Welcome to part II of the Executive Compensation Series!
In this series, we bring together three highly respected experts, each offering a distinct perspective:
Part I: Scott Calderwood shares the executive recruiter’s perspective, including how compensation discussions unfold during retained search and the mistakes candidates often make.
Part II: Ezra Singer explains how executives can negotiate offers, severance, and employment agreements while preserving important relationships.
Part III: Mary Russell demystifies stock options, equity, and the legal and tax implications of startup and private company offers.
Together, these conversations provide a practical and unusually transparent look at one of the most important—and frequently misunderstood—aspects of executive career transitions.
Transcript
Maureen: Welcome back to the Get Hired Up! Podcast. This series was inspired by the questions our clients ask every day. If there is a compensation, governance, or executive career topic you would like us to address in a future episode, we invite you to contact our producer, Maddison Shears, at Maddison@WestgateBranding.com. We read every submission and use your questions to shape future conversations.
I’m your host, Maureen Farmer, CEO of Westgate Executive Branding and Career Consulting.
Maddie: And I’m Maddie Shears, the podcast producer.
Maureen: Over the years, one of the most common questions our clients ask is, “How should I negotiate executive compensation?” Whether they are pursuing a public company role, joining a private equity-backed business, or considering a venture-backed startup, executives want to understand how to protect and maximize their compensation while maintaining strong relationships with recruiters, boards, and hiring leaders.
Maddie: To answer these questions, we are delighted to present a special three-part series on executive compensation. If you haven’t yet listened to part one of this Executive Compensation Series, Recruiter Insights on Compensation Negotiation with Scott Calderwood, we’ll leave a link to that episode in the show notes. This week for part two of the Executive Compensation Series, Compensation Strategies for Senior Leaders, we will speak with Ezra Singer, who will share his insights on structuring executive offers, negotiating severance, and maximizing compensation while preserving important relationships.
Maureen: And in our third and final episode, Mary Russell will guide us through one of the most misunderstood aspects of executive compensation: equity, stock options, and the legal and tax implications of startup and private company offers.
Maddie: We are very pleased to bring this series to our audience because it addresses some of the most important and frequently misunderstood aspects of executive career transitions. Now, let’s hear from Ezra and our host, Maureen Farmer.
Maureen: Ezra Singer is the CEO of Ezra Singer and Associates, a boutique executive advisory firm specializing in helping leaders maximize compensation while navigating career transitions with strategic insight and integrity. With a background as a senior HR executive, CHRO at Verizon, SVP of HR at Limited Brands, Ezra combines deep corporate experience working with boards and C -suite executives with a nuanced understanding of executive markets, equity, and negotiations strategies. He is recognized for guiding executives through the often stressful personal negotiations with a unique understanding of complex compensation structures, ensuring offers reflect true market value while maintaining positive professional relationships. That’s so important. Ezra, welcome to the Get Hired Up podcast.
Ezra: Well, thank you, Maureen. Happy to be here.
Maureen: So this is exciting. We are putting together a series on executive compensation. And Ezra, you are our first guest, and we’re just so happy and delighted to have you. When we think about offer construction these days in 2025, 2026, what would you say are the most common types of offers you’re seeing in terms of base, bonus, LTI, that type of thing? And are there any businesses contexts that change those offers?
Ezra: Sure. Well, the higher up you are in organization, the greater percentage of your compensation will be performance -based. Base salaries at the highest level may constitute 20 or 30 % of your overall compensation. You’ll have the base, you have your target bonus, and then you’ll have different forms of equity. If you’re in a public company, it’s publicly traded stock. If you’re in a private company, it’s often phantom stock or phantom different types of equity. Depending on the company you’re going to, If it’s a growth company, you’re going to be looking more at options. If it’s a stable company, it might be more RSUs, restricted stock units, or performance units. And what I’m seeing more is companies are looking to do performance units. Restricted stocks really focus on retention. You stay there, you get the money. Performance is you have to stay there and hit certain goals.
