Cardiac device market entrant required progressive regional MD

A medical device firm focused on cardiac-related technology was entering the region and required someone with strong language skills, management skills, and KOL network, to effectively deal with a somewhat provincial group of distributors and build out the regional operation.

The client seriously underestimated what it would cost to get what they needed.

In addition, there was a very limited pool of strategic thinkers fitting the requested specification.

Other issues included that the client had not yet established a business entity, their technology was brand new to the market, and they were a startup in a conservative industry. Eliciting interest from candidates would be very challenging.

We knew that we would need to double the long list to ensure our pool was big enough to produce the caliber of candidates expected by the client.

We designated a research team of 4 people to canvas the market targeting about 50 companies with related technology. We identified prospective candidates who either currently worked with these companies or worked for them in the past.

With the initial budget, the first phase of the search was focused on demonstrating to the client the standard quality level of candidates in the desired price range. Expectedly, the client rejected all preliminary candidates.

We regrouped with the client and recalibrated the salary required to get the job done. We then mapped the market looking for more senior prospects from large MNC medical device companies specializing in cardiac products. In all we identified over 600 prospective candidates through the course of mapping the market, and spoke to 260 of them directly.

Qualified candidates were relatively few. One especially qualified candidate was very reluctant to consider the opportunity. We sparked his interest by focusing on his potential to make significant impact within the company due to the importance of the role. More importantly, we focused on the societal benefit of the product, an approach that resonated strongly with the candidate.

He became the client’s preferred candidate, was offered, accepted, and has been highly successful in the role every since.