From first call to placement

The first call

The first call is with John. Fifteen to 30 minutes, by phone. No slides, no agenda sent in advance, no follow-up sequence if you decide the model isn't right for you. The aim is straightforward: John needs to understand your business and your situation well enough to know whether the search model fits, and you need to understand the model well enough to decide whether you want to take the next step.

What John listens for: the size and stage of the business, who owns it and how long they've been running it, what's happened recently that's prompted the search for a mentor, which part of the business is causing the most pressure right now, and whether the owner has a clear sense of what kind of mentor would help or whether that question is still open. Both situations are workable. The brief-building process handles the second case.

The service is built for owner-managed Melbourne businesses with annual turnover typically between $1 million and $20 million. If the business sits well outside that band, or if what the owner actually needs is a consultant to deliver a project, a coach to build operating habits, or a specialist to handle a crisis, John will say so on the call. There's no value in taking an engagement the model isn't designed for.

Up to three calls are available before the engagement letter is signed, all free of charge. Some owners have a clear brief after one conversation. Others need two calls to get there. After a third call without the engagement moving forward, John will usually ask for a decision before investing more time on either side. The paid work begins when the engagement letter is signed and the deposit has cleared.

The engagement letter and deposit

The engagement letter is a short document between you and Managers & Directors Pty Ltd. It's modelled on the executive search engagement letters John has used throughout his career, adapted for the mentor matching model. We send it by email and you sign it by whatever method suits you.

The letter is specific about what the fee covers and what it doesn't. It covers the search, the brief, and the shortlist. It does not cover any business result you achieve with the mentor. It makes clear that the mentor's advice after the introduction is not supervised by Managers & Directors, that the mentor invoices you directly, and that the mentoring relationship runs between you and the mentor without our involvement once the placement is made.

The fee is paid in two halves. The first half is due on signing and starts the search. The second half is invoiced when the shortlist pack is delivered. Neither half moves without the other trigger: the signed letter and deposit together start the search, and the shortlist presentation triggers the second invoice. Full fee detail is on the Fees page.

The engagement letter also sets out the protections that apply if the engagement doesn't go to plan. The shortlist fallback, the dispute process, and the 10 business day window you have after shortlist presentation to indicate which mentors you want to meet. Senior mentors hold their availability for a reasonable period but not indefinitely. The window keeps the process moving for both sides.

The brief

Once the engagement letter is signed and the deposit has cleared, John writes the brief. It's a written document, typically two to three pages, that translates the pre-engagement conversations into a specification the search can run against. It is the most important document in the process. The quality of the brief determines the quality of the shortlist.

The brief covers the business in plain language, size, sector, ownership structure, how it makes money, what gives it its edge, the situation that's brought the owner to this point, the kind of mentor being sought, and the specific experience that mentor needs to have lived through. It also covers practical constraints: timing, anything the search should avoid, any particular Melbourne context that shapes who would and wouldn't work for this client.

You see the brief before the search starts. John sends it by email and asks you to confirm it, also by email. That confirmation locks the document. From that point, every mentor approached is approached against what's written in it. If something material changes during the search, a new constraint emerges, the problem turns out to be different from how it first presented, John will raise it and the two of you will agree whether it's a refinement or a different engagement. Most changes are refinements.

A brief built carefully at the start makes everything that follows faster and sharper. It's also the document that a dispute would be measured against if one ever arose. Both reasons are enough to take it seriously.

The search

The search runs to a two-week timeline from the day the brief is confirmed. John runs it. There is no research team behind him, no junior consultant doing the initial sourcing, no offshore support. The judgement applied to the brief is John's judgement, and that's what the engagement fee is paying for.

The search starts with the Melbourne mentor pool. The pool is built through John's network and direct referral, not through advertising or public recruitment. The mentors in it are senior Melbourne operators: current and former chief executives, managing directors, chairs, and specialists with the kind of operating depth the brief calls for. Melbourne's pool reflects Melbourne's market, manufacturing, professional services, family business, construction and trades, design and creative, and the mentors in it have run businesses at a scale above what the client is currently managing. That gap in scale is deliberate. A mentor who has only run businesses at your current size doesn't have the perspective the engagement is there to add.

When the pool doesn't have a direct fit, John goes wider. Fresh sourcing draws on his broader network, direct approaches, referrals from existing pool mentors, and where the brief requires it, active search. Every mentor presented is Melbourne-based. Remote mentors are not substituted when a Melbourne brief can't be filled from the local pool. If a brief genuinely can't be filled locally, John says so on the call rather than presenting a remote candidate as an equivalent.