Maureen: So in terms of LTI, long -term incentives, how do they correlate to restricted stock units? Are they similar in terms of how they are vested or how they are delivered to the executive?
Ezra: Sure. So when you think of LTI, you’re talking long -term incentives, which consist of, it can be stock options, it can be restricted units, it can be performance units, it can be some combination of those. Usually vesting period, well, in public companies, they’re usually granted annually and often as a percentage of base. Again, the higher up you are, the greater percentage of your base it’ll be. In private companies, portfolio companies of private equity firms or startups, usually you’re given a grant, which is a percentage of the company. So it’s very, very different.
Maureen: Right. And so in 2025, 2026, what are you seeing today that’s different than, let’s say, five years ago?
Ezra: More of a focus on performance pay, more of a focus on performance units. And again, these are performance restricted units versus pure restricted units. Greater emphasis on pay for performance. This is a trend that’s been going on for years. I see other differences in terms of severance to or change of control.
Maureen: A lot of our listeners and a lot of the people that I work with will often be working with a recruiter. So going into the conversation with recruiters from the very beginning, what is the best strategy for communicating to the recruiter what the expected salary level is for the client or for the executive?
Ezra: Maureen, that’s a great question. And the advice I give my clients very strongly is to not tell the recruiter what you’re looking to make. That can only hurt you. If you give the recruiter a number, that’s the ceiling and will never go higher. If the recruiter gives you a number, that’s the floor and you have the opportunity to negotiate it upwards. Now keep in mind also the recruiter’s goal is not to help you get as much compensation as possible. That’s my goal. The recruiter’s goal is to fill the job. The recruiter’s not working for you. They’re recruiting for the company. And therefore, again, they want to place the job. Many of my clients work with recruiters. They don’t even tell the recruiters they’re working with me. The recruiter will push you. The recruiter will say, help me. tell me what you’re looking to make, or I need your number to go forward. And that’s all well and good, but the response should be every job out there, Maureen, has a general range. You can tell I’m a bit passionate about this. Every job will have a range. The recruiter is either given a number by the company of what they’re looking to pay, or the recruiter will suggest to the company what they should pay. And so it’s very reasonable to go back to to the recruiter or the hiring manager and say, I’m sure there’s a range for the job. You know the company’s compensation philosophy. If you can tell me the top end of the range, I’ll let you know if it makes sense to go forward
Maureen: That sounds like amazing advice. Not everyone is going to have you on their side. So in terms of a range, is it appropriate for a candidate to introduce expectations around salary with a range versus with a finite number?
Ezra: Neither. When they ask your expectations, have them tell you the range. Don’t tell them the range. Do not tell them a finite number. Get the recruiter to tell you the range. They have a number in mind, Maureen. They always do. People don’t realize that. And I know it’s stressful. But in my career, hiring people, and I’ve been involved in hiring over 200 senior people, or in my practice, the recruiter will not walk away from you if you don’t give them the number. They want to fill the job. If you’re a candidate they’re interested in, they will give you the number. Usually not the top number, but they will give you the number.
I do role -playing with my clients, and I push them hard, asking, well, you got to tell me what you’re looking to make, or I can’t bring your resume forward. Help me. And the response should be, I’m happy to help you. I’m happy to give you a number. Tell me what the range is, and I’ll let you know if that number works.
Maureen: Sometimes that’s not an option, and the recruiter insists. So in that situation, would the candidate a range or a finite number?
Ezra: Again, if you have to choose between the two, if you give a range, they’re going to hear the low end and you’re going to hear the high end. That’s just human nature. If you say the range is X or X plus 20%, they’re going to hear the X, you’re going to think of the X plus 20%. So what I’d say is give a number, give it reasonably higher than you know, you’ll take because they’re going to come back to you. But again, I strongly, strongly recommend don’t give the number.
