The hunting of the executives
Telegraph
"Now here," said the Red Queen, "it takes all the running you can do to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else you must learn to run at least twice as fast."
Welcome to a topsy-turvy world where everyone speaks in riddles and does extremely odd things. Actually, this wonderland is not Alice's but her fantastical adventures are the closest thing to the mysterious goings-on at City headhunters. Why else would Saxton Bampfylde Hever have hijacked Lewis Carroll's creation to try to explain whatever it is that it does.
The firm has just published Picking Winners in a Race with no Finishing Post, a booklet on searching for senior executives. The March hare's tea party and the garden of talking flowers might seem an odd place to look for them but, hey, non-executive directors (NEDS) are becoming ever harder to find. Who knows where they might turn up?
"The Alice books' curious combination of logic and absurdity seemed strangely appropriate," muses chief executive Stephen Bampfylde (please don't call him a Cheshire cat). So, the risk of falling behind in this rapidly globalising world is communicated through the Red Queen's observations on exercise and the whiting's instruction to the snail to walk a little faster because: "There's a porpoise close behind us and he's treading on my tail." Now that's not a nice thing to call the corporate governance police.
Saxton's little book also features the Unicorn's advice: "Well, now that we have seen each other, if you believe in me I'll believe in you." That might help NEDS at board meetings.
Then there is Alice's comment to the hookah-smoking Caterpillar: "I can't explain myself because I'm not myself you see. I know who I was when I got up this morning but I think I must have changed several times since then." So that's the best way to deal with the Financial Services Authority.
Saxton is clearly on to something here. Worried about setting an age limit for a board director? As long as he can balance an eel on the end of his nose, his eye is as steady as ever and he is awfully clever. There's no mention of what to do when you fall down a rabbit hole, change size unexpectedly, or encounter a mad hatter.
However, the verdict on what happens to people who don't perform well on the battlefield is as apposite as ever. Off with their NEDS.
So to Saxton's reception at the Victoria and Albert Museum. "We could have thrown a tea party," says Bampfylde, "but we thought you might prefer champagne and canapés - it's worked so well in the past."
I can't spot any lachrymose mock turtles but there's Friends Provident deputy chairman Lady Judge, who I suppose could preside if anyone makes off with the Queen's tarts. And Alastair Eperon, the former Boots corporate affairs director who now runs his own reputation management consultancy, might be needed to help the Knave of Hearts, who is accused of such unspeakable act on the party's napkins.
But all too soon, the champagne runs out and everyone has to go home. It seems abrupt but then I remember the conclusion to Saxton's little handbook. "The Dodo suddenly called out: 'The race is over,'" it quotes. Now that's no way to refer to one of the City's top headhunters.
