Prowess Search Partners is a team of tech industry veterans, with decades of search experience, recruiting for some of the most ambitious companies around. 

Nancy Hilpert, Founder & Managing Director

I was lucky to cut my teeth in recruiting at Microsoft where I had the chance to learn from some of the best industry recruiters and hiring managers of the day working to an incredibly high quality standard. I learned how to work with ambiguity as we set out to build brand new product and service areas; I had a chance to introduce the application of competitive intelligence and targeted passive outreach helping to establish Microsoft as a leading competitor for high impact senior talent in the emerging software industry.  And I learned that recruiting is less about heroics and more about teamwork, intelligence, persistence and process.  

Following my passion for innovation, I was able to, early in my career, jump out with a few kindred colleagues to start a search practice focused on early stage startups and new technology initiatives.  We have been working together ever since, helping technology driven companies find key leaders to support their growth, often as an external partner, sometimes as committed in-house team. In the process, we have honed our engine, challenged traditional methods and learned that listening and agility are the keys to success.  Over the course of hundreds of searches, we’ve seen that great recruiting goes beyond finding the qualified slate, and closing a candidate—it’s about making a lasting match, and that requires an understanding of organizational dynamics and interpersonal psychology.  

Prowess Search Partners represents the culmination of our collective career learnings as a recruiting team (agile works best) and the application of psychological principles (personality matters) to executive hiring.  I act as search manager and lead recruiter and am backed by the tremendous operational support of a veteran team of collaborators who bring 20+ years of experience in executive recruiting and talent market research. Together we have  recruited executives for Fortune 100 firms, mid-sized growth companies as well as early stage startups.  While our roots are in Technology  and Product (software, cloud, internet, digital), over years of experience we expanded to support all key leadership functions including Marketing/Communications, Operations, R&D, Analytics, BD/Revenue, Sales, Finance, Legal and People/Talent. Our clients value us for the high quality of our candidate pool, creativity in sourcing, process management and exhaustive research which gives them a clear view of the market.  And our candidates appreciate our professionalism, transparency and the care we take to deeply understand their drives and needs. 

What keeps it interesting for us is a diversity of clients, the challenge of high impact roles, and bringing creativity and grit to accomplish what often seems the impossible (our favorite kind of possible!).  Most of all, we love working with innovative leaders who are challenging traditional industries and services and working to improve life in some way for others. We aspire to partner with ambitious companies who are working to drive positive and sustainable change for their audience, customers, members, users; to be a trusted advisor on matters related to leadership recruiting; and to be a critical resource that can be drawn upon in times of need.