Maureen: So we have two scenarios here. So one scenario is we get the range from the recruiter. And that’s great, then we can anchor our expectations to that range. But then in the opposite situation, I’m assuming it’s not appropriate to give a finite number, we want to give a range.
Ezra: Sure.
Maureen: So in giving that range, salaries are going to differ depending on where they are in the country. So a CEO in Boise, Idaho is likely going to make less than a CEO in New York, all things being equal. So helping to manage the candidate’s expectations around what the salaries are, how should a candidate do the research around those ranges?
Ezra: Again, I don’t believe Glassdoor or Salary .com are helpful at all. I have access to proprietary data where we can cut the data in terms of a CEO of a $1 billion company in Des Moines, Iowa with revenue, let’s say, of a billion dollars. What would they make and how is the different pay components of base, target bonus, target incentive? So they can have that information.
Maureen: That’s wonderful Ezra and I know this is a matter of timing. So we don’t always have the luxury of working with the client before they’ve been talking to recruiters. And it’s the same with their networks as well. So oftentimes I work with clients after they’ve exhausted all possibilities, you know, they have been in market for 18 months, and they’ve been in transition for that 18 months. They’ve exhausted their relationships with their networks, and they’ve exhausted relationships with recruiters. So that presents a big problem. Then we start looking at other arrangements where we are using the hidden job market to negotiate, to make arrangements to develop that relationship based on trust. So given we’re now in negotiation, the number is X, what types of, in terms of the cadence of negotiation, when and how should the severance be brought up?
Ezra: Sure. So what I advise clients to do, focus on the compensation first. That’s going to be the most important. And as you’re discussing it, say, there are some other things I’m going to want to talk to you about, such as severance, such as whatever benefits, relocation as the case may be. First, let’s get agreement on the annual comp and then I’m sure we can work out the other parts too. And I like that because one, you want to focus on the annual comp and two, when I was doing hiring, I would just hate it when when I think I had a candidate all locked up and ready to sign, and they say, oh, there’s one more thing, and it comes out of the blue. So this way you’re letting them know there’s going to be one more thing, but first you’ve got an agreement on the annual comp.
Maureen: What’s usually the one more thing, Ezra?
Ezra: Severance. Severance will become the most important thing next.
Maureen: Yeah. Well, they want to protect themselves on the downside.
Ezra: Absolutely. Absolutely. I could not agree with you more. And I work with my clients to make sure as they’re getting hired, they negotiate their severance pay. And I have some clients who hesitate and say, well, won’t that make it look like, you know, I’m not able to do my job. Maybe deep down, they were fired from the last job. It’ll make them feel look insecure or that they’re jumping. And the answer is no. The world has changed. And you say to the hiring manager or the recruiter, look, the world has changed. I’m going to do a good job, is what you say. I always do a good job. However, The boss may leave, or her boss may leave, and the replacement could come in, and she might want her own team, and therefore I want to make sure I have protection. And this is your one shot to get the protection.
Maureen: I’ve had so many experiences with candidates when I was working in corporate, as well as my own clients, and friends, and family, in fact, who have been recruited in actively, aggressively recruited into an organization. only to have the reporting manager leave within six months.
Ezra: And that’s what you say. And therefore you’re not coming across as insecure. And The hiring manager will know that. Hiring manager may be looking to leave or may be there, but no, his boss may be leave. So it’s very, very reasonable to say that.
Maureen: So going back to the timing, so you’re suggesting that they negotiate their annual compensation severance and then benefit. So at the CEO level, let’s just say, for example, in a public company, What is typically negotiable and what is typically board -mandated non -negotiable, typically? Or there’s no typical?
