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Executive Search · Managing Directors · Country Managers · Heads of Sales

Executive Search Firm for Europe

JN Recruitment is the boutique executive search firm for machinery, industrial technology and recycling companies. We fill the leadership roles your European revenue depends on — Managing Directors, Country Managers, Heads of Sales and Sales Directors — through confidential retained search, run in the local language of every market.

  • Retained executive search — direct approach, never job adverts
  • 100% industrial B2B — machinery, industrial technology & recycling
  • Leadership mandates from Lisbon to Helsinki, searched in the local language
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Our niches
  • Machinery & plant engineering
  • Industrial technology
  • Recycling & environmental technology
2–4 weeks

to your first shortlist — even on confidential leadership mandates

2 levels

of leadership — from Managing Director to Head of Sales and Country Manager

17+ markets

with dedicated market expertise, from Germany to Greece

3 offices

in Germany, Poland and Cyprus — searches run in the local language

Executive search agency

A boutique executive search agency for industrial leadership

Executive search is not just CEO succession. The mandates that decide whether your European business grows sit on the first and second leadership level: the Managing Director of your German subsidiary, the Country Manager who opens France, the Head of Sales who turns a group of field reps into a pipeline machine. These people are employed, discreet and courted — they do not read job adverts, and they do not talk to agencies they have never heard of.

As a boutique executive search agency focused entirely on machinery, industrial technology and recycling, we start every mandate with a network that already exists: the Managing Directors, Country Managers and Sales Directors of your niche, across Europe. We approach them directly and confidentially, consultant to executive, with a concrete mandate — in German for Germany, in French for France, in Polish for Poland. Every shortlist comes with verified P&L and capital-equipment track records, referenced inside the industry.

The model is retained: you engage us exclusively, we commit to a result — the standard for leadership roles, and the reason serious candidates engage with us at all (our glossary explains retained vs. contingency in detail). And when a mandate spans several markets at once, the same team runs it as one search — see how we work as a European recruitment agency.

Positions we fill

Leadership positions we recruit across Europe

From the Managing Director of a European subsidiary to the Head of Sales of a single market — these are the executive and commercial leadership roles our executive search firm fills, each referenced inside the industry.

Managing Director / General Manager

Runs a country subsidiary or European entity end to end: P&L, team, customers and the parent-company relationship. The most consequential — and most confidential — search a manufacturer commissions.

Country Manager

Your first leadership hire in a new market: opens the country, wins the reference customers, builds the local organisation — often the bridge from export sales to a real subsidiary.

Head of Sales / Sales Director

Leads a national sales organisation: succession for a long-serving sales leader, key-account structure, pricing power and pipeline discipline. The classic second-level executive search mandate.

Head of Sales Europe / VP Sales

Multi-country commercial leadership — DACH, Nordics, EMEA or all of Europe: aligns country teams, distributors and OEM channels into one number the board can trust.

Business Unit / Division Director

Owns a product line or division across markets: strategy, engineering interface and commercial results for one part of the portfolio — a search that needs deep niche knowledge, not a database.

Head of Service & After-Sales

Leads the installed-base business — service contracts, spare parts, retrofits: the margin engine of every machinery company, and a leadership market with chronically scarce talent.

Our industries

Three industries. One specialisation: technical sales.

We recruit exclusively for technical sales and leadership roles in three industries — and know their products, players and career paths in detail.

Row of industrial press machines on a factory floor

Machinery & plant engineering

Presses, machining centres, complete production lines: we find the people who sell, install and service capital equipment across Europe.

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Close-up of a CNC milling machine spindle over a steel workpiece

Industrial technology

Automation, drive technology, HVAC, air and water treatment — technical products need sales hunters who speak the language of engineers.

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Claw crane handling scrap metal in a recycling facility

Recycling & environmental technology

Shredders, granulators, sorting and treatment plants: machinery that turns waste into raw material — a market whose key players we know.

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100+ companies expanded successfully with our placements

How executive search works

Hiring leadership in Europe: what employers should know

Executive mandates follow different rules from staff-level recruiting — in confidentiality, in notice periods, in how candidates decide. The essentials we brief every client on before a leadership search starts:

~90%

Of executives are passive candidates

Sitting Managing Directors and Sales Directors do not browse job boards — they respond to a credible, confidential approach from someone who knows their industry. That is why executive search is direct search: identify, approach, convince. Adverts select for whoever is looking; search selects for whoever is best.

3–12

Months of notice at leadership level

Senior executives across Europe sit on notice periods from three months to a full year — German Geschäftsführer contracts often run to twelve. Leadership searches therefore start earlier than most companies expect, and we keep signed candidates committed through the whole transition.

NDA

Confidential succession is the norm

Many executive mandates replace an incumbent who has not been told, or prepare a succession the market must not learn about. We run these searches without naming your company until shortlist stage — candidate conversations happen under NDA, references are taken without triggering rumours.