Mentors approached for a brief see a summary first, the sector, the problem area, the indicative session fee, without the client's name or any sensitive detail. If they're interested, they sign a confidentiality agreement. Only then do they see the full brief. The vetting that follows covers their relevant experience, any conflicts of interest, and whether their working style is likely to fit the client's situation. A mentor who passes vetting goes onto the shortlist. One who doesn't is set aside for this brief and may be right for a future one.

You won't hear much from us during the two weeks the search is running. The work is happening. We come back when there's a shortlist worth presenting.

The shortlist and the second 50%

The shortlist is three vetted Melbourne-based mentors as standard, sometimes two for a brief where only a small number of suitable people exist in Melbourne, presented in a written pack sent by email. John walks through the pack with you on a call. Each mentor entry covers what they've actually done rather than a polished CV summary: the businesses they've run, the situations they've navigated, the operating experience that connects to your brief, their working style, and an indicative session fee range the mentor charges for engagements at this level. The pack also carries John's view on which of the three is the strongest fit for your brief and why.

You decide which mentors to meet. One, two, or all three, your call. The engagement fee covers our commitment to make all three available. John arranges the introductions by email and the mentor and client schedule the interview directly from there. The mentors at this level are senior enough to run the conversation themselves. John doesn't usually attend, but he's available if either party would find that useful.

Once the shortlist pack is delivered, you have 10 business days to let us know which mentors you want to meet. Senior mentors hold their availability for a reasonable window; beyond 10 days that window can close. If something on your side has changed and you need more time, tell us and we'll manage it. The 10-day window is a working guideline, not a hard deadline that cuts the search off.

The second half of the engagement fee is invoiced when the shortlist pack is presented. By that point the search is complete: the brief has been written and confirmed, the pool has been searched, mentors have been approached and vetted, and three suitable people have been identified and prepared for introduction. The fee reflects the work done to that point, not the outcome of the placement decision.

The interviews and placement

Interviews happen in the week or two after the shortlist is presented, on a schedule that suits you and the mentor. Most clients meet two or three of the shortlisted mentors. Some meet only the one who looks strongest on paper and decide from that single conversation. Either approach works. The interviews are usually 45 to 60 minutes, in person or by video.

The interview is a fit conversation. You are working out whether you want to spend time with this person regularly over the coming months and years. They are working out the same about you. Bring your real situation, ask about their experience with problems like yours, and pay attention to how they think rather than what conclusions they reach. You're not looking for solutions in the interview. You're looking for someone whose thinking you'd value in the room.

When you've decided, you tell John. He confirms with the mentor and makes the formal introduction. The mentor sends their own engagement letter, we provide a standard template as a courtesy if they don't have one, and you agree session terms, frequency, and fees directly with them. That letter is between you and the mentor. Managers & Directors doesn't sign it, supervise it, or hold a copy.

At placement, our search work is finished. John steps back from the mentoring relationship. He doesn't sit in on sessions, doesn't receive updates from the mentor, and takes nothing from the session fees. There's a light check-in shortly after the engagement gets underway, covered in the next section, and an ongoing availability for future searches. Beyond that, the mentoring is yours to run.

The early-stage fit check-in and the shortlist fallback

A few weeks after the engagement starts, John will check in. A brief call or an email, depending on what suits. The question is open: how is it going. It's a fit conversation, not a performance review. John isn't in a position to assess whether the mentor's advice is sound, that's between the mentor and the client, but he can hear whether the relationship is one you want to keep building.

If the fit isn't there, the shortlist fallback is what happens next. Within the first three sessions of the engagement, you can move to a different mentor from the original shortlist at no additional fee. John approaches the new mentor, makes the introduction, and steps back again. The original mentor is told plainly that the fit wasn't right for this engagement. They remain in the pool for future briefs. There's no difficult conversation for the client to manage and no financial penalty for using the fallback.

The fallback covers the original shortlist. If the conclusion after working through the shortlist is that none of the three is the right fit, that's a different situation. A fresh search is treated as a new engagement and the engagement letter covers how that's handled, including John's discretion where the quality of the original shortlist is genuinely in question. In practice, the vetting process catches most fit problems before a mentor reaches the shortlist. The fallback is there for the cases that get through.

When the engagement is going well, the check-in is short and John leaves you to it. A mentoring relationship that's working doesn't need oversight from us.

After the placement

The mentoring relationship belongs to you and the mentor. Most run longer than the initial period because the value is real and the relationship has developed. Some go for a year, some for several. The cadence and the agenda are set between you. Managers & Directors isn't part of that conversation and doesn't need to be.

If your situation changes and you need a different kind of mentor, a different problem, a different stage of the business, a second mentor running alongside the first, you can come back and run a fresh search. The brief and shortlist process starts from the beginning, because each search is built around what's actually needed at the time.

After a successful placement, an optional ongoing arrangement may be available to clients who want priority access for future searches. John raises it if it's relevant. He won't if it isn't.