Ezra: There’s probably no typical, but usually you can negotiate the amount of pay. You can negotiate sign -on bonuses or make -up bonuses, as the case may be. It’s hard sometimes to negotiate the different components of, is it going to be options or stock. With regard to severance, I’m usually seeing one or two years. For public companies where there’s a change in control, you really can’t negotiate anymore a single trigger that the executive can leave and get all the severance benefits if there’s a change in control. Companies are now looking for a double trigger, change in control and termination. You can usually negotiate what I’ll call a good reason termination, and this is very important whether it’s a public or private company. The way I think of it, Maureen, is there are five ways in which you can leave an organization. You can quit and you shouldn’t get anything, but you want the next company to buy you out. You can be fired for cause and you shouldn’t get anything. There could be an involuntary termination for other than cause, and that’s where severance would kick in. There could be a change in control, which is where you usually get greater severance. And the fifth one is a good reason termination. And a good reason termination is usually they change your job, they change your location, they change the reporting relationship. You’re the CEO reporting to the board, and they restructure and they want the CFO to also report to the board. You’re a CFO reporting to a CEO and they change and put a COO between you. And that’s a material diminution of duties. And generally, you have 30 or 60 days to notify the company that this is a good reason. They have maybe 30 days to rectify it. And if they don’t, it’s a good reason that it becomes an involuntary termination for other than cause.
Maureen: We call that constructive dismissal here in Canada.
Ezra: Exactly. But if you don’t have that language, they can change your job and you don’t want to quit because it’s going to cost you too much money.
Maureen: Yeah, absolutely. So can you tell me a little bit, Ezra, about the difference between private companies compensation and public company compensation?
Ezra: Sure. And there’s a big difference, a giant difference between the two of them. And keep in mind, public companies have disclosure requirements, there’s proxy requirements, there are public boards they’re dealing with. I’ll focus now, and usually let’s talk about equity, they’ll give annual grants. And maybe you can negotiate what the value of the grants will be. Portfolio company of private equity firms, and more and more of my clients I see are going from publicly traded companies to portfolio companies of private equity, they are more willing to give you or more likely to give you a percentage of the company.
So you’re going in as a C -suite executive in a public company, you’ll get a grant each year, maybe a multiple of your base. If you’re going to a portfolio company of a private equity firm, they’re more likely to give you a percentage of the company. Now you need to know what the company is valued in order to know what the value of this grant is. If you’re getting 1 % of a $100 million company, it’s a much lower value than 1 % of a $1 billion company. Usually, they’re mega grants and they’re one -time grants.
You’ll look at the grant and you won’t get another one maybe ever or as a refresher down the road. Also, in the portfolio companies, there’s no liquidity. So you can’t say I’m vested and therefore I want to cash out. You usually have to wait for some exit event. It may be being bought or going public or things like that. So again, this is your chance with the portfolio companies or startups, I know someone else will talk about that, for the pot of gold. When I work with my clients, they see this, this is a chance for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. and it can create generational wealth or not. When you go in, you really want to get an understanding of the value of the company and companies, they don’t have stock, they’re trading. Often, they’ll do something called a 409A valuation or you look at what their latest rounds of funding were or pitch decks are. And you want to make sure you understand their business plan. And you want to say to yourself, OK, usually in these situations, I’ll show you three scenarios. Here’s the value of the grant today. But with you on board, we’re going to double that value. And now it’s 2x. And then we’re going to exit in three to five years at 10x. And that’s all well and good. But you want to look at their business plan. You want to get a sense of that. Say, how likely is it that 10x is a real realistic number, and judging the value of the offer is 2x even realistic, and what are the odds I’m going to be there that long, and what’s going to happen if they terminate me before they have the exit experience?
Maureen: Another topic that comes up a lot, Ezra, in this world is relating to non -competes, non -solicits, confidentiality. What’s your experience advising people on these topics?
