Writing a brief that works.

A job description describes a person. A brief describes an outcome. The difference sounds small and decides the entire search: a description invites lookalikes of the last incumbent, while a brief tells the market — and your search partner — what must actually change once the seat is filled.

Outcomes, not adjectives.

The spine of a working brief is three to five outcomes with a clock on them: what must be true in twenty-four months that is not true today. Revenue rebuilt in a named segment, a platform migration landed, a leadership bench that no longer depends on one person. Adjectives — dynamic, strategic, hands-on — screen nobody out and attract nobody in. Outcomes do both.

Non-negotiables, kept short.

Every additional must-have narrows the market, and most wish-lists carry passengers. Separate the two or three requirements that are truly structural — a licence, a market, a scale actually operated at — from preferences that a strong candidate can render irrelevant. A brief with twelve must-haves is not rigorous; it is unfilled.

Context candidates deserve.

Senior candidates read a brief the way you read their CV — for what it omits. Why is the seat open? What did the last person find hard? Where does the role genuinely sit — the reporting line on paper and the one in practice? What is the honest state of the team being inherited? A brief that tells the truth about the hard parts earns candour back, and saves everyone the interview where the truth surfaces anyway.

The test of a good brief.

One page is enough. If the brief needs ten, the role is not yet designed — and no search, however energetic, fixes an undesigned role.

We draft the brief with clients as the first working session of every mandate, before a single approach is made. Bring us the outcome you need and we will pressure-test it together — that conversation costs nothing and usually changes the role.