An AI-native retained executive-search firm.
Turnkey Recruiting places senior leaders — Director through C-suite — for companies between $50M and $10B in revenue (200–10,000+ employees), nationwide. Two people run it: an engine and a craft. The engine builds and operates the system; the craft runs the searches and owns the client relationships. The system below is what lets two people operate like a full search desk.
Client-facing recruiter
Runs every search, screens candidates, manages the buyer relationship, closes the placement. The face of the firm. Never touches a command line — the system serves you finished outputs.
Builds + runs the system
Operates the ATS, drafts the documents, keeps the numbers honest, and carries finance-lane credibility — a CFO turned recruiter. The back office, invisible to clients.
One placement, then repeat
H2 is deliberately one clean placement that proves the engine — then the same system runs the next search, and the next, at almost no added cost.
| Lane | Position | Who buys |
|---|---|---|
| Finance & Accounting | Anchor lane — "CFO turned recruiter" credibility | CHRO · VP of HR · President · COO · P&L owner |
| Mining / Minerals / Rare-earths + Industrial | Tim's deep network — reshoring & capacity tailwind | President · COO · P&L owner |
| SaaS / Technology | Growth-stage finance & operating leaders | CHRO · VP of HR · COO |
Clients: $50M–$10B revenue · 200–10,000+ employees · nationwide. The specialty-vehicle lane exists but is never led publicly.
Claude Code is the operator.
This is the part most search firms don't have. There is no bot fleet, no daemon, no scraper running in the background. Ricky talks to Claude Code; it reasons through the search in-session, drafts the documents, and writes every result into one system of record. The cost of all that reasoning is $0 marginal — it runs on a flat subscription, not a per-call meter. You get the leverage of a full back office without the headcount or the software bill.
Does the heavy lifting
- Turns a job brief into a structured search, fee, and qualification check
- Builds & ranks the target list; scores every candidate 0–100
- Drafts dossiers, client-ready candidate cards, agreements, offers, invoices
- Persists every change to one database with a full audit trail
- Enforces the money & guarantee rules automatically — nothing slips
Does the judgment
- Approves the target list and the outreach voice
- Runs the screen calls and reads the human signal
- Decides who makes the shortlist and who gets passed
- Manages the buyer, negotiates, and closes the placement
- Owns the relationship that turns one search into the next
One database, single-writer
Every search, candidate, and dollar lives in recruiting.db. One writer, append-only history — so the record can never quietly drift or get double-edited.
PII stays in-house
Candidate details never leave our system. HubSpot stays the client/company CRM; the candidate database is a private, compounding asset that gets more valuable with every search.
Cheaper than a SaaS ATS
Below ~30 concurrent searches, this custom spine beats Ashby/Greenhouse on cost — and the AI-native engine is the differentiator, not an add-on.
Six stages, one hard gate.
Every search moves through the same swimlane — intake to nurture — with a clear owner at each step. The columns show exactly who does what: the system, you (Tim), Ricky, and the client.
Reading it: rows are the four players · columns are the six stages · the red bar is the one rule nothing skips.
No sourcing begins until the engagement agreement is signed AND the engagement fee is invoiced (the first third, at signing). This is enforced in the ATS — a search physically cannot enter Active Search otherwise. It's what keeps the firm from doing free work on a handshake.
Your whole desk, on one screen.
This is the tab you live in. Every active search, every candidate in play, what needs your attention next, what's on the calendar, and where each client stands — generated straight from the system, always current.
Live sample data — three searches in flight: Northwind (shortlist), Redrock (active search), Lumina (post-placement).
Three things change — and one doesn't.
Here's the honest split. The system takes the research, writing, tracking, and paperwork off your desk. It sharpens the work you keep. And it never touches the part that's actually you — the conversations and the judgment. Read it at three levels.
What you stop doing
The Sunday-night spreadsheet work, writing up candidate notes, chasing status, formatting decks, drafting paperwork, doing fee math. The 50–70% of the week that was never the craft.
What gets better
Faster shortlists, client-ready output that's consistent every time, a briefing waiting before every call, and more searches at once — without hiring or more hours.