Ezra: Start with courts don’t like non -competes. which is a good thing if you’re an executive, and many states have outlawed them. That said, the time of the non -compete should be coterminous with the amount of severance. And it’s very reasonable to say, again, if you’re letting me go, you’re taking me out of the market, you should be paying me for that amount of time. And it’s a very reasonable argument to make. I’ve seen situations where the company will ask the executive to sign a two -year non -compete -compete but only offer one -year severance. And you say this really is imbalanced. I’m happy to sign a two -year non -compete if you’re going to give me two years severance, or lower the non -compete to one year. And sometimes companies will call it garden leave, that they’ll put you on garden leave and pay you, which takes you out of the market also. For non -solicits, you want to make sure there’s language that you’re not going to actively solicit someone who worked for you. If someone calls you, you know, you’ve had a, there’s a CFO that you worked with in the past, and he or she calls you, I say, I know you left, I’d like to go with you. You want to make sure that you’ve got the protection that, you know, say I didn’t call them, they called me. So I’d put in the word, you know, actively in terms of a non -solicit.
Maureen: I had the experience one time with someone who had been actively recruited out of a large organization into another large organization. And three months later, the entire team was terminated. They had all signed. It was an 18 -month non -compete. And it was around the time of COVID. It was, I think, the summer. Oh, horrible. terrible. And this particular person was incredibly integrous. He was not going to compromise his reputation or his relationship with either company by doing anything untoward. So he ended up leaving the industry that he had known very well and going to another tangential or adjacent industry for about 11 or 12 months. And then he still had a non -compete that he had to honor for the following six months. It was a really, really, really difficult time for him and his family.
In that situation, you’ve been recruited. In Canada, I think it’s called enticement, when you entice someone away from an organization. and they’re now in a new organization. There’s a legal protection, but in the US, I don’t think this is the case. How would you advise clients as they are negotiating their packages with new organizations that that won’t happen? I guess that would fall under a severance, wouldn’t it?
Ezra: Well, yes. Usually, as you negotiate your severance and you’ll look at a non -compete, and we talked about that, and then you’ll look at a non -solicit, and the equivalent of enticement will be actively solicit.
The other thing you can do if you’ve had people in your old company who’ve been laid off, and you have a non -solicit, it’s reasonable for the people who’ve been laid off or for you to call the company and say, you know, Mary was laid off. She worked for me before. I’d like to hire her. I want to make sure you don’t have a problem with it. If the company laid her off, they may not care. Right. So it really goes back to relationship building. I think that was your point at the very beginning of our conversation, is that these negotiations that we are engaged with, with recruiters and hiring managers, really are about relationship building. That’s very important. The relationship building is important, but I also say to clients, you know, it’s important to have a good relationship, but the recruiter’s not going to be trying to get you the maximum amount of money. You know, what I work on very closely is, you know, getting people, maximizing their comp while maintaining good relationships. And what I say is if there’s extra money to be had, I’d rather they have it, but if they think it’s going to harm the relationship, it’s not worth it. And you’ve got to figure out where that line is. And also, Maureen, companies at the executive level expect you to negotiate now. There’s situations where they make you an offer. If you don’t negotiate, they’re going to wonder like, well, what’s wrong with this person? Will they be strong enough or aggressive enough to negotiate when we need them to negotiate for us?
Maureen: Oh, I agree wholeheartedly. Absolutely. Because we are being of our candidacy is being evaluated from the moment we walk through the recruiters door, whether it’s an internal recruiter or a third party recruiter, and how we behave will be communicated back to the board. Absolutely. Every move we make, we are being watched and evaluated.
There are a lot of scenarios some scenarios maybe where the executive is not negotiating with a recruiter, they’re actually actively negotiating with the chair of the board, a lead director, a major shareholder. In that situation, how do you see the negotiation process differently? Or is there a difference?
Ezra: Well, again, often the recruiter is just a functionary. No offense to the recruiters out there. And once you’ve got the job, you’re not going to deal with them until your next job, maybe. I mean, you want to build a good relationship, but you’re not going to be dealing with them as much as you will with your hiring manager or the board. And therefore, again, you want to really work on those relationships. And you want to say at one time, you’re a CEO and you’re negotiating your comp with the board. And this could be at any level. And you say, look, you see how I’m negotiating for myself, just imagine how I’m going to be negotiating for the company when we’re on the same side of the table. And boards and CEOs really appreciate when you say that.
