How to build a talent map: target companies, org charts and move signals from public sources

Talent mapping is building a structured picture of where the people you might hire work today: the target companies, the teams and reporting lines inside them, named people with their level and time in role, and signals that they might move. To build one, set the map's boundaries from the intake, list and tier the target companies, chart each team from public sources, place named people with the source of every fact, add move signals, and turn the result into an outreach plan. Unlike a talent pipeline, a map covers people you have not contacted yet.

For keeping warm candidates ready for roles you fill again and again, see how to build a talent pipeline; for the daily search and message workflow, see how to source candidates on LinkedIn. This page is the research step that comes before both.

How is a talent map different from a pipeline or a sourcing list?

When is a talent map worth building?

• Executive and senior searches, where the candidate pool is a few dozen people across known companies.
• Niche technical roles, where the people sit in a handful of teams you can name.
• A new location or market, to see whether the talent exists before the business commits.
• Agency business development, to show a prospective client you know their market.
• Succession and workforce planning, to know the external bench for critical roles.

It is rarely worth it for high-volume hiring, where applications and job boards supply the pool.

Step 1: Set the map's boundaries

A map without boundaries never finishes. Take these from the intake meeