Services

Leadership Diagnostics & HR Advisory

Assessment, advisory, and AI competence development for leadership teams — independent of or alongside executive search.

Not every leadership challenge translates into a search mandate. Some require an independent assessment of the leadership already inside the organisation. Some require a strategic HR perspective before a structure is set or a role is scoped. Some require building the capability of the leadership team itself. Ertler Executive Search offers three distinct service lines for these situations — grounded in business psychology, direct experience with leadership under pressure, and a decade of assessing senior talent across sectors and geographies.

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Search focus

Leadership assessment and management audits — standalone or integrated with executive search

360° feedback, BPT® diagnostics, and executive assessment conducted by qualified business psychologists

HR advisory and AI competence development for senior leadership teams across DACH and internationally

Leadership diagnostics

When does leadership diagnostics or HR advisory make sense?

The trigger for external diagnostics or HR advisory is typically not a vacancy — it is a structural or capability question that a vacancy would only temporarily answer. An organisation preparing for growth needs clarity on whether its current leadership architecture can carry the next phase. A company navigating transformation needs to know whether its senior team has the change capacity required before it designs new roles. A board considering succession needs an independent assessment of internal candidates before it decides whether to search externally.

Our HR advisory engagements are project-based and scope-defined: we work on organisational design, leadership architecture, role profiling ahead of search, HR strategy, and management audit preparation. Where appropriate, we combine advisory with diagnostics — so that recommendations are grounded in validated assessment data, not impression alone. For organisations that have previously worked with us on search mandates, advisory often follows naturally: we know the business, the leadership culture, and the market context well enough to add immediate value without a lengthy briefing phase.

Assessment methods

Management audits, BPT® assessment, and 360° feedback

Diagnostic credibility comes from three things: the instrument, the person administering it, and the independence of the evaluation.

Diagnostic credibility comes from three things: the instrument, the person administering it, and the independence of the evaluation. Most assessment processes in executive search compromise on at least one of the three.

Members of our team are qualified business psychologists, certified in the assessment instruments we use, with direct experience in leadership evaluation at senior organisational levels. Where mandates require it, we also work with an external network of certified test psychologists — ensuring evaluator independence and data protection compliance. Assessments use the validated BPT® (Berufs-Persönlichkeitstest) with optional Riemann-Thomann cross-evaluation for leadership style and interpersonal dynamics. Data is stored exclusively in Austria or Germany in accordance with GDPR. Under stable life circumstances, BPT® results remain a useful reference point for several years and can support role changes, promotion decisions, and development planning without re-testing.

As part of a search mandate

Candidate assessment is integrated into the shortlisting process. Clients receive structured dossiers combining competency-based interview findings with psychometric results and a written evaluation.

As a standalone engagement — management audits

Where organisations need an independent view of an existing leadership team — before a restructuring, after an acquisition, or as part of succession planning — we run structured management audits. These cover individual executive assessments, team dynamic evaluation, and a written report with concrete development or repositioning recommendations.

360° feedback

The 360° feedback process adds a further dimension: structured external perception data from managers, peers, direct reports, and relevant external partners, combined with a 90-minute individual exploration session. The output is not a score — it is a development roadmap.

AI competence development

AI competence development for leadership teams

The strategic challenge of AI adoption is not technical — it is a leadership and governance question. Which decisions can AI support, and which must remain human? How does the leadership team govern AI-generated output in high-stakes contexts? How does the EU AI Act affect accountability structures, and who in the organisation owns that accountability?

Our AI competence development programme is aimed at executive boards, senior leadership teams, and HR functions navigating these questions in practice. It is not a general AI literacy training — it is a structured capability assessment and development process built around the specific operating context of the client organisation.

The programme runs in three phases: an AI maturity assessment mapping the current state of AI integration across leadership practices, HR processes, and operational functions; a role-specific competence development programme built around actual decisions and responsibilities of the leadership team; and an embedding phase implementing governance frameworks and capability measurement. Deliverables include a written AI maturity report, a role-based competence development plan, and a governance framework tailored to the organisation's risk profile and EU AI Act requirements.

Typical engagements

Assessment, advisory, and capability development mandates.

Management audit ahead of restructuring or post-acquisition integration

Standalone psychometric assessment of internal succession candidates (BPT®)

HR strategy and role design ahead of a search mandate

AI competence development for executive boards and HR functions

Leadership architecture review before scaling or entering new markets

AI maturity assessment for leadership teams

360° feedback programme for a senior leadership team or individual executives

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Related services and practice groups

Executive Search

Retained executive search for C-level, senior leadership, and specialised executive appointments.

Practice Groups

Explore the industry and functional markets where Ertler Executive Search runs senior mandates.

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Considering a management audit, leadership assessment, or HR advisory engagement?

Let's clarify the question first — and determine whether diagnostics, advisory, or a search is the right response.

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FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

Direct answers to common client questions before starting a diagnostics or HR advisory engagement.

A search mandate starts with a vacancy and ends with a placed candidate. An HR advisory engagement starts with a structural or capability question — and may conclude that no search is needed at all, or that the search brief needs to be fundamentally different from what the client originally had in mind. The two services are complementary: advisory sharpens the quality of search decisions; search experience grounds advisory recommendations in market reality. The choice of starting point depends on the question the client actually needs answered.

Yes — and this is often the more valuable configuration. Standalone diagnostics make sense when an organisation needs an independent view of existing leadership: before a restructuring, ahead of a succession decision, or as part of a management audit following an acquisition. The assessment is commissioned directly by the board, supervisory board, or HR leadership — with no connection to an active vacancy. The output is a written report with structured findings and concrete recommendations.

The process typically runs four to six weeks from briefing to individual debrief. Structured feedback is collected from a defined group — managers, peers, direct reports, and relevant external partners — through a validated digital questionnaire. The output is not a score or a ranking. It is a structured perception profile, combined with a 90-minute individual exploration session in which the findings are reflected, contextualised, and translated into concrete development measures. Written output includes specific recommendations for leadership behaviour, collaboration, and individual development priorities.

General AI training explains tools and techniques. AI competence development defines how leaders use, govern, and challenge AI-supported decisions in their own operating context. The focus is not prompt technique — it is accountability, decision quality, risk awareness, and role-specific application. The programme starts with an assessment of the leadership team's current AI maturity, maps it against the organisation's actual decision environment and EU AI Act obligations, and builds competence around that specific context. The output is a governance framework and development plan, not a certificate.