Maureen: Often it can be really tricky when there is no third party involved, at least in my experience anyway.
Ezra: It can be trickier, but the two things I can to clients is you want to be confident and you want to be enthusiastic about the position. You’re saying to the CEO or the board, I’m really excited about this role. We’re going to make this work. What I’m hoping we could do is blank, blank, blank. And you’re building the relationship with the person.
Maureen: There is, at least on the corporate side, I recall, you know, oftentimes once the job not the offer, but the job, the candidacy, the recruiting process is transitioning from recruitment into negotiation of an offer. You know, the interview process, now we’re going to make you an offer, and then the negotiation begins. I’ve often seen the candidate become somewhat adversarial in that negotiation process. So you’ve not had that experience?
Ezra: I have not had that experience at all. In situations where you think there’s a chance of it being adversarial, particularly at the highest levels, get lawyers involved and let them argue it out. That’s what lawyers are for. And then you could always blame the lawyer on it being adversarial. But no, again, I really focus on the relationship part and not harming the relationship. And if the client is saying, I want something that I think is unreasonable, I’ll tell them. I think if you do this, what’s the risk of harming the relationship? And as a rule, they’ll say, I think that could be a problem. They don’t do that. I’ve never seen that happen in my practice. When I work with my clients, maybe this is why it hasn’t been adversarial. Hope is a magic word. I mean, some people say, you know, for elections, it’s not a strategy. I was hoping to get to here. And when you say it that way, that’s going to prevent it from being adversarial. I’m really excited. I think I can add tremendous value. I was hoping to get to this. Again, that eliminates the adversarial aspect.
Maureen: Yeah, I agree with that. That’s a magic word in this context. When it comes to the candidate has been in good faith going through the process and is delivered a low ball offer despite a range that was presented, how do you recommend executives respond to a low ball offer?
Ezra: So I’ll ask the candidate, and usually I like framing it numerically, on a scale of one to 10, how much do you want the offer? And if they’re out of work in particular, they’re at a nine or 10. And how much do you think the company wants you? And that’ll give us a sense of how much leverage we have. And it’s not an exact science, but it gives you a sense. You could then go to the recruiter and say, you had told me the range was blank to blank, and this is below that range. Now, I’m really excited about this opportunity, and I’m going to add tremendous value by doing XXX. So, how do we get to the range? And see what the recruiter has to say. If the recruiter says, no, even though we told you the range, we made a mistake, and this is all we’re going to do, then the question becomes, how much do you want the job? And if you want the job, go in and you feel you need the job, you go in enthusiastically and hope you can show value and say to them, well, this is less than I was told, but I’m going to join and hopefully within a year we can revisit this or within six months we can revisit it. And if it’s so much lower, you say, what’s my baseline? And if they’re below that baseline, you may just walk away.
Maureen: In that scenario, Would you recommend negotiating a performance review after three months, after six months, based on performance?
Ezra: A couple of thoughts. Thanks. I left a key one out. Another way we’ve bridged the gap, and this is very important, so the offer comes in lower than you were told, and they say this is the best they can do. Another thing you could say is, well, let’s bridge the gap through a sign -on. And sign -ons are different budget lines in a corporation than annual comp. So you could say, let me have a sign -on, and let’s say the sign -on is a value that will make up two years’ worth of the differential. Sign -ons are critical, and I apologize for not mentioning that first. And then in addition, you could say, and let’s do a compensation review in six months. or a year, whatever. I like six months more, but they may want to say a year. But we bridge the gap many times with sign -ons.
Maureen: No, that’s an excellent point. And you alluded to something that I would love to discuss maybe as we conclude our conversation today, because it is relevant for so many executives today, given the current labor market is around executives who are currently in transition, meaning they’re not currently employed. Do you believe that they have less leverage than someone who is currently employed?