Retained

How serious leadership searches are engaged

Executive search is retained: an exclusive mandate with a structured process and commitment on both sides — not a CV race between five agencies. Retained is what makes discretion, systematic market coverage and honest candidate counsel possible; contingency recruiting selects for speed, not for the best executive.

Salary benchmarks

Executive compensation in Europe: Country Manager benchmarks

What does industrial leadership cost in Europe? Annual gross benchmarks for a Country Manager in machinery, industrial technology and recycling — full per-role tables on each market page:

Market — Country Manager Base salary OTE (on-target earnings)
Germany €120,000 – 150,000 €150,000 – 200,000
United Kingdom £90,000 – 120,000 £120,000 – 165,000
France €100,000 – 130,000 €130,000 – 175,000
Netherlands €100,000 – 130,000 €130,000 – 175,000
Italy €100,000 – 130,000 €130,000 – 170,000
Spain €90,000 – 120,000 €120,000 – 160,000
Poland PLN 360,000 – 480,000 PLN 480,000 – 650,000

Source: JN Recruitment placement and interview data, industrial B2B. Managing Director packages typically run 25–50% above Country Manager level in the same market; capital regions price 10–15% above the national range.

Executive search Q&A

Executive search: frequently asked questions

Book a 30-min intro call

We are a boutique executive search firm for industrial companies: we fill leadership roles — Managing Director, General Manager, Country Manager, Head of Sales, Sales Director, VP Sales, Business Unit Director — for machinery, industrial technology and recycling businesses across Europe. Every mandate is a retained direct search: systematic market mapping, confidential approach of proven executives, structured interviews and industry references in the local language, and support through offer, resignation and notice period until the executive actually starts.

No — that is a common misconception. Executive search covers the first and second leadership level: alongside Managing Directors and CEOs of subsidiaries, the classic mandates are Heads of Sales, Sales Directors, Country Managers and Business Unit leaders — positions with P&L or revenue responsibility that cannot be filled through job adverts. In industrial companies, a Head of Sales search is executive search in every respect: confidential, direct, reference-checked at leadership level.

Exclusively industrial B2B: machinery and plant engineering, packaging and processing technology, automation and industrial technology, industrial components, and recycling and environmental technology. This focus is the point — we know the Managing Directors, Sales Directors and rising Country Managers of these niches across Europe before your briefing call, and we can judge a capital-equipment P&L track record instead of matching keywords.

Method and level. A recruitment agency typically works contingency — paid on success, often competing with other agencies, strongest for specialist and staff-level roles. Executive search is retained and exclusive: a systematic, confidential direct search for leadership positions, with a committed process instead of a CV race. We run both models — executive search for leadership roles, and specialised sales recruitment for the team beneath them — so you have one partner for the whole commercial organisation.

The large global search firms are excellent at board level and cover every function — but your Head of Sales for granulation technology is not their sweet spot. A boutique with total industry focus starts the search inside your niche: we already know the candidates, their employers, their numbers and their reputations. You work directly with the consultant who owns your mandate — not with a partner who sells and a researcher you never meet — at fees well below big-firm level.

In five stages: a deep briefing on role, context and success profile; systematic mapping of every relevant company and executive in the target market; confidential direct approach and structured interviews; a shortlist of three to five referenced candidates with our written assessment; and support through offer, contract, resignation and notice period. You receive fixed progress reporting throughout — and a first shortlist typically within two to four weeks.

Yes — a large share of executive mandates are confidential: replacing an incumbent who has not yet been informed, preparing a succession, or entering a market before competitors should know. We approach candidates without naming you, work under NDA, and reveal your identity only to shortlisted, seriously interested executives at the agreed stage. Discretion is one of the core reasons leadership searches are retained.

All European markets, with dedicated market pages and salary benchmarks being rolled out per country — Germany is live, further markets follow. Searches are run from our offices in Germany, Poland and Cyprus by consultants working in the language of the target market. For mandates spanning several countries at once — a Managing Director Europe plus the first Country Managers beneath them — one briefing covers the whole search.

A first shortlist typically lands within 2–4 weeks, and most leadership mandates are signed within 6–12 weeks. The variable is the start date: executive notice periods run three to twelve months depending on market and contract. That is why succession planning should start earlier than feels necessary — and why we keep signed executives engaged and counter-offer-proof until day one.

Retained executive search is priced as a percentage of the placed executive’s total annual compensation, typically structured in stages across the mandate rather than purely on success. As a boutique we sit well below the fee levels of the large global firms — and we never charge candidates. We put the exact model, including what happens if a placement does not work out, openly on the table at the briefing.

Across Europe

One executive search practice, every European market

The same retained leadership search opens every market on the continent — pick the country you are hiring in.

Building the sales team below the leader?

Fill your key sales roles across Europe — now.

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Jonas Strambach – Director & Senior Recruiter, JN Recruitment
Our mission is simple: placements that open new markets.
Jonas Strambach Director & Senior Recruiter, JN Recruitment
Jonas Strambach – Director & Senior Recruiter, JN Recruitment

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