Best Headhunters for Product Managers: From PM to CPO

Product leadership is the most cross-functional role in technology. A great product leader must simultaneously be a technologist, a designer, a business strategist, a customer advocate, and a team leader. This breadth makes product executive search uniquely challenging. The best product headhunters evaluate on dimensions that generic recruiters miss: - Product sense: Can they identify what to build and, more importantly, what NOT to build? - Data literacy: Do they make decisions based on metrics, experiments, and user research? - Technical fluency: Can they have meaningful conversations with engineers about feasibility and architecture? - Design sensibility: Do they understand and advocate for user experience? - Business acumen: Can they connect product decisions to revenue, retention, and market positioning? - Leadership: Can they inspire product teams, resolve conflicts, and create a culture of customer obsession? Generic recruiters tend to over-index on one dimension (usually business or technical) and under-evaluate the others.

Product executive search requires a headhunter who understands the product management career ladder and how skills evolve at each level: PM to Senior PM: Individual contributor excellence. Execution, feature delivery, stakeholder management. Group PM to Director: Multi-team coordination. Strategy development, roadmap ownership, hiring. VP Product: Organizational leadership. Vision setting, portfolio management, executive influence. CPO: C-suite strategy. Board-level communication, company-wide product vision, P&L ownership. Your headhunter should match the level of hire to your needs. A brilliant VP Product may struggle as CPO if they haven't developed board communication skills. A great GPM may not be ready for VP if they haven't managed other PMs. Ask your headhunter: How do you evaluate product sense? If the answer is "I look at their track record," push deeper. The best product headhunters use case study exercises, product critique sessions, and structured references from engineers, designers, and business stakeholders who've worked with the candidate. HireHunter's product practice connects you with headhunters who are former product leaders. They evaluate candidates the way a CPO evaluates their team - through the lens of impact, judgment, and leadership.