Ezra: Not necessarily. The world has changed so much that hiring either recruiters or hiring managers realize that a lot of good people are out of work through no fault of their own. Years ago, it was if you’re out of work, there was something wrong with you. Now they realize with restructurings, with mergers, et cetera, that good people are out of work. You may feel you don’t have much leverage, but I’ve had clients who’ve been out of work who not only have negotiated significant increases in what they were making before, but also sign -on bonuses to bridge gaps. So again, the mindset may be, I don’t have as much leverage or power, but the reality is you have more than you think.
Maureen: And Ezra, from your experience as a corporate hiring manager and a CHRO, were you ever concerned by hiring someone who was currently in transition or not working? Was that ever a concern for you?
Ezra: You might look at them, you want to find out why they left. And also you look at what their career trajectory is. Are they jumping jobs every two years? Or have they had a reasonable length of service? And then listen to their explanation. And, you know, I left because my company was bought and they had two CFOs and they only needed one. And the acquiring company wanted their person. That’s perfectly reasonable. So I would also do reference checks to see, but that would not be a showstopper to me at all.
Maureen: That’s really good to hear because I hear from people a lot who are very concerned about that topic. And I think it’s just because of a, it’s a perception and let’s face it, it’s not an easy time when you’re in transition, especially when you maybe have dependents that are depending on you, family members, that type of scenario. it can be a very stressful time for people. And I think that will often translate into settling or feeling like they need to settle.
Ezra: I agree with, it’s so stressful. And therefore, again, it doesn’t become adversarial, but to the degree you can, and I work with people. One person called me their compensation therapist, because as you go through this, it’s how you’re going to present it. Again, you said, and I fully agree, hope is a magic word. I’m hoping we could do this. You’ve been successful in past jobs, Maybe you’ve been unsuccessful in some, but people don’t need, you know, you don’t really need to highlight that. And here’s the value that I’m going to bring and present it that way. Again, you want to be confident. You want to be enthusiastic. And the companies will buy that. Companies buy confidence. If they think your confidence has been shattered because you’re out of work, they’ll hesitate. And there’s a saying in a different world, Maureen, fake it till you make it. Fake it till you make it. And you want to be very confident. I was doing a great job, but there was a restructuring. They needed to cut headcount. Whatever it is, sometimes people say they raise their hand or whatever, and then talk about all the good things you did. But I understand it’s hard. I don’t want to minimize this for people. I have a full understanding of how difficult and challenging it may be.
Maureen: But what you’re saying, if I could recap it and restate it for the sake of the listener here, is that from a corporate perspective, given your decades of experience hiring executives and other professionals and organizations, being in transition is not a showstopper for you, but you will likely deepen your due diligence around reference checking and things like that to find out why they left specifically a particular company.
Ezra: Yes, I would add, not just from my experience as a hiring manager for all those years, but in my practice now, I’ve had many clients who come to me and they’re out of work and they’ve been successful. It’s not a showstopper at all.
Maureen: And it’s interesting, identity is so wrapped up in what we do. Oh my goodness, yes. And even when, and I want to talk a little bit about this before we conclude, because it’s often not mentioned, regardless of your financial net worth, identity is so wrapped up in the work that we do. And so when we leave an organization, whether by choice or well, maybe not by choice, because that would be a different scenario, but when it’s not our choice, or when we’ve sold our company, or there’s been an acquisition, a merger, and those types of things, it can have a profound impact on people’s identity and their sense of self -worth when they’re in transition, and they can buy into, and I know you and I talked a little bit about this in our pre -call, and I know this is not an area of expertise for you, but it’s a topic of interest, and it goes back to the concept of of ageism in the workforce. And the way I look at this, Ezra, is that, and I can prove this with evidence, is that when you have a value proposition that is robust, and it’s what the market needs, and you have a solid trajectory, that concept of ageism disappears altogether.
