How We Help Our Clients
Every search below was run by one of our principals.
We've grouped them by the problem rather than the industry, because the problems repeat. A business building something for the first time, a business going through a change of control, and a role where the capability barely exists in the market are three different searches, whatever sector they sit in.
Clients and candidates are described rather than named, to protect confidentiality where required.
Building something new - Pressure and change of control - Scarce capability - When it isn’t a search
Building something that doesn’t exist yet
Greenfield work is a different appointment. There's no team to inherit, no systems to lean on, and no internal benchmark for what good looks like. The leader has to build the function while delivering against a schedule that was set before anyone knew what it would take.
These searches usually look past commodity or sector experience and go after delivery record instead. What matters is whether someone has personally taken something from nothing to running, not whether they've done it in the same industry.
Case studies
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A major resources business was building a greenfield critical minerals operation and, for the first time, delivering it under an unfamiliar project delivery model. Two firsts at once, on an asset with no tolerance for a slow start.
We searched Australia and internationally for leaders who had delivered multi-billion-dollar mining and complex processing projects, rather than screening on commodity experience. The brief was built around what the first eighteen months would actually demand.
The deciding question was who had personally taken a project of that size and complexity from ground to running, under a delivery model they didn't control end to end. The appointed candidate came from large complex processing and mining builds at directly comparable scale.
Compass weighting: Delivery and Engagement.
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Western Australia's first new salt operation in two decades, and a project of strategic importance to the state. The business was moving from construction into operations for the first time, with no existing operational team, no established systems and no internal benchmark.
The appointment had to carry operational readiness and ramp-up, which is a different job to running an established asset. It calls for someone who can build a function rather than inherit one, and hold a team together through the least stable period an operation ever has.
The appointed leader is taking the operation through readiness and ramp-up now.
Compass weighting: Delivery and Resilience.
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Oyu Tolgoi, in Mongolia’s South Gobi, is one of the world’s largest copper and gold operations, and its underground expansion is among the most complex mining projects anywhere. The business needed a General Manager Project Services to strengthen control of a very large capital program, with cost and estimating discipline at the centre of the brief.
We didn’t limit the search to mining. The skills that mattered most, rigorous estimating, cost control and leading large project teams, are just as well developed in oil and energy, where megaprojects have long been run with tight commercial discipline. We searched internationally and assessed candidates on how they would lead people in a remote, multicultural environment, not just on technical depth.
The appointee came from Canada with an oil and energy background. He brought the emphasis Oyu Tolgoi needed: disciplined estimation, a sharp focus on cost and strong people leadership.
The best candidate for a mining role isn’t always in mining. Knowing where the transferable skills sit, and how to test them, widens the field when it counts.
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A European shipbuilder establishing an Australian business needed an entire organisation built, not a role filled.
Over eight years we appointed the executive team across facilities in two states, advised on the structure itself before the roles existed, and then built the layers beneath it. Functional leadership, senior technical roles, and the operational appointments a shipbuilding program runs on.
The constraints were the hard part. Citizenship and clearance requirements narrow the market before capability is considered, and the business needed leaders who could satisfy an Australian program and a German parent at the same time.
We supported the business through a change of ownership. A number of the people appointed are still there, in roles that survived the transition.
Compass weighting: Delivery and Engagement.
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A contractor delivering a major Western Australian rail program needed operations leadership and a joint venture director.
Joint venture leadership is its own problem. The role answers to two organisations with different boards, different commercial positions and different views of the same risk. Technical capability is necessary and nowhere near sufficient. The person has to hold a partnership together while delivering to a client who cares about neither party's internal politics.
Compass weighting: Engagement and Resilience.
Leadership through pressure and change of control
Some appointments are made when a business is stable and planning ahead. These weren't.
A change of ownership, a turnaround, or a board rebuilding its executive team creates a problem the individual brief doesn't capture. Appointments made in these periods have to work as a set, and sequencing matters as much as selection. A chief executive appointed to change direction needs the appointments around them to reinforce it rather than test it.
Case studies
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Thiess is the world’s largest contract miner. In 2026, while this search was under way, CIMIC bought Elliott’s 40% stake for A$1.18 billion, returning Thiess to full CIMIC ownership and, indirectly, Hochtief’s. Thiess needed a Group Executive People and Culture who could lead the people agenda through that transition and keep culture steady as the business moved back under a single owner.
We ran the search alongside the buyout, so candidates had to be engaged confidentially and with care while the ownership position was still settling. We assessed them on their ability to lead through pressure and change of control, not just on functional depth, and looked well beyond mining for people who had done it before.
Kellie Breen was appointed Group Executive People and Culture. She joined from Sunwater, where she had been Chief People Officer for more than eight years and led cultural change across a state-owned infrastructure business. Earlier, she was General Manager Human Resources at WDS, bringing her back to the resources sector she knows well.
Ownership changes unsettle people at every level. The people leader sets the tone for how the workforce experiences it, and the right appointment can come from outside the obvious pool.
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Relationships between the mine and the local community, including the Indigenous community, had broken down. Stakeholder and environmental performance was under pressure, and the operation needed a leader who could rebuild trust as well as run the mine.
We searched across North America, Latin America and Australia. The brief went beyond operational depth. We looked specifically for a leader with a proven record in environmental and stakeholder management, someone who had rebuilt community relationships before rather than one who would learn on the job.
An Australian with international experience was appointed, chosen for a best-in-class track record in environmental and stakeholder management. The operation stabilised, community engagement improved, and the mine went on to deliver results ahead of guidance.
