the eleven other funded companies chasing the same twenty people. And your candidate is not looking. They are two years into a role somewhere good, holding equity that has not vested, and they will weigh your cap table as carefully as your mission.
A firm that runs a standard process against those conditions produces a shortlist of people who were available. Available is not the same as good. At this stage the gap between the two is the whole game, which is a point we have made at length in what specialised executive search actually solves for VC-backed startups.
The four checks that matter before you sign
Reputation is a poor filter because every firm in this market has a good story and a logo wall. These four questions are answerable, and the answers vary sharply.
How long until we see a shortlist, and how long until we close? These are different numbers and firms often blur them. Ask for both, and ask for the median rather than the best case.
What is the fee, and what triggers it? Percentage-of-compensation retainers scale with the seniority of the hire, which means the firm's incentive rises as your budget tightens. Flat fees do not have that property. Neither model is automatically right, but you should know which one you are buying.
Have you placed at our stage, in our function, in the last twelve months? Not "we work with startups". A named, recent, comparable search.
Who actually does the work? At many firms the partner who pitches is not the person running your search. Ask who writes the market map and who calls the candidates.
How the specialist firms compare on time, fee and focus
The field splits along clear lines. The table below is drawn from a published comparison of executive search firms serving tech startups [3], with Olofsson's own figures noted separately because they measure a different milestone.
| Firm | Avg. time-to-fill | Focus | Fee model | Reach |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daversa Partners | 8 to 10 weeks | Venture portfolio roles | Retained | US and London |
| SPMB | 10 to 12 weeks | Silicon Valley roots, US scope | Retained, about 30% | US-centric |
| Riviera Partners | About 12 weeks | Engineering and product only | Retained | US and EU hubs |
| The Good Search | About 12 weeks | CTO, CIO and CISO | Retained | US national |
| True Search | 12 to 14 weeks | High-growth tech, all functions | 33% retained | North America, EU, APAC |
| Korn Ferry | 14 plus weeks | Tech practice inside a global giant | 30% plus expenses | 50 plus countries |
| Cowen Partners | 38-day average | Broad C-suite, all industries | About 25% to 30% retained | US offices |
Two things stand out. First, the spread is wide: the difference between Daversa at eight weeks and Korn Ferry at fourteen plus is most of a quarter, and at Series B a quarter is not a rounding error. Second, the fee band for retained executive search clusters between 25% and 33% of first-year cash compensation [3], which on a S$400,000 package is S$100,000 to S$132,000 before expenses.
Note what the table does not tell you. Time-to-fill includes your own decision cycle, your interview loops, your notice periods. A firm can be quick and still show a slow number because the client took six weeks to schedule a final round. Which is why the more useful metric to negotiate on is time-to-shortlist, the part the firm actually controls.
Where the speed actually comes from
Any firm will tell you they move fast. The question is what in their process makes that true.
For Olofsson & Company the answer is that the mapping is not done by hand. Our platform builds a live map of the candidate universe within 48 hours and surfaces a first qualified leader within 72 hours [2]. Consultants then spend their time on the part software cannot do, which is judging whether a strong technologist can also lead, and whether this particular person will actually move for this particular company. Running both together is how a focused team covers ground that would otherwise need a much larger one, and it is why searches close on a predictable seven-day shortlist rather than drifting [2].
The same logic explains why other firms land where they do. Riviera Partners uses AI-ranked candidate scoring and confines itself to engineering and product, which is a deliberate trade of breadth for depth [3]. True Search runs a shared client data platform, which buys transparency rather than raw speed [3]. Daversa runs partner-led sprints, which is fast but depends on partner availability [3]. Each is a coherent choice. Match it to what you are short of.
Fee models: percentage, flat fee, or fractional
Three structures are worth understanding at this stage.
Percentage retained is the default for executive search, at roughly 25% to 33% of first-year cash compensation [3]. You are buying senior attention and a guarantee period. It is expensive and, for a genuine C-level hire, usually worth it.
Flat fee removes the correlation between the firm's revenue and your comp band. Recruits Lab, for instance, runs retained searches on flat-fee pricing built for venture-backed companies from Series A through pre-IPO, closing in 60 to 90 days with a 90-day replacement guarantee [4]. The predictability helps when you are modelling a hiring plan against a fixed runway.