Ezra: I agree. I don’t know if it disappears altogether, but it certainly helps. Rebut that and don’t talk about your many, many years of experience, talk about the results you’ve delivered. And, you know, when I was doing hiring and some people would want these, you know, young Turks right out of school, my view was they’d stay maybe a couple of years, but then they’d want to leave to see if the grass is greener. Whereas people who have had success in their career are more likely to stay with you longer. And keep that institutional knowledge, you know, longer to the benefit of the organization. And again, to the degree people can, is make sure you’re up to date with technology. Understand AI to the degree you can talk of it. Everyone’s talking AI nowadays, but to the degree you can wrap that into either the work you’ve done or different things, that’s going to help you deal with it too, because there might be a perception that the boomers don’t know AI and are afraid of it, and therefore we need someone who can embrace it.
Maureen: I agree with you 100%. I would love to ask you the question, is there any other advice you could give candidates as they are interviewing and negotiating compensation?
Ezra: The first piece of advice is be confident. You may not feel it particularly if you’re out of work, but people buy confidence, so be confident. Secondly, be enthusiastic. Companies want to hire people who want to work for them, so be enthusiastic. It’s okay to let them know that you have other opportunities out there and that will even make you more appealing to them. Third is You don’t have to jump at the initial offer. Again, I talked about don’t tell them what you’re looking to make, but when that offer comes in, Again, you’ll think about it, or it feels low, or we’re in the neighborhood, let’s continue talking so you don’t shut that down. Again, I said hope is a magic word. As you said also, Mary, I’m hoping we can do better. And I guess the fifth one will be hang in there. Hang in there, particularly if you’re out of work. I understand how tough it can be. Maybe you’ve been through this before. Maybe you’ve known people who go through this. Keep on pushing, keep on networking. There’s a hidden job market out there, and good things will eventually happen, even if you don’t feel it at the moment.
Maureen: I love that advice, Ezra. And I do have one last PS to this question. Sure. I’ve heard recently, even at the most senior level, that executives are only being given 24 hours to respond to an initial offer. What’s your advice on that?
Ezra: That’s a red flag to me. Okay. That’s a good. You’re going in, you know, to a significant job and they’re saying you only have 24 hours. What is that telling you about the company and the culture of the company? Now, if you know it works, fine. But if you have questions, say, look, I want to make this work, but I need to understand more and then ask more questions. Don’t take an offer where you don’t understand all the components because then not good things are going to happen afterwards. They say, here’s the offer. It’s X dollars, X bonus, X equity. You have 24 hours and they haven’t mentioned severance. You go back and say the numbers work. However, I want to go over these things, the severance. I’m hoping for this. So to say in summary, if everything on the offer is what you’re willing to accept, that’s fine. But if you have questions or want to understand certain things or things are left out, go back to them and say, I’m really enthusiastic, I need to understand this first. And if a company says, no, I’m not going to explain it to you, that’s a giant red flag.
Maureen: Yeah, that’s a really good point. And one to your point that it generally demonstrates some type of a red flag.
So Ezra, what has surprised you most in your career so far?
Ezra: I guess what surprised me the most is how much I enjoy the transition from being an employment lawyer to being in the HR function. That I think of it is, if you think of concentric circles and the businesses in the center, employing HR supports the business, then employment lawyers support HR. And this got me so much closer to the business with the ability to make decisions that really impacted the success of the business.
Maureen: That’s awesome. That’s an excellent answer. Thank you for that. My last question is we are foodies here over at the podcast, and we’re collecting the names of our guests’ favorite restaurants. Do you have one that you would like to add to our list?
Ezra: There’s a restaurant in St. Pete called Alello, which is in downtown St. Pete. Their branzino is just wonderful. And they also have a lamb bolognese. That’s one of our favorites.
Maureen: Well, that’s wonderful. We will make sure that that your restaurant shows up in the show notes, as well as our annual list, which we distribute to all of our listeners, and our guests who come on to the podcast. So you have a have a pre qualified curated list of restaurants wherever you go in the world.
Ezra: That is great!