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Product leadership
CPO, VP Product, Head of Product. Operators who can still write a spec and hold a board.
RetainedExclusiveOne principalEst. 2019
Calder is a solo boutique practice for product, design, and engineering leadership. No associates. No bench. When a board retains Calder, they retain Maya Calder — the person who writes the brief, maps the market, and makes the call.
01 — Practice
I spent the first half of my career inside larger search firms. The work that mattered was never the deck. It was the conversation after the conversation — and that work does not survive a bench.
Calder exists so that the person who takes the brief is the person who calls the candidate. I read the product. I sit with the team. I decline more searches than I take, because a retained mandate I cannot give a full week to is a search I should not have signed.
Clients are typically founder-CEOs, COOs, and boards who have already tried a network hire or a contingent firm and want the seat filled by someone who is not already in their Slack. Candidates hear from me once, with a specific reason, and never as a blast.
02 — Mandates
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CPO, VP Product, Head of Product. Operators who can still write a spec and hold a board.
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CTO, VP Engineering, Head of Platform. Builders who scale teams without losing the craft.
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CDO, VP Design, Head of Design. People who pair taste with systems, not decks.
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GM, country lead, business-unit head. P&L owners who can still sit with customers.
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Chief People Officer and Head of Talent for companies that treat culture as an operating system.
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Founder-successor seats, first executive hires, and quiet replacements. Always retained. Always exclusive.
03 — Approach
A working session with the hiring manager and, where it matters, the board. I write the mandate. You sign it. We do not start from a job description pasted out of Notion.
I build the market map myself: companies, adjacent functions, people who are not looking. No scraped lists. No junior sourcers. You see the map before anyone is called.
I approach people as a peer, not a blast. I interview in depth, check references before the shortlist, and bring you three to five names I would hire.
I run process, compensation, and the quiet politics of a yes. After start date I stay on for ninety days. If it fails on fit, I rerun the search.
04 — Who this is for
For companies
You get one partner, a written brief, a market map before outreach, weekly notes, and a shortlist of people I would hire myself. You do not get a portal login or a weekly pipeline review of names I have not spoken to.
For candidates
I approach people who are doing well where they are. If I write, it is because a specific seat matches how you actually work — not because your title matched a Boolean string. Conversations are confidential. Your employer is never named to a client without your leave.
05 — Selected work
| Year | Seat | Context | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Chief Product Officer | Series C · climate software · London | Hired from a public-company GM seat in 11 weeks. |
| 2025 | VP Engineering | Series B · fintech infrastructure · SF / remote | First engineering leader after the founders. Still in seat. |
| 2024 | Head of Design | Growth · B2B SaaS · New York | Replaced a failed contingent search. Offer accepted first choice. |
| 2024 | General Manager, Europe | Series D · healthcare software | Confidential successor search. Announced after start date. |
| 2023 | Chief People Officer | Late-stage · 400 people | First CPO. Built the function; company later acquired. |
Client names are withheld by default. References are available to serious retainers after a first conversation. Live mandates are not listed publicly.
06 — Voices
“Maya is the only recruiter I have kept on speed dial. She understood the product well enough to argue with me about the brief.”Founder & CEO, Series C climate company
“No associates, no theatre. She brought four people. We hired the second. Two years later that VP Eng is still the best hire we made.”CTO, fintech infrastructure
“I was not looking. She described the seat so precisely I took the call. The process was discreet, fast, and adult.”CPO, placed 2025
07 — Terms
Calder works only on exclusive retained search. The fee is earned for the work of the search, not solely for a start date. That is what buys you a partner who will tell you the seat is wrongly specified before burning a quarter in the market.
08 — Questions
Contingent search rewards speed and volume. Retained search rewards judgment. Calder only works on exclusive retained mandates so the market is not being worked by three firms at once, and so candidates hear one coherent story.
Three live mandates. That is the capacity of one principal who actually does the work. If the calendar is full, I will say so and give you a date I can start — I do not park a search with a researcher.
First executive hires, yes — typically post-Series A, when the seat is a true leadership role with a compensation band that supports a retained fee. I do not run volume pipelines for ICs or 'we will know it when we see it' hunts.
Most close in eight to fourteen weeks from signed brief to accepted offer. Confidential replacements and highly specialised seats can take longer. You get a written timeline with the engagement letter.
Thirty percent of first-year cash compensation, billed in thirds: on engagement, on agreed shortlist, and on start date. Expenses (travel, assessments) are billed at cost with prior approval. There is no success-only option.
If the hire leaves or is let go for performance within ninety days of start, I rerun the search at no additional professional fee. The guarantee does not cover restructures, visa failure, or a change in the role itself.
I do not take candidate retainers. If you are a leader I should know, send a note. I will keep you in mind for live mandates that fit. I will not shop a CV around the market.
Client companies are off-limits for one year after the engagement, longer if the letter says so. I do not poach from a client to fill another client's seat. I also decline searches that are cover for a pre-chosen internal candidate.
Based between San Francisco and London. Mandates are typically US, UK, and remote-first European teams. I travel for finals. Intro conversations are video.
The market map is built to be wider than the hiring manager's existing network — that is the point of hiring a search. I report the composition of the map and the process, not slogans. I will not run a search whose brief is written to clone the last person in the seat.
09 — Inquire
A first conversation is forty-five minutes. Bring the seat, the compensation band, and why this hire has to happen now. If I cannot take it, I will say so on that call.