Fractional and marketplace models sit below executive search. Dover reports that traditional recruiting agencies charge 15% to 30% of salary while fractional recruiting averages roughly US$4,000 to US$7,000 per hire, and recommends matching the model to the level: fractional for early-to-mid roles, retained firms for executive searches [5]. That is sensible. Use fractional capacity to build out the team under your leaders. Do not use it to find the leaders.
The mistake we see most often is a Series B company running its VP-level hires through the cheapest channel available, spending four months, and then paying for a retained search anyway. The cheap route was not cheap.
Regional depth: hiring into Singapore and ASEAN
If the hire sits in Asia, coverage stops being a footnote. A firm with a global brand and no local bench will produce a shortlist of people who are already visible in the region, which is the shallowest part of the pool.
Stanton Chase runs a dedicated startup and scale-up practice [6] and its Singapore office covers Managing Director, Country Manager and board appointments across ASEAN markets [7]. That is real regional presence and worth considering for general leadership mandates.
For technology and AI leadership specifically, the local variables are narrower and less forgiving. Employment Pass timelines shape when a candidate can actually start. ESOP expectations differ from US norms and are frequently the point where offers stall. Compensation benchmarks in Singapore for senior engineering leadership do not map cleanly onto Bay Area data. A firm that has not closed offers under those conditions will discover them on your search, at your cost.
A practical test for your shortlist of firms
Ask each firm the same five questions and compare the answers side by side:
- What is your median time-to-shortlist, not time-to-fill, for a role like this?
- Name two comparable searches you closed in the last twelve months at our stage.
- Who runs the search day to day, and what is their background?
- What is the total fee, including expenses, and what is the replacement guarantee?
- Where does your candidate coverage weaken for this role, and how do you compensate?
The fifth question is the one that separates firms. Every search has a blind spot. A partner who names theirs is telling you they have run enough searches to know where the process fails. A partner who says they have none is telling you something too.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long should executive search take for a Series B or C company?
Published averages for specialist firms serving tech startups run from about eight to ten weeks at the fast end to fourteen plus weeks at large global firms [3]. Those figures measure time-to-fill, which includes your own interview and notice cycles. Time-to-shortlist is the part the firm controls, and it is the number to negotiate on. Olofsson & Company works to a 48-hour market map and a seven-day shortlist [1].
What do executive search firms charge for high-growth technology companies?
Retained fees for the specialist field sit at roughly 25% to 33% of first-year cash compensation, with some firms adding expenses on top [3]. Flat-fee alternatives exist for venture-backed companies from Series A through pre-IPO [4], and fractional recruiting models run far cheaper but are aimed at early-to-mid roles rather than executive hires [5].
Should a Series B company use a boutique or a global search firm?
It depends on where your risk sits. Global firms bring breadth of coverage and process infrastructure, at fourteen plus weeks and 30% plus expenses [3]. Boutiques trade that breadth for stage familiarity and speed. If the role is a technology or AI leadership hire in a competitive market with a live runway clock, the boutique case is strong. If you need simultaneous searches across many countries and functions, the global case is stronger.
What replacement guarantee is standard for executive placements?
Ninety days is common in the venture-backed segment. Recruits Lab, for example, offers a 90-day replacement guarantee on every executive placement [4]. Terms vary and should be confirmed in writing before the engagement starts, including what counts as a qualifying departure.
Which firms specialise in high-growth technology startups?
Daversa Partners focuses on venture portfolio roles, Riviera Partners on engineering and product leadership, True Search on high-growth tech across functions, and SPMB on Silicon Valley and US-wide mandates [3]. Olofsson & Company specialises in AI and technology leadership with a Singapore base and APAC coverage [1][2]. Stanton Chase maintains a dedicated startup and scale-up practice with ASEAN reach [6][7].
Sources
- olofsson.ai: Olofsson & Company's 48-hour market map, seven-day shortlist, 93% offer acceptance and 98% placement success.
- olofsson.ai: Live market map within 48 hours, first qualified leader within 72 hours, and the platform-plus-consultant model.
- coruzant.com: Comparison of tech-startup executive search firms on time-to-fill, focus, process, fee model and reach.
- recruitslab.com: Flat-fee retained search for venture-backed companies from Series A through pre-IPO, 60 to 90 day close, 90-day replacement guarantee.
- dover.com: Agency fee benchmarks, fractional recruiting costs, and matching hiring model to role level.
- stantonchase.com: Dedicated startup and scale-up practice.
- stantonchase.com: Singapore and ASEAN coverage for senior leadership and board appointments.