At a Glance

• When a senior seat opens, the reflex is to hire a proven name from a competitor. It feels safe, and it is how the industry has always done it.
• The cost of buying leaders isn’t the search fee. It’s the bench that never forms, the people who leave when they’re passed over, and the institutional memory that walks out with them.
• The bought leader often carries the same playbook to the next firm in three years, and the cycle restarts—each firm training talent for the others.
• Nobody owns the problem, because the person who would build the bench is too busy covering for the fact that no one did.

The Chair That Always Gets Filled From Outside