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I've worked with a lot of executive recruiters over the years. From the bottom of my heart, Tony Hazen is the best I've ever worked with.
Tony is a Managing Partner in the Houston office of DHR Global, one of the sixth or seventh largest executive search firms in the world. He specializes in placing senior leaders who drive transformation and value creation across industrial sectors and private equity-backed companies. But what makes Tony different isn't his firm's size or his impressive client list — it's how deeply he understands the human side of building a winning team.
When I was CEO of ThinkPower Solutions, Tony was instrumental in assembling what I would call a best-in-class management team. The leaders he helped me recruit — Larry LeBlanc as CFO, Dan Helman, David Chandler, and others — didn't just fill roles. They transformed the company. Revenue grew 57% in the final three years I was there. Working capital efficiency doubled. That kind of performance doesn't happen without the right people in the right seats, and Tony is the person who helped me find them.
This episode is a masterclass in how to build leadership teams that create real, measurable value — whether you're a private equity firm or an entrepreneur scaling your business.
Tony didn't come from a pedigree background. He took a couple of years off after high school, went to the University of Kentucky — a great school, but not Harvard or Yale — and fought his way into executive search about a quarter of the way through his career. In an industry that traditionally attracts people with polished resumes and Ivy League credentials, Tony got in the door on effort and grit.
He describes it as "bloody knuckles." He had to work for everything he got. And that background, rather than being a disadvantage, became his superpower. Because he came up the hard way, he can relate to people from all walks of life — the entrepreneur who built a company from nothing, the blue-collar-turned-executive, the PE partner who's never worked outside of finance. That range of empathy and intuition is what makes him exceptional at reading culture and finding fit.
I relate to this deeply. I grew up in Chennai, India, where many of my schoolmates' parents worked factory jobs. Later I went to a top engineering school. That ability to connect with both the job site and the C-suite is what made ThinkPower successful, and it's what makes Tony successful in his craft.
DHR Global is a retained executive search firm that works across all industries — healthcare, consumer, financial services, and Tony's specialty: industrial services, private equity, oil and gas, and anywhere people wear hard hats doing dangerous things. They focus primarily on C-suite placements, and their Jobplex division handles emerging leaders at the director level and below.
Tony's sweet spot is the middle market — specifically, private equity-backed companies and entrepreneurially founded businesses that are ready to scale. About 90% of his work now comes through private equity firms, not because he prefers working with PE over entrepreneurs, but because PE firms currently own an enormous portion of the middle market. They're the gateway to the founder-led businesses Tony loves helping transform.
This was one of the most important parts of our conversation, and I want every entrepreneur listening to really absorb it.
Entrepreneurs have a unique and genuinely rare skill set. Taking a company from zero to $25 million, $50 million, $100 million in revenue — very few people on earth can do that. But the playbook that gets you there is almost never the playbook that takes you to the next level. k
Tony hears it all the time when he first meets founders: "I've never used a recruiter. What do I need you for? We're doing fine with Ann Ethel running the books." He understands where that comes from — these are people who built something extraordinary with grit and 20 different hats. But there's a wall that almost every entrepreneur hits where they need to professionalize the business, and very few can do that alone.
There are a handful of Mark Zuckerbergs and Elon Musks who can take a company from founding to global dominance. But even they needed a Sheryl Sandberg or a Steve Ballmer. In the industrial middle market — the hard hat world that Tony and I operate in — bringing in professional leadership isn't a sign of weakness. It's the normal, healthy evolution of a growing company, no different than Facebook going public or SpaceX raising venture capital.
Tony's advice to entrepreneurs boils down to this: recognize when you're about to hit a wall. The playbook that built your company to $50 million won't be the same playbook that takes it to $200 million. Be open to professional leadership. And understand that paying $60,000 for a glorified bookkeeper is very different from investing $200,000-$300,000 in a CFO who will transform your financial operations, manage lender relationships, and help market the company for an eventual exit. As Tony puts it, "Title is the cheapest form of compensation there is."
Tony was emphatic about one thing: the relationship between the CEO and the executive search partner is everything. If the key stakeholder isn't engaged — giving time, providing honest feedback, being open about culture and expectations — the search will fail, regardless of how good the recruiter is.
