Independent executive search for global social impact
Philosophy
Client-first flexibility
Philosophy
Jago believes good search depends on a relationship of genuine trust. Working with an independent consultant means clients have one person who is accountable throughout, and a partner who can take a more creative, collaborative approach to finding the right leader than a volume-driven firm typically allows.
Experience
Client-first flexibility
Philosophy
Jago's networks span the private, public, and nonprofit sectors in the UK and globally. He has led assignments across all sizes of organisation, at C-suite, board, and senior executive level, with particular depth in helping new and scaling organisations build complementary, diverse leadership teams.
Values
Client-first flexibility
Client-first flexibility
Jago's approach is built on honesty and rigour. Many of his clients return to him across multiple appointments, which gives him the depth of understanding to push back constructively when needed, and to advocate for candidates who might not have been the obvious choice.
Client-first flexibility
Client-first flexibility
Client-first flexibility
The established search firms serving this sector are volume businesses: senior consultants pitch, junior staff deliver, and candidate engagement is treated as a process to be managed rather than a relationship to be built. Jago works differently. Every search is shaped around the client's specific priorities, with the emphasis on proactiv
The established search firms serving this sector are volume businesses: senior consultants pitch, junior staff deliver, and candidate engagement is treated as a process to be managed rather than a relationship to be built. Jago works differently. Every search is shaped around the client's specific priorities, with the emphasis on proactive market exploration, careful assessment, and rigorous referencing, rather than recycling a familiar pool of applicants.
Clients
Approach
Leadership challenges in times of turmoil
Leading a global social impact organisation today is demanding in ways both familiar and newly complex. Senior leaders in philanthropy, NGOs, and mission-driven organisations are navigating persistent uncertainty, rising expectations, and a world less predictable year on year. Decisions carry more weight, and the consequences of getting them wrong are harder to undo.
Financial pressure is now an everyday reality. Funding is less stable than it once was, and governments, foundations, and corporate donors are asking tougher questions about impact, governance, and cost. Inflation, political change, and economic fragility have made long-term planning harder, while new models of giving and blended finance force leaders to rethink how their organisations are funded and sustained.
The operating environment is tightening too. In many countries civil society faces heavier regulation and growing suspicion, particularly where international funding is involved, and even in established democracies compliance and reporting demands keep climbing. Leaders must protect their organisations, their people, and their values while working constructively within shifting political limits.
Technology brings both promise and unease. Digital tools and artificial intelligence are opening new possibilities in fundraising, communications, and service delivery, but adoption is rarely straightforward. Many organisations are moving faster than their systems, skills, or safeguards can comfortably support, even as cyber and reputational risks rise.
People remain at the heart of it. Expectations of social impact leaders are high and the pressures unrelenting; burnout is common, senior talent is harder to retain, and succession planning is too often postponed in favour of the urgent. Building resilient leadership teams and healthier cultures is now essential, not aspirational. Trust, meanwhile, is more fragile than ever: donors and partners want clear evidence of impact and strong governance, public scrutiny is immediate and unforgiving, and a reputation built slowly can be undone quickly.
The leaders who will thrive are not those with all the answers, but those who can exercise sound judgement, adapt to change, and lead with steadiness under pressure. For any organisation seeking to protect and grow its impact, the quality of its leadership has never mattered more.
Adaptable and personalised executive search
The global social impact sector is changing at a pace few leaders have experienced before. Public expectations are higher, scrutiny is more intense, and the space for error is shrinking. Organisations are being asked to deliver meaningful results while navigating political pressure, funding uncertainty, and growing complexity. In this environment, leadership quality is not a secondary concern; it is central to an organisation's ability to protect its mission and sustain its impact.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the competition for senior talent. Attracting, appointing, and retaining effective leaders has become significantly harder at the very moment the cost of a poor appointment is at its highest. Traditional, volume-led executive search is ill-suited to this reality. Rigid processes, standardised shortlists, and transactional candidate engagement do little to address the uncertainty, risk, and nuance a senior leader weighs before considering a move.
In times of instability, organisations need a search partner who brings judgement, discretion, and deep sector understanding. Identifying the right leaders increasingly means building trusted relationships with people who are fully committed to their current roles and not actively looking to move. These candidates need informed, credible counsel to help them assess risk, opportunity, and alignment with mission, often over an extended period.
Jago works in close partnership with clients to design a search process shaped around their specific context, challenges, and ambitions. By leading every assignment personally, from initial brief through to appointment and transition, he reduces risk, sustains momentum, and adapts the search as circumstances change. This allows for creativity and persistence in reaching the right individuals, not simply those who happen to be available. The result is leadership appointments that stand up to scrutiny, endure through uncertainty, and strengthen organisations at the moments strong, steady leadership matters most.
About Jago
Jago has over 18 years' experience in international executive search. He began his career with a leading boutique search firm, working across the education, arts, and not-for-profit sectors on both executive and non-executive board appointments. He went on to advise multilaterals, arts institutions, and civil society organisations on senior leadership appointments with the Education and Social Enterprise practice of Heidrick & Struggles, a top-three global firm, and brings board-level insight from his time with Lygon Group, where he worked on non-executive appointments for the FTSE 100 and 250.
Since establishing his own practice in 2015, he has led a wide range of leadership assignments for clients in the UK and overseas: philanthropic foundations, impact investors and intermediaries, social impact agencies and consultancies, think tanks, policy and academic institutions, and campaigning and advocacy organisations. His clients are typically global in reach and mission, and concerned with hiring diverse, multicultural leaders. Many come to him to bring new technology, ideas, and approaches to bear on the most pressing questions of the public good, and his ability to work across sectors, helping candidates move into social impact careers, has proved valuable in attracting the right talent to lead that change.
Jago studied sixteenth and seventeenth century painting under T.J. Clark at the Courtauld Institute, where he gained an MA in History of Art. He holds a BA in Politics from the University of Durham, and has also studied at the Institut d'Études Politiques in Aix-en-Provence and at Birkbeck College, University of London.