A candidate listed “ERP implementation experience” on their resume. Clean formatting. Good companies. The right keywords in the right places.
Most recruiters would check the box and move them to the shortlist.
I asked the candidate to walk me through the data migration. How they handled the cutover. What went wrong and how they fixed it.
They couldn't answer. They'd used the ERP system. They hadn't implemented it. Two very different things that look identical on a resume.
I caught that because I've lived it. Before I started Inner Circle Agency, I built my career in finance, accounting, HR leadership, and industrial operations. When I read a resume, I'm comparing what I see on paper to what I know the actual job looks like.
That difference matters more than most hiring managers realize.
What “operator-first” recruiting looks like in practice
When I interview a Controller candidate, I know what month-end close looks like at 2am. I know the difference between someone who can talk about variance analysis in an interview and someone who's actually reconciled the numbers under pressure.
When I evaluate a CFO candidate, I'm listening for whether they drove financial strategy or just reported on it. Those are two completely different skill sets, and both candidates will tell you they “led financial strategy.” The distinction lives in the details of how they talk about the work.
“I've sat across from auditors, built budgets, and managed P&Ls. That changes how I evaluate your candidates.”
This isn't something you learn from a recruiter training program. It comes from doing the work.
I've managed P&Ls. I've built budgets and defended them. I've sat across from auditors. I've worked in industrial operations where a bad hire on the floor costs you real money, not just awkward meetings.
That experience changes how I source, how I interview, and how I present candidates to clients. I give you a shortlist ranked by whether this person can actually do the job, from day one, in your specific environment.
Why this matters most at the Director-to-C-Suite level
Junior hires can be trained. If someone joins as a Staff Accountant and has a gap in their GAAP knowledge, you can close that gap in a few months.
A Director of Finance who doesn't have the right strategic instincts? That's a $240,000 to $850,000 mistake, according to research from SHRM and industry compensation studies. That range includes salary, severance, lost productivity, team disruption, and the cost of running the search again.
At the C-suite level, the impact multiplies. A wrong VP of Finance at a 300-person manufacturer doesn't just cost money. They set the wrong priorities, build the wrong team, and create problems that take a year to unwind after they leave.
Source: SHRM
The stakes at this level demand a recruiter who can evaluate candidates with the same lens the board would use. Someone who understands the function, the business context, and the difference between a resume that looks right and a person who is right.
The gap between generalist recruiters and functional experts
Most recruiting firms staff generalists across their practice areas. A recruiter who filled a marketing VP role last month might be working on a Controller search this month. They learn the terminology. They ask the standard questions. They match the keywords.
What they can't do is catch the details that separate a good candidate from a great one. They can't tell whether a Controller's “ERP implementation experience” means they configured NetSuite for a manufacturing company's inventory modules or simply ran reports in it. They can't evaluate whether a CFO candidate's “M&A experience” means they led the diligence or just built the financial model.
Those distinctions are invisible on a resume. They only become visible in conversation, and only if the person asking the questions knows what to listen for.
Who this is for
If you're a mid-market company (100 to 1,000 employees) hiring at the Director-to-C-Suite level in finance, ERP, or operations, and you've been burned before by a recruiter who didn't understand the role, you're exactly who I built ICA for.
I take on a small number of searches at a time. Every client gets me directly. And I evaluate every candidate through the lens of someone who's actually done the work you're hiring for.
About ICA
I'm April Ben-Sabat, founder of Inner Circle Agency. I built my career in finance, accounting, HR leadership, and industrial operations before starting ICA. ICA recruits for the roles I used to hold. Our team evaluates candidates the way a board would, because that operational experience is baked into how we work.
ICA is boutique by design. We take on a small number of searches at a time so every client gets senior-level attention. We specialize in Director-to-C-Suite placements across finance, ERP, and operations for mid-market companies in the US.
If you're hiring for a role where the wrong person costs you a year of momentum, let's talk.
Frequently asked questions
What does “operator-first” mean in recruiting?
It means the recruiter has hands-on experience in the function they recruit for. At ICA, April built her career in finance, accounting, HR, and industrial operations before founding the firm. That means she evaluates candidates based on real functional knowledge, not just resume keywords.
Why does a recruiter's background matter for executive search?
At the senior level, the difference between a good hire and a bad one lives in the details: how someone talks about their work, what questions they ask, what they skip over. A recruiter with functional experience hears things a generalist doesn't. That's the difference between a shortlist based on keyword matches and one based on real fit.
How do you evaluate candidates differently than a traditional recruiting firm?
I start with the actual work: what does this role look like day-to-day, what are the hard problems, what kind of environment is this person walking into? Then I interview candidates with that context in mind, probing for the specific skills and experience that matter, not just the ones that show up on a resume.