A mine’s social licence can matter as much as its geology. Sometimes the most important skill in a General Manager isn’t on the operations side at all.
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A major Australian contractor and its listed parent set out to rebuild leadership across the business. Over close to a decade we appointed the chief executive, human resources leadership, state leaders, and business development and strategy roles, along with the managing director of the Singapore operation.
Sequencing mattered as much as selection. A chief executive appointed into an unsettled business needs the next appointments to reinforce the direction rather than test it, which means the searches beneath the top role are part of the same decision rather than separate briefs.
The business went on to become one of the strongest performers in the group.
Compass weighting: Delivery and Resilience.
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A listed Australian contractor needed a new chief executive and additional board capability.
Board and executive appointments made in the same period have to work as a set. A chief executive with a mandate to change direction needs directors who understand what that will cost in the short term and will hold their nerve through it. Appointing them separately, months apart, tends to produce a board and a chief executive with different timelines.
The business returned to profitability and was subsequently acquired.
Compass weighting: Delivery and Engagement.
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Australia's first sovereign submarine program, at a point when the business building it was also going through changes of ownership.
Two demands at once, and they pull against each other. Delivering a build program of that complexity takes single-minded focus. Carrying a business through a change of control takes attention in the opposite direction, toward shareholders, structure and the people wondering what it means for them. The appointment had to hold both.
The successful candidate was found domestically.
Compass weighting: Delivery and Engagement.
Capability that barely exists in the market
Some roles have a field of perhaps twenty people nationally, and most of them are employed and not looking.
When the obvious pool is that thin, the work shifts from finding candidates to working out who can transfer. That's a judgement about the person rather than their history, and it's where assessment carries more weight than a CV ever could.
Case studies
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A global industrial services business needed leadership for a highly technical division. Heat treatment is specialist work, and the pool of people who understand the process and can run a business unit around it is small.
The search couldn't trade one for the other. A capable commercial manager without the technical grounding wouldn't hold credibility with the team or the client. A technical specialist without commercial judgement wouldn't hold the margin.
Compass weighting: Delivery, tested against technical depth rather than general operational experience.
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A major lithium producer needed someone to carry commercial negotiations on supply across Asia and the Americas. The role sat at the point where production meets the market, responsible for the contracts that determine what the operation is actually worth.
This is a narrow field. The combination required is commodity marketing depth, contract negotiation at scale, and the cultural fluency to hold long-term relationships across two very different regions. Most candidates have two of the three. A candidate was found in Japan and has been successfully relocated to Australia. Later they continued in a broader role with Tianqi acquisition of Talison.
Compass weighting: Direction and Engagement.
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A specialist robotics business needed a Director of Operations. The field is narrow. Very few people have run operations in subsea robotics, so the search had to look at leaders from adjacent technical environments and work out which of them would transfer.
Assessment carried more weight than usual because the sector experience wasn't there to lean on. The question was whether someone could pick up an unfamiliar technical domain fast enough to lead in it, which is a judgement about the person rather than their history.
The client has since engaged us again.
Compass weighting: Delivery and Direction.
When the question isn’t a search
Not every leadership question starts with a vacancy, and not every one ends with a placement.
Sometimes a board already has a candidate and needs to know whether that candidate is the right one. Sometimes the answer is that the person is already inside the business. The work is the same discipline, applied to a different question.
Case studies
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A private equity owner and the board of a shutdown and maintenance business had a chief executive in mind. What they wanted was to be sure.
We ran the candidate through the same process any shortlisted candidate goes through. Interview against the brief, assessment under the Leadership Compass, and referencing conducted personally and in depth. Alongside it we mapped the market at that level, so the board could see what else existed rather than assuming.
The appointment went ahead. The difference is that it went ahead on evidence rather than conviction, which is what a board and an owner need when they're the ones accountable for it.
Compass weighting: Engagement and Direction.
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A defence shipbuilder was leading a nationally significant program under close scrutiny. The business needed a new CEO, and its parent organiation was closely involved in the decision.
We mapped the CEO market across Australia and Europe. We assessed internal candidates against the same standard as external talent, so the comparison was fair and grounded in the real market. We then presented the full picture to the decision-makers.
The appointment went to an internal candidate. He went on to lead the business through its sale to an Australian contractor.
Good succession isn’t about favouring insiders or outsiders. It’s about knowing exactly how your internal people compare with the market, so the board can back its choice with confidence.
From Both Sides of the Table
“Ivan partnered with us on a number of critical executive search processes, including senior leadership appointments for our European parent company. Over eight years he became a highly trusted advisor on complex, business critical searches across domestic and international markets. His depth of insight, commercial acumen and consistent outcomes made him a partner we relied on time and again. He was instrumental in shaping our Australian executive team and senior leadership group. I know critical recruitment assignments are always in very safe and capable hands with him.”
Head of Human Resources; Client - Defence Prime Contractor
"We needed a partner who understood local employment conditions, market practice, what it takes to get a senior appointment right and could move quickly. TDN’s timely support helped us formalise the process for a senior executive appointment and guided us throughout. Responsive, thorough and generous with their advice, TDN made a confidential and complex cross-border process straightforward."
President; Client - Mining Services
“Thank you for taking the time to provide such thoughtful and candid advice. Your explanation of how retained search works, the distinction between a base city and the actual employment market, and particularly the need to position myself clearly as an operational leader with deep maintenance and shutdown expertise were extremely helpful. Your point about presenting the move to an NED role as a deliberate and properly structured handover also resonated with me. It has given me several important things to work on.”
Senior Executive and Director; Candidate - Mining and Technology Solutions