From the Desk of Hillary

When Khosla Ventures posted "How to Hire" this month, it immediately caught our team's attention. Their framework—particularly around value creation versus value protection—resonates deeply with what we see in executive search every day.

Too many times, we’ve watched companies hire for value creation roles with candidates who have "seen it and done it a million times." But we believe that search isn't about finding a protocol or person—it's about solving a business problem. And when your company is tackling a problem that no one has solved before, hiring the "obvious" candidate with similar experience can actually be more harmful than helpful. Instead of bringing fresh thinking and creative problem-solving to the position, they often arrive with preconceived notions about how things "should" work.

It's exciting to see someone like Khosla articulating this distinction so clearly. More and more founders are getting it: you need very different leadership when you're building something new instead of safeguarding what already exists.

We'll be sharing more specific insights in the coming weeks. For now, I encourage you to read Khosla's piece and consider: Are you hiring for value creation or value protection? The answer should fundamentally shape your search and who you consider.

Hillary Mager

Go to Market:

Ketos · Head of Sales: Dan Erck 

Nabla · Sales: Dane Axelgard

Canopy · Head of CS: Jed Stone

Nourish · Head of Sales, Providers: Craig Thompson

Product/Engineering 

Radar · CTO: Zach Little

Learnlux · Head of Engineering: Dan Corman 

Health Verity · Senior Director of Security: Salman Baset

Health Verity · VP Product: Igor Altman 

Exec, Ops, G&A:

LVT · CPO: Will Clive 

Everclear · VP Ops: Zachary T.

Moniepoint · Head of TA: Nikolai Kabatsikov

AI Squared · President and COO: Darren Kimura

Abby Care · COO: TBA

Headway · Head of Total Rewards: TBA 

See You in 2025!