What stays all you
The client relationship, the candidate conversations, the read on fit, the close. Your name, your network, your reputation. The AI is invisible — clients experience Tim.
Level 1 — what comes off your plate
The low-judgment, high-drudgery tasks that historically eat most of a search consultant's week.
| What you used to own | What happens now |
|---|---|
| Build the target-company / market map | The engine drafts the universe of likely companies and titles for the role — you edit it, you don't start from a blank page |
| Write candidate write-ups after every screen | Your call notes become a finished, client-ready candidate card — you tweak the tone, not the formatting |
| Format the shortlist deck | Generated on-brand and AI-invisible — you review, you don't build |
| Maintain the pipeline tracker / status spreadsheet | The system is the tracker — every move is logged once and never re-keyed |
| Write the weekly client status update | Drafted from live pipeline state — you read it and send it |
| Draft engagement letters, offers, consent & replacement letters | Templated and auto-filled from the record — no blank-page drafting |
| Calculate the fee, installments & admin fee | The fee engine computes it — and re-computes on the actual accepted comp — so the math is never wrong |
| Remember guarantee windows & 24-month off-limits dates | Set automatically at placement; the system watches the clock and flags it before it matters |
Net effect: you stop being a part-time data-entry clerk, copywriter, and paralegal — and spend the day in conversations instead.
Levels 2 & 3 — sharper vs. untouched
Same work, higher quality
- Speed to shortlistResearch and write-ups were the bottleneck — collapsing them is what makes a 14–21 day shortlist real.
- ConsistencyEvery card, update, and document reads professional — no "tired on Friday" variance.
- Pre-call prepA briefing is assembled before every candidate and client call — you're never cold.
- Fewer costly mistakesFee math, the no-work-before-signed gate, guarantee dates — enforced, not remembered.
- More searches at onceThe admin tax per search drops, so your ceiling rises without hiring.
- A compounding databaseSearch #10 reuses the work of #1–9 instead of starting blank.
What the AI never touches
- The client relationshipTaking the brief and reading what the buyer actually needs vs. the job description.
- The candidate conversationsScreening, reading a person, building trust.
- Judgment on fitThe system scores it; you decide who's real and who gets submitted.
- The closeOffer, counter-offer — the human stuff that makes or breaks the placement.
- Advising the clientMarket read, comp guidance, when a candidate is worth stretching for.
- Name, network & reputationThe AI is invisible — the client experiences you.
The line is simple: AI is your associate and your back office. It is not your face, and it is not your judgment.
Inside one search, candidate by candidate.
Drilling into a single search gives you the ranked shortlist with the reasoning behind each score, the client-ready candidate card you actually send the buyer, the pipeline funnel, and the billing tied to this engagement. This is what turns "I have some people" into a defensible, fee-worthy shortlist.
Note: the candidate card is the client-facing artifact — polished, persuasive, and with the AI engine completely invisible.
The money rules, built into the system.
These aren't on a sticky note — they're enforced in code, so the fee, the installments, the guarantee, and the off-limits clocks are always right. Here's the structure the ATS runs on.
| Fee ladder | Basis | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Open at 30% | Cash comp | Where we start every retained engagement |
| Fall back 25% | Cash comp | Negotiation room without leaving money on the table |
| Floor 25% | Base salary | Final fallback basis |
| + $2,500 | Admin fee | Cheeky, waivable |
| $5,000 | Minimum | Hard floor on any retained search |
Cash comp = base + target bonus + guaranteed sign-on. Excludes equity, benefits, and discretionary pay.
1/3 · 1/3 · 1/3
Signing → qualified shortlist (~day 45) → offer accepted. Cancel after we've started? ~two-thirds is owed — never a cash refund.
6 months · 12 for C-suite
If a placement doesn't stick, we re-run it. Excludes layoffs, restructures, role eliminations, and budget cuts — things outside the candidate's control.
Only with 90-day exclusivity
We'll work contingent, but only with a signed 90-day exclusive — code-enforced. No racing five other firms to the bottom.
24-month no-solicit
We never poach a candidate we placed — the clock is set automatically at placement and protects the client we just served.
The final fee recomputes on the actual accepted compensation at placement — never the estimate. If the package lands higher than quoted, the fee follows it. The system trues this up automatically.
