PRIVATE EXECUTIVE ADVISORY
The questions
you can’t
ask anyone
around
you.
A private counsel relationship for executives who are still succeeding, and quietly wondering if they should be doing something different.
“The board doesn’t know. Your team doesn’t know. But you’ve been carrying this question for months.
That’s exactly where this conversation begins.”
i. You are still performing at a high level. You are simply navigating a defining moment.
ii. You want market intelligence, not motivation. You are curious about what a change would actually yield and look like?
iii. You need a thinking partner with no agenda, no placement fee, and no conflict.
iv. You are building a deliberate next chapter and not reacting to circumstance.
“Stay if you should stay. Move if you should move. We have no stake in the answer other than supporting you.”
IMPACT NARRATIVE - PRIVATE
ADVISORY
WHO THIS IS FOR
You are at an inflection point.
You just haven’t named it yet.
This is for executives at the edge of something and wanting to navigate it on their terms, before the market decides for them.
i.
The Quietly Restless CEO
Four or five years into a role that’s simply run its course. Performing well. Asking privately whether this is still the right platform.
iii.
The Deliberate Architect
Senior enough to choose what is next rather than just responding to it. Building toward board seats, advisory roles, or a fractional practice, with intention and not urgency.
v.
The Transformation Leader
You’ve led the hardest kind of work, enterprise change, organizational rebuilding, growth under pressure. Now you want to tell that story to an audience that will value it.
ii.
The Executive Taking a Call
A search firm is reaching out. Maybe multiple. You’re not sure if you should engage, and if you do, what is it that you actually want on the other side.
iv.
The PE/Venture-Backed Operator
Between portfolio companies or approaching the end of a hold period. Wanting to understand the full landscape of what is available, before committing to the next sponsor or venture.
vi.
The Intentional Bookend
Approaching the decade where the work you take on defines the legacy you leave. Board composition, advisory equity, and the right chapter deserve deliberate strategy.
THE ENGAGEMENT
Private
counsel.
Not a coaching program.
This is a retainer relationship. It’s ongoing, confidential, and structured around the questions you are actually carrying. There is no defined endpoint. There is no playbook. There is a trusted advisor with 18 years of intelligence from both sides of the executive search table.
01
What would a move actually yield in comp, scope, platform, and trajectory? We can tell you, because we ran those searches.
MARKET INTELLIGENCE
02
How the market sees your profile today, and how to shape the story before you need it.
Proactive, not reactive.
NARRATIVE POSITIONING
03
A thinking and action partner for the decisions too consequential for your board, your team, or even your family to hold with you objectively.
DECISION ARCHITECTURE
04
When you are ready to explore managing search firm relationships, evaluating opportunities, and negotiating outcomes with someone who knows the other side.
SEARCH NAVIGATION
05
Positioning for board seats, advisory equity, and portfolio company roles, built over months, not assembled in a panic.
BOARD & PORTFOLIO STRATEGY
THE INVESTMENT
Monthly retainer.
No placement fee. No conflict.
We don’t take placement fees. We don’t earn more if you move. This is what makes the counsel honest.
“The retainer model exists because the right answer
— stay or go — should
never be influenced by
what pays the advisor”
.
.
.
.
Advisory Retainer
Monthly counsel relationship — market intelligence, narrative work, decision support, and search negotiation on a rolling basis. Pause or exit at any time.
ONGOING - NO FIXED TERM
$1.5K
per month
Strategic Partner
6-MONTH COMMITMENT
Deep engagement — ongoing work, active search navigation, board strategy, offer negotiation, and onboarding support. Full access, full attention.
$1K
per month
Encore Counsel
For executives building board portfolio, advisory practice, or fractional platform over a deliberate 12-month arc. Long-horizon, light-touch cadence.
12-MONTH - PORTFOLIO FOCUS
$9K
per year
WHY THIS IS DIFFERENT
Three things no one else in this space offers.
The Other side of
the Table
We’ve run searches for organizations exactly like the ones you are considering. We know what their committees are looking for, what concerns them, and what they will pay. That’s not coaching , it’s intelligence.
O1
No Placement
Incentive
Search firms make money when you move. Career coaches often do too. We don’t. Our retainer is the same whether you stay, move, or spend twelve months just thinking. That neutrality is rare.
O2
A Room That Doesn’t Exist Elsewhere
This isn’t a conversation you have with your board, your team, or your family. It’s the room where you can think out loud without consequence. We built it deliberately.
O3
YOUR ADVISOR
Built from 18 years on both sides of the table.
FOUNDER & EXECUTIVE ADVISOR
Dana has spent 18 years at the center of executive search, placing C-suite and senior leaders at growth-stage, mission-driven, and high-consequence organizations. As a Certified Executive Coach and Topgrading Master Practitioner, he brings both the market intelligence of a seasoned search practitioner and the depth of a trained coach to every advisory relationship.
He founded the Private Advisory practice because the executives he admired most kept asking a question they couldn't ask in any other room. This is that room.
EXECUTIVE COACH
TOPGRADING PRACTITIONER
SEARCH 18+ YEARS
Dana Young
“I take a small number of advisory clients at any given time. This is a practitioner relationship, not a service, not a platform, not a program."
Ready to Begin
The conversation is
confidential by design.
No intake form. No sales process. A direct conversation to see whether there’s a fit and what you are actually trying to think through.