He's reached a point in his career where he won't take a search if the key stakeholder won't be actively involved. And I can tell you from experience that our searches succeeded precisely because of that partnership. When the first slate of candidates wasn't on the mark, I told Tony directly — no blame, just clarity on what I was really looking for. The next slate had four out of five candidates I wanted to interview. That iterative, honest back-and-forth is how great hires happen.
The flip side is equally important: a great search partner has to be willing to push back on the CEO. Tony told me more than once when he thought I had a blind spot, when he'd seen other CEOs make the same mistake. If your recruiter is just an order taker, you're not getting what you're paying for.
The two pillars, as Tony put it: trust and candor. It sounds simple. It's anything but.
This is where Tony's intuitive gifts really shine. Finding candidates with the right skills and experience is table stakes. The difference between a good hire and a transformational one is cultural fit — and that's something no resume can tell you.
Tony's process starts with deeply understanding the CEO: how they think, how they built the business, what they talk about, how they say things. He picks up on subtle cues that signal what the culture actually is, not just what the CEO says it is. Then he matches those qualitative insights with the quantitative requirements of the role.
I'll share a real example. When we were doing our CFO search, we had two excellent finalists. One was a Harvard graduate — the shiny object. The other was Larry LeBlanc, who went to UT Arlington. After extensive discussions with Tony about cultural fit, we chose Larry. It was one of the best decisions I ever made. Larry didn't just run finance; he transformed our financial operations and was a major driver of value creation.
The lesson: don't be blinded by pedigree. The best hire is the one who fits your culture, shares your mission, and has the grit and capability to perform in your specific environment.
Tony identified three mistakes he sees repeatedly, and they're worth committing to memory.
This is the big one. Tony has seen it more times than he'd like to admit: a CEO finds the perfect candidate early in the process but decides to keep looking, just to see what else is out there. Meanwhile, another company comes in, makes the candidate feel wanted, and closes the deal. The original CEO is left wondering what happened. The market is ruthless. Human beings want to feel wanted. If you've found your person, trust your gut and move.
Especially in private equity, the deal teams are so focused on the acquisition itself that they sometimes treat management team upgrades as an afterthought. It's one of the most important things they'll do post-close. The right leader can be the difference between a 6x multiple and a 10x multiple at exit. Arguing over $250,000 in equity when the value creation potential is tens of millions is, to put it bluntly, foolish.
If you want a CFO with multiple successful exits and public company experience, that person commands a premium. The market will pay them what they're worth. You can either be the company that recognizes that reality, or you can be the company that loses every top candidate to the competitor who does.
Tony's breakdown of executive compensation was one of the most practical segments of our conversation.
Base salary keeps people whole — they need to pay their bills and maintain their lifestyle. Nobody's taking a step backward on base.
Bonus drives short-term performance and keeps people engaged quarter to quarter.
But equity is where the magic happens. Equity creates true alignment between the executive and the business. It's what keeps a CFO working late when the team is grinding through a tough quarter. It's what keeps a COO on mission when a competitor calls with a $20,000 raise.
Tony made an important distinction: the best candidates ask for more equity, not more cash. They want ownership because they believe they can create value. That's a signal you want to see. Conversely, if a candidate is only focused on maximizing base and bonus with no interest in equity, that's a red flag. They're not bought into the long-term vision.
One critical nuance: compensation discussions are fundamentally different from deal negotiations. Private equity deal teams sometimes approach executive compensation the same way they approach acquiring a company — press everything down, keep as much as possible on their side. That's a terrible approach for hiring. Compensation is emotional. You're not buying an asset; you're building a relationship. Come to the table in good faith, make the candidate feel valued, and recognize that the marginal cost of paying someone what they're worth is dwarfed by the value they'll create.
And once you've hired them — don't stop paying attention. Markets shift. Competitors call. I always asked my executives one question: "When was the last time you thought about quitting, and why?" The answers were always honest, and they gave me the insight I needed to make adjustments before it was too late. Tony was a great resource here too — I'd call him regularly to check whether the market had moved since our last hire, and he'd give me the data I needed to stay competitive.