The back office, fully transparent.
You don't need to touch any of this — but here it is, so you can see the whole operation. Billing, system health, the AI engine itself, what's automated today versus what we'll turn on as volume justifies it, and the guarantee clock running in the background.
Reading it: invoices by installment · single-writer health · the AI engine on $0 marginal spend · live-vs-deferred automation · guarantee watch.
What the system does today
Search + candidate pipeline with the hard gate · fee engine, invoices & guarantee clocks · dossiers, fit-scoring & candidate cards · bulk import & pre-call briefs · Excel + dashboard export.
Claude Code · $0 marginal · invisible
Operating model is Claude-as-operator, billed on a flat subscription, with zero AI footprint in anything a client ever sees. The leverage is real; the fingerprints are not.
What’s live now — and what’s next.
We start with what we already pay for. LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Apollo, and the email stack are in hand — so sourcing, outreach, and nurture go live from the first search, not "someday." Only billing-send and CRM-sync wait for real placement volume. Nothing new runs until a search justifies it.
| Phase | Capability | Turns on when | Net new $/mo | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Phase 1 · Live now | LinkedIn Sales Nav sourcing · Apollo enrichment · bulk import · pre-call briefs · niche lead-gen ponds · candidate outreach · nurture/drip | From the first live search | ~$150–200 | starting live |
| Phase 2 · Scale | Stripe invoice send · e-sign · HubSpot sync · reporting cron · reverse-shopping | First placements / repeat clients | Mostly $0* | next |
*Already in the stack at $0 marginal. Net-new at Phase 1 is ~$150–200/mo (Sales Navigator + Apollo). We only re-evaluate a commercial ATS above ~30 concurrent searches.
The gap most firms have
Keeping candidate and client pools warm automatically is something many desks never build. We own it as a Phase-1 capability, live now — top-of-mind without the manual grind.
Discreet, never a blast
Senior-passive outreach stays low-volume, personalized, and human-gated — threaded, never auto-replied. Reaching an exec should feel like a 1:1, not a campaign.
Lead with a standout exec
When we have a genuinely exceptional candidate, we shop them to target companies — the highest-open-rate door into a new client.
Staying top-of-mind, automatically.
Most desks let candidate and client pools go cold between searches. Ours doesn't. The system keeps every relationship warm with personalized touches it drafts itself — but nothing sends until a human approves it, and any reply hands the conversation straight back to you. Here's the loop.
Segment
Everyone we've touched sits in the database, tagged by lane, relationship, and status — passive candidates, lost finalists, dormant clients.
Trigger
A signal enrolls them: a finish on a search, a placement anniversary, a dormant buyer, or a new role that fits a silver-medalist.
Personalize
The engine drafts each touch from that person's record and full history — a real 1:1 note, never a template blast.
You approve
The draft posts to Slack. You tap approve, edit, or skip. Nothing reaches a candidate or client unreviewed.
Send & thread
It goes out low-volume and threaded, in your voice — the AI stays invisible. It reads like you wrote it, because you signed off on it.
Listen & loop
A reply stops the sequence and routes to you. No reply — the next touch is queued, then they return to the warm pool.
The guardrail that matters: every touch is drafted by the system, approved by a human, and sent as you. A reply always ends the automation and hands you a live conversation.
The stack behind it
All of it is already in the toolstack — no new platform to buy.
Cadence by track
| Who | Rhythm | It stops when |
|---|---|---|
| Passive candidate | Day 0 reconnect → Day 6 → Day 16 → Day 30, then a light quarterly value touch | They reply, or opt out |
| Lost finalist / silver medalist | Re-engage at ~30 & 90 days, and the moment a fitting role opens | They reply, or get placed elsewhere |
| Dormant client / past buyer | Monthly value note · quarterly check-in · placement-anniversary note | They re-engage or book a call |
Cadence and volume are deliberately restrained — reaching a senior exec should feel like a personal note, not a marketing sequence.
What I'd love your eyes on.
You're the craft — this system exists to make your judgment go further, not replace it. Walk the tabs and tell me where it matches how you actually run a search, and where it doesn't.
A few questions to bring back
No prep needed — just react to what you saw.