Personalwirtschaft 2025: Executive Search in a Changing Market

Page Executive was pleased to participate in the Personalwirtschaft 2025 Personnel Consulting Round Table in Frankfurt.

Caroline Gellrich – van Brakel, Head of Page Executive Germany & Austria, joined other prestigious leading experts for a deep dive into the rapidly shifting landscape of recruitment consulting.

Economic Shifts: A Market in Transition

Germany’s economic climate is challenging, with structural pressure on automotive, mechanical engineering, and energy intensive industries. While this creates uncertainty, it also opens opportunities; particularly in succession planning for SMEs and interim leadership.

Candidate volume is high, but so is misalignment, making expert screening and advisory support more valuable than ever. At the same time, select industries such as pharma and legal remain active and competitive in their hiring.

Boards & Leadership: New Expectations

Supervisory and advisory boards – especially in medium sized companies – are undergoing generational change: becoming younger, more diverse, and focused on competencies that matter in disruption. These include transformation experience, digitalisation, and restructuring expertise.

Companies increasingly seek leaders for missions, not just roles. As Caroline highlighted, adaptive specialisation and the ability to quickly learn new skills – particularly around AI – are becoming decisive.

Talent Dynamics: Purpose, Flexibility & Fit

Candidates across generations are becoming more selective. Purpose, flexibility, and cultural alignment matter as much as salary or title.

Hybrid work expectations remain strong, while relocation is declining due to family and lifestyle constraints.

Decision speed is now a competitive advantage: top candidates often engage with multiple offers in parallel.

The Role of AI: Opportunity and Pressure

AI is transforming the search process, from profiling to candidate identification. Yet EU data protection limits create competitive tension with US based research solutions.

AI also introduces risks – fake CVs, deepfakes, inflated profiles – making trust and long term relationships a critical differentiator for established consultancies.

Firms like Baumann Management Consulting already use in house AI to strengthen search and mobility analysis.

Key Takeaways

• Structural challenges are reshaping industries; but creating new leadership needs.
• The candidate market is abundant, but matching quality is more critical than ever.
• Boardrooms are evolving: younger, more diverse, with new competency expectations.
• Leaders must combine empathy, toughness, and a strong digital footprint.
• AI accelerates search yet elevates the value of human judgement and trust.