Tony sees AI making executive search more efficient — dramatically so. Research that used to take a team of associates an entire weekend can now be done in minutes. Resume analysis, note capture, company intelligence gathering — all accelerated.
But he raised a concern that I think applies far beyond recruiting: if AI eliminates the entry-level roles in an apprenticeship business, where does the next generation of senior practitioners come from? Executive search is a craft that's learned through years of working alongside experienced partners, developing intuition, learning to read people. If there's no one entering the funnel, the pipeline of future Tony Hazens dries up.
It's a tension that every industry built on human judgment and mentorship will have to navigate.
If there's one thread that runs through this entire conversation, it's this: building a great company is ultimately about building a great team, and building a great team requires trust, decisiveness, and the humility to know what you don't know.
Tony Hazen helped me build the management team that transformed ThinkPower Solutions. He did it by investing time to understand me, my culture, and my vision — and then by having the courage to tell me when I was wrong. The leaders he placed are the ones driving the company today, and the value they've created speaks for itself.
For entrepreneurs who think they can do it all: I was you. I thought the same thing. The moment I opened myself up to professional executive search and started building a real leadership team around me, everything changed. The company grew faster, operated more efficiently, and ultimately became far more valuable.
For private equity firms: don't treat talent as an afterthought. It's one of the highest-ROI investments you'll make post-close. Be decisive. Pay people what they're worth. And find a search partner you trust — not an order taker, but a real partner who will push back when you need it.
Tony, thank you for your partnership, your friendship, and for everything you've done for ThinkPower and for every company you've helped build. You were born to do this work, and it shows.
Listen to the full episode on From Boots to Boardroom.
From Boots to Boardroom is presented by KYRO AI — Digitize work and maximize profits.
I've worked with a lot of executive recruiters over the years. From the bottom of my heart, Tony Hazen is the best I've ever worked with.
Tony is a Managing Partner in the Houston office of DHR Global, one of the sixth or seventh largest executive search firms in the world. He specializes in placing senior leaders who drive transformation and value creation across industrial sectors and private equity-backed companies. But what makes Tony different isn't his firm's size or his impressive client list — it's how deeply he understands the human side of building a winning team.
When I was CEO of ThinkPower Solutions, Tony was instrumental in assembling what I would call a best-in-class management team. The leaders he helped me recruit — Larry LeBlanc as CFO, Dan Helman, David Chandler, and others — didn't just fill roles. They transformed the company. Revenue grew 57% in the final three years I was there. Working capital efficiency doubled. That kind of performance doesn't happen without the right people in the right seats, and Tony is the person who helped me find them.
This episode is a masterclass in how to build leadership teams that create real, measurable value — whether you're a private equity firm or an entrepreneur scaling your business.
Tony didn't come from a pedigree background. He took a couple of years off after high school, went to the University of Kentucky — a great school, but not Harvard or Yale — and fought his way into executive search about a quarter of the way through his career. In an industry that traditionally attracts people with polished resumes and Ivy League credentials, Tony got in the door on effort and grit.
He describes it as "bloody knuckles." He had to work for everything he got. And that background, rather than being a disadvantage, became his superpower. Because he came up the hard way, he can relate to people from all walks of life — the entrepreneur who built a company from nothing, the blue-collar-turned-executive, the PE partner who's never worked outside of finance. That range of empathy and intuition is what makes him exceptional at reading culture and finding fit.
I relate to this deeply. I grew up in Chennai, India, where many of my schoolmates' parents worked factory jobs. Later I went to a top engineering school. That ability to connect with both the job site and the C-suite is what made ThinkPower successful, and it's what makes Tony successful in his craft.
DHR Global is a retained executive search firm that works across all industries — healthcare, consumer, financial services, and Tony's specialty: industrial services, private equity, oil and gas, and anywhere people wear hard hats doing dangerous things. They focus primarily on C-suite placements, and their Jobplex division handles emerging leaders at the director level and below.
