Beyond the direct competitor set

A familiar industry background can reduce uncertainty. A candidate knows the language, the market structure and some of the operating constraints. That familiarity has value when the mandate depends on specific regulation, customer relationships or technical systems. Yet it is possible to overvalue resemblance. A leader may have held the right title in a competitor while never having faced the strategic problem at the heart of the new role.

The more useful question is not simply “Where do our competitors hire?” It is “In which environments have leaders solved the kind of problem we need solved?” That question can produce a more diverse and more relevant search universe, provided the transfer is tested carefully.

Separate context from capability

Every mandate contains elements that transfer and elements that do not. Scaling a distributed team, integrating an acquisition, shifting a business model or building a control function may have parallels in other sectors. Deep familiarity with a particular regulatory regime, customer ecosystem or production technology may be harder to substitute.

The search team should make that distinction explicit. Which experiences must be present on day one? Which can be learned with support? Which are actually proxies for judgement, resilience or the ability to lead through ambiguity? A precise answer permits thoughtful adjacency; a vague answer produces a long list of interesting but unqualified names.

Build an adjacency hypothesis

An expanded market map should not become an indiscriminate trawl. It should test hypotheses about comparable leadership work. For example, an organisation seeking to improve a complex service operation might look at leaders who have coordinated high-stakes, multi-site delivery in adjacent sectors. A company building a new ecosystem might examine executives who have formed partnerships under similar commercial and governance conditions, even if the end product differs.

For each adjacent pool, define the reason it belongs in the search. Identify what would transfer, what would require learning and what evidence would disprove the hypothesis. This keeps market exploration disciplined. It also gives the client a way to evaluate candidates who do not look like the initial template.

Adjacency can also be found within an industry, not only between industries. A leader from a different business model, ownership structure or stage of growth may offer a more relevant perspective than a counterpart at the nearest competitor. The search map should reflect the conditions in which capability was exercised. “Same sector” is a broad label; it does not tell the client whether the candidate has led through the same kind of strategic tension.

Assess the transfer, not the analogy

Adjacency should change the interview questions. A broad claim such as “this candidate has led transformation” is insufficient. What was the starting condition? Which decisions did the person own? What changed because of those decisions? What resources and constraints shaped the work? Which parts of that experience match this mandate, and which do not?

The candidate should be able to explain both relevance and difference. Someone who treats a new sector as identical to a previous one may be less convincing than someone who identifies the assumptions they would need to test. Intellectual honesty about what will not transfer is itself useful evidence.

The client has a reciprocal obligation. If it invites an adjacent leader into the process, it should evaluate that person against the agreed contribution rather than repeatedly return to a checklist designed for an industry insider. Otherwise the wider search is performative. The value of broadening the universe appears only when the assessment method is prepared to recognise a different but credible path to the outcome.

When direct-sector experience remains essential

There are cases where the competitor set deserves to dominate: a role with immediate regulatory accountability, highly specialised technical risk or relationships that cannot be built within the available time. Even then, direct competitors should be one deliberate pool, not the whole search by default. The client benefits from knowing whether it is choosing sector familiarity because it is truly essential or because it feels safer.

The discipline is to widen the universe while keeping the standard high. Begin with the strategic contribution, create explicit adjacency hypotheses, test them against evidence and show the client the trade-offs. That is how broader search becomes more than a claim of “thinking outside the box.” It becomes a better way to identify leadership the organisation might otherwise never consider.