As the CEO of www.taxconnections.com, and an internationally recognized expert in executive search for tax professionals, I want to alert you to important trends we are observing in our retained executive search services division. Most tax executives we work with generally do not respond to online ads or submit their resumes to resume portals when companies have an open tax role. Tax professionals are generally not comfortable sending their resume into a resume portal to an unknown person only to receive an automated messaging system and never to be heard from again. They value their privacy when it comes to considering other opportunities. This trend places companies at a huge disadvantage when searching for corporate tax expertise for their organizations.

What happened during the last major tax reform legislation under President Reagan is about to happen again…an increase in workload due to new tax law changes! Some of the biggest multinationals are already working behind the scenes to get ahead of these changes by increasing their hiring initiatives. We know this because we are talking to them right now about increasing headcount to their corporate tax teams. It is important to remind you there was very little hiring during the 2001 and 2008 recessions and this has greatly affected the management talent pool currently available. Many corporations are unprepared for the challenges they face in attracting corporate tax professionals with a wide range of tax skills.

There will be serious shortages and some companies will be impacted in ways they never anticipated. What we are experiencing now is a greater number of company needs from a smaller pool of corporate tax professionals available today! Will tax reform affect companies hiring? Yes! In fact, tax reform will create a lot of competition for the very best tax talent available at any given time. Within this competitive environment, retention is a factor as opportunity and compensation will rise for the limited pool of tax executive talent available to meet the current market demand.

Organizations who delay in getting the help they need in their tax organizations will feel the impact of the new tax legislation. Organizations who rely on in-house recruiters who lack the expertise in tax will never get the best talent available in the tax community. Smart tax executives work with smart tax recruiters and I can count one hand the tax recruiters I would trust with my tax career. I am referring to the top of the line tax recruiters out here and the handful of them we know. After this many years in the tax search profession, I have great respect for my competitors because I know how hard they work for clients. I want to applaud the tax search professionals who connect the very best tax executives with tax organizations around the world. We are part of a small group of tax search experts who have built world class tax organizations over thirty years.

We have a proven track record of strong performances for our multinational clients through TaxConnections Executive Search Services division. I can guarantee the clients who retain us will get the very best of the talent pool available in the market because this is precisely what we do and who we are… we are internationally recognized experts in retained search for tax executives. Organizations searching for the best tax experts will do very well working with our retained executive search services division now and far into the future!

If you sincerely want to attract the best talent to your corporate tax organization, work with tax search experts who understand what extraordinary talent really looks like in the tax profession.

Have a question or need help? Contact kat@taxconnections.com