Tony's sweet spot is the middle market — specifically, private equity-backed companies and entrepreneurially founded businesses that are ready to scale. About 90% of his work now comes through private equity firms, not because he prefers working with PE over entrepreneurs, but because PE firms currently own an enormous portion of the middle market. They're the gateway to the founder-led businesses Tony loves helping transform.
This was one of the most important parts of our conversation, and I want every entrepreneur listening to really absorb it.
Entrepreneurs have a unique and genuinely rare skill set. Taking a company from zero to $25 million, $50 million, $100 million in revenue — very few people on earth can do that. But the playbook that gets you there is almost never the playbook that takes you to the next level. k
Tony hears it all the time when he first meets founders: "I've never used a recruiter. What do I need you for? We're doing fine with Ann Ethel running the books." He understands where that comes from — these are people who built something extraordinary with grit and 20 different hats. But there's a wall that almost every entrepreneur hits where they need to professionalize the business, and very few can do that alone.
There are a handful of Mark Zuckerbergs and Elon Musks who can take a company from founding to global dominance. But even they needed a Sheryl Sandberg or a Steve Ballmer. In the industrial middle market — the hard hat world that Tony and I operate in — bringing in professional leadership isn't a sign of weakness. It's the normal, healthy evolution of a growing company, no different than Facebook going public or SpaceX raising venture capital.
Tony's advice to entrepreneurs boils down to this: recognize when you're about to hit a wall. The playbook that built your company to $50 million won't be the same playbook that takes it to $200 million. Be open to professional leadership. And understand that paying $60,000 for a glorified bookkeeper is very different from investing $200,000-$300,000 in a CFO who will transform your financial operations, manage lender relationships, and help market the company for an eventual exit. As Tony puts it, "Title is the cheapest form of compensation there is."
Tony was emphatic about one thing: the relationship between the CEO and the executive search partner is everything. If the key stakeholder isn't engaged — giving time, providing honest feedback, being open about culture and expectations — the search will fail, regardless of how good the recruiter is.
He's reached a point in his career where he won't take a search if the key stakeholder won't be actively involved. And I can tell you from experience that our searches succeeded precisely because of that partnership. When the first slate of candidates wasn't on the mark, I told Tony directly — no blame, just clarity on what I was really looking for. The next slate had four out of five candidates I wanted to interview. That iterative, honest back-and-forth is how great hires happen.
The flip side is equally important: a great search partner has to be willing to push back on the CEO. Tony told me more than once when he thought I had a blind spot, when he'd seen other CEOs make the same mistake. If your recruiter is just an order taker, you're not getting what you're paying for.
The two pillars, as Tony put it: trust and candor. It sounds simple. It's anything but.
This is where Tony's intuitive gifts really shine. Finding candidates with the right skills and experience is table stakes. The difference between a good hire and a transformational one is cultural fit — and that's something no resume can tell you.
Tony's process starts with deeply understanding the CEO: how they think, how they built the business, what they talk about, how they say things. He picks up on subtle cues that signal what the culture actually is, not just what the CEO says it is. Then he matches those qualitative insights with the quantitative requirements of the role.
I'll share a real example. When we were doing our CFO search, we had two excellent finalists. One was a Harvard graduate — the shiny object. The other was Larry LeBlanc, who went to UT Arlington. After extensive discussions with Tony about cultural fit, we chose Larry. It was one of the best decisions I ever made. Larry didn't just run finance; he transformed our financial operations and was a major driver of value creation.
The lesson: don't be blinded by pedigree. The best hire is the one who fits your culture, shares your mission, and has the grit and capability to perform in your specific environment.
Tony identified three mistakes he sees repeatedly, and they're worth committing to memory.
This is the big one. Tony has seen it more times than he'd like to admit: a CEO finds the perfect candidate early in the process but decides to keep looking, just to see what else is out there. Meanwhile, another company comes in, makes the candidate feel wanted, and closes the deal. The original CEO is left wondering what happened. The market is ruthless. Human beings want to feel wanted. If you've found your person, trust your gut and move.
