From One Urgent Hire to a Built-In Succession Plan for an Agriculture Fund Manager’s Accounting Team

Post by:The Reserves Network

Key Metrics:

  • 1 direct hire placement within 2 months of engagement
  • Candidate sourced directly from a competitor
  • 1 pending placement order for 2026 that we expect to convert

The Challenge

I initially reached out to a company specializing in Agriculture Land Investment Management within the Des Moines metro. They had recently hired a President, and I connected with him a few times over the past year on LinkedIn, building the relationship gradually. Through those touchpoints, I eventually learned they were navigating an upcoming transition tied to the retirement of an Accounting Manager who had been with the organization for over nine years. After finally getting connected with their CFO, I gained deeper insight into their hiring plans — they were looking to backfill the role by bringing on two accountants: one internally sourced hire and one external hire that they engaged us to support. The CFO has deep ties to a competitor firm, which had placed her in her first job years ago. Given the size of their team and their lack of internal HR talent sourcing, we needed to move quickly on this position. They needed someone highly motivated, capable of ramping quickly, and eager to grow into the role to ensure long-term stability within the accounting function.

The Solution

Leveraging our network and consistent communication with the client, we spent several weeks sourcing candidates while quickly identifying that culture fit and long-term potential were the top priorities.

The Result

We ultimately presented a candidate who was highly motivated to step into a new organization and industry, and who aligned well with the team’s values and growth expectations. The client moved quickly, and we successfully filled the role within a couple of weeks.

Shortly after the candidate’s start date, the client shared that their internally hired accountant was not working out, creating an additional need. Because of the trust built throughout the process, they engaged us again to support a second hire. Through ongoing conversations, we continued to refine our understanding of what the team was missing and strategically identified candidates with complementary skill sets and leadership potential.

As a result, we earned the trust to exclusively source a second candidate who, alongside the first hire, gave the organization flexibility and confidence that they would have a set succession plan between the two new hires — one that fit their culture and ultimately strengthened the long-term stability of their accounting team.