Track them down

Charlie Fridley, managing partner at The Beneva Group, a Sarasota-based executive search and recruitment firm, often says his work is like chess, not checkers.

That saying, and Fridley's ability to see the big picture through many small moves, came together for a client recently. The client, a global company in product design and manufacturing, sought a plant manager with specific advanced and technical engineering skills to oversee rapid growth at a facility in Louisville, Ky.

Fridley and his team of seven employees at The Beneva Group, an affiliate of MRINetwork, a global search and recruitment firm, pored through their internal database and LinkedIn with minimal success. The Beneva Group focuses on finding employees and executives for the security technology, consumer products and plastics and special chemicals industries.