“Are you seeing what I am seeing?” I texted Stephen.
“What are you seeing?” he texted.
“Look at the committee member in the third box on the right of the screen. The one in the black-framed glasses with the long dark hair. Is she on a treadmill?”
“OMG. You are right! Wow.”
I could see Stephen on the screen. He began to crack a smile and then started taking deep breaths so as not to laugh out loud.
“She is in full-blown cardio—in AN INTERVIEW. OMG. She just increased the incline. I saw her fiddling with the buttons a minute ago. Now she’s hanging onto the handrails.”
“I bet she is on level nine or ten! She looks like she is climbing a mountain. WHAT? She is starting to sweat. She just put her hair in a ponytail,” he texted.
Meanwhile, a candidate—someone who had likely spent hours preparing for this important conversation—was answering thoughtful questions from the search committee, probably trying not to notice.
As amusing as it was—mostly in retrospect—I couldn’t stop thinking about the candidate. They deserved better.
One of the things I love most about executive search is that it provides a front-row seat to leadership. We get to see people at their best—and occasionally at their most oblivious. And as recruiters, we accumulate all kinds of “career-first” moments—things we have simply never seen before. This was one of mine.
The treadmill was a first. Divided attention was not.
Once we had an avid birder on our committee. When something interesting flew by, he would quickly pick up his GIANT binoculars to see if he could identify it. To his credit, he always asked for forgiveness.
Search committees often forget that an interview isn’t just about evaluating a candidate. The candidate is evaluating the institution as well. A committee can either say: We are excited you’re here. Or they can send the message that the interview is just one more meeting in an already busy day.
And the candidate gets to decide what that message tells them about the institution—and its leadership.
As Simone Weil wrote, “Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.” Perhaps especially true when someone has worked so hard to earn ours.
— Monica Burton
This essay is adapted from The Heart of Leadership, a memoir in progress.
© 2026 Monica Burton. All rights reserved.