Especially in private equity, the deal teams are so focused on the acquisition itself that they sometimes treat management team upgrades as an afterthought. It's one of the most important things they'll do post-close. The right leader can be the difference between a 6x multiple and a 10x multiple at exit. Arguing over $250,000 in equity when the value creation potential is tens of millions is, to put it bluntly, foolish.
If you want a CFO with multiple successful exits and public company experience, that person commands a premium. The market will pay them what they're worth. You can either be the company that recognizes that reality, or you can be the company that loses every top candidate to the competitor who does.
Tony's breakdown of executive compensation was one of the most practical segments of our conversation.
Base salary keeps people whole — they need to pay their bills and maintain their lifestyle. Nobody's taking a step backward on base.
Bonus drives short-term performance and keeps people engaged quarter to quarter.
But equity is where the magic happens. Equity creates true alignment between the executive and the business. It's what keeps a CFO working late when the team is grinding through a tough quarter. It's what keeps a COO on mission when a competitor calls with a $20,000 raise.
Tony made an important distinction: the best candidates ask for more equity, not more cash. They want ownership because they believe they can create value. That's a signal you want to see. Conversely, if a candidate is only focused on maximizing base and bonus with no interest in equity, that's a red flag. They're not bought into the long-term vision.
One critical nuance: compensation discussions are fundamentally different from deal negotiations. Private equity deal teams sometimes approach executive compensation the same way they approach acquiring a company — press everything down, keep as much as possible on their side. That's a terrible approach for hiring. Compensation is emotional. You're not buying an asset; you're building a relationship. Come to the table in good faith, make the candidate feel valued, and recognize that the marginal cost of paying someone what they're worth is dwarfed by the value they'll create.
And once you've hired them — don't stop paying attention. Markets shift. Competitors call. I always asked my executives one question: "When was the last time you thought about quitting, and why?" The answers were always honest, and they gave me the insight I needed to make adjustments before it was too late. Tony was a great resource here too — I'd call him regularly to check whether the market had moved since our last hire, and he'd give me the data I needed to stay competitive.
Tony sees AI making executive search more efficient — dramatically so. Research that used to take a team of associates an entire weekend can now be done in minutes. Resume analysis, note capture, company intelligence gathering — all accelerated.
But he raised a concern that I think applies far beyond recruiting: if AI eliminates the entry-level roles in an apprenticeship business, where does the next generation of senior practitioners come from? Executive search is a craft that's learned through years of working alongside experienced partners, developing intuition, learning to read people. If there's no one entering the funnel, the pipeline of future Tony Hazens dries up.
It's a tension that every industry built on human judgment and mentorship will have to navigate.
If there's one thread that runs through this entire conversation, it's this: building a great company is ultimately about building a great team, and building a great team requires trust, decisiveness, and the humility to know what you don't know.
Tony Hazen helped me build the management team that transformed ThinkPower Solutions. He did it by investing time to understand me, my culture, and my vision — and then by having the courage to tell me when I was wrong. The leaders he placed are the ones driving the company today, and the value they've created speaks for itself.
For entrepreneurs who think they can do it all: I was you. I thought the same thing. The moment I opened myself up to professional executive search and started building a real leadership team around me, everything changed. The company grew faster, operated more efficiently, and ultimately became far more valuable.
For private equity firms: don't treat talent as an afterthought. It's one of the highest-ROI investments you'll make post-close. Be decisive. Pay people what they're worth. And find a search partner you trust — not an order taker, but a real partner who will push back when you need it.
Tony, thank you for your partnership, your friendship, and for everything you've done for ThinkPower and for every company you've helped build. You were born to do this work, and it shows.
Listen to the full episode on From Boots to Boardroom.
From Boots to Boardroom is presented by KYRO AI — Digitize work and maximize profits.
Hari Vasudevan, PE, is a serial entrepreneur and engineer focused on AI-driven solutions for utilities, construction, and storm response. As Founder and CEO of KYRO AI, he leads the development of AI-powered software that helps utility, vegetation, and field service teams digitize operations, improve storm response and restoration, and reduce operational risk. He also serves as Vice Chair and Strategic Advisor for the Edison Electric Institute’s Transmission Subject Area Committee and holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in civil engineering with professional engineering licensure in multiple states.
