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Search Leaders Have Mastered Prompting. Now They Want AI That Works for Them.

By now, most search consultants can prompt their way to a sharp client or candidate brief in seconds. Then they spend the next twenty minutes copying it into their ATS and emailing prospects.

That’s where executive search is with AI: Hunt Scanlon Media’s own research found that 91% of search professionals already use general-purpose tools like ChatGPT and Claude. The harder question now is what comes after the chat window.

A new report from Ren, an AI-powered relationship intelligence platform for executive search and professional services, offers answers. Survey respondents described a clear gap between what they can do with AI today and what they want it to do next.

Prompting is now table stakes

Among executive search respondents, 72% consider themselves experts at writing prompts to research companies, compare sources, and synthesize information. No other AI skill came close. Only 17% said they still want to get better at it. For most search professionals, prompting is a solved problem.

Source: Ren AI-powered dealmaking survey, executive search respondents, October 2026

Ask about what comes after the prompt, and the picture changes. Search respondents reported low expertise but high interest in nearly every advanced AI skill. That appetite runs into a practical problem: the systems search firms run on need to be connected.

“General-purpose AI is a foundation, not a finish line. It doesn’t know your clients, your candidates, or what changed in your network this morning,” said Canay Deniz, CEO of Ren. “Connecting it to the systems that do is where the value really begins to accumulate.”

Specialized tech stack

Respondents named Bullhorn, Recruiterflow, Ezekia, Invenias, Loxo, Thrive, and PCRecruiter as their CRM or ATS, and only one named Salesforce. These specialized systems hold a search firm’s most valuable asset: its relationship and search history.

But not a single search respondent said their current tools already meet their needs. Two-thirds (67%) want a better tool for prospecting and lead generation, and 61% want one for CRM and contact management. Asked for the one capability they most want from vendors in the next 6–12 months, respondents named integration more than anything else.

“[Ease] of integration. One single interface for seamless insights across platforms,” a VP at a mid-size firm wrote. A consultant put it plainly: “Integrating AI within the CRM (i.e. Copilot into Bullhorn).”

The plumbing already exists. MCP (Model Context Protocol) is the standard plug that lets an assistant like Claude or ChatGPT work directly with a firm’s CRM or ATS, inbox, calendar, and data sources. Think of it as USB-C for AI, and most search CRM and ATS vendors now offer their own MCP connectors. With those connections in place, AI can take on more of the heavy lifting:

• Combine tools. A consultant asks for a warm intro to a prospective client, and the AI checks the firm’s relationship data for the best path in.
• Run on its own. Every morning, the AI pulls a partner’s priority clients from the CRM, gathers news on each, and emails a digest.
• Take action. When an executive in a consultant’s network changes jobs, the AI logs it in the ATS and creates a follow-up task, whether the move signals a new search or a new candidate.

The blank-canvas chatbot is a starting point, not the destination. Yet only about a quarter of search respondents (28%) consider themselves experts at connecting AI to their tools. The connectors exist. The question is who turns them on.

Bottom-up adoption

In search, the answer is usually the individual. Ren’s executive search respondents more often discover new AI tools through colleagues and industry events than through a firm-wide rollout. That makes adoption organic, but it also leaves individuals to find, connect, and keep up with each new tool on their own.

That tension came up at Ren’s September webinar with Hunt Scanlon Media, where panelists discussed firms stuck in “pilot purgatory” and overwhelmed by tool overload, as well as the growing need to connect purpose-built tools with existing CRM and data systems.

That’s why the leadership role in search looks different. It isn’t picking the tool. It’s clearing the way: approving connections, choosing systems that can plug in, and scaling what consultants already find works.

Search consultants don’t need more prompt training. They need the freedom to experiment with agents and automations, and the connections that let the best ideas spread across the firm.

“The best AI workflows in a search firm rarely start with a mandate,” Deniz said. “They start with one consultant who saves an hour a day and tells the partner down the hall. Leadership’s job is to notice what’s working and make it easy for everyone else to plug in.”