Our co-founders Ken Charles and Cody Pettit, two Americans living in Tokyo, met in 2010. Cody was a young English teacher and Ken had just sold his first startup company to a tech firm in San Francisco after years recruiting on Wall Street.
They bonded over a love of life, gaming, Japan, and all sorts of geeky things.
Ken went on to found the IT recruiting division at a preeminent executive search firm in Tokyo. Over many drinks across many nights, Ken convinced Cody to leave the safety of English teaching and to become a recruiter. This was 2015 and set off the sequence of events that would lead to ExecutiveSearch.AI.
Ken and Cody in Shimo-Kitazawa, Tokyo circa 2014.
It became obvious to both Ken and Cody that the recruiting industry was stuck in the dark ages. Boiler-room style call centers, bothering office receptionists, or even worse — mindlessly spamming people on LinkedIn or Bizreach all day — is low quality work and not worthy of the high service fees recruiting firms charge.
High quality, passive job seekers need a trusted partner who truly understands their industry and career ambitions. And tech companies looking for top talent need partners who can find candidates outside of LinkedIn & Bizreach.
Thus began the founding principle of ExecutiveSearch.AI — Ken and Cody would start a “Tech-first Executive Search” firm. One where the focus would be on the human-to-human elements. One where software & AI would be used to free up recruiters’ time so they could spend more time with candidates.
Ken & Cody launched ExecutiveSearch.AI on February 1st 2018 as a modern recruiting firm for a modern era. Focused solely on filling tech companies’ executive, engineering and product positions.
ExecutiveSearch.AI started with 2 customers in 2018, added a third in 2019, and a few more since. We added a third partner, Eileen Tian, and expanded our team. We’re quickly becoming the leading AI-powered recruiting firm in Japan. What’s next? Reach out and find out!
The three partners (Cody Pettit, Ken Charles, Eileen Tian) in 2021.