Oldest Executive Search Firm

The executive search business began in the United States in 1926 when Thorndike Deland launched a business that charged a $200 retainer to find expert buyers for New York department stores. However, it was not until after the second world war that executive search gathered speed as part of the rapidly growing management consultancy business. It soon became evident to search consultants at McKinsey and Booz Allen Hamilton that the service might best be provided as a separate business. McKinsy moved out of the executive search business in 1951.

McKinsey left the search sector in 1951. H. Wardwell Howell, head of the McKinsey search practice at that time, left to found Ward Howell, which became one of the biggest global search firms (until 1998 when its American division was acquired and the rest of the company rebranded itself as Signium). Handy Associates also broke away from McKinsey. Booz Allen Hamilton, which maintained its search activities until the late 1970s, groomed many of today’s top search consultants. Among firms launched by its former management consultants are Boyden (1946), Heidrick & Struggles (1953), Spencer Stuart (1956) and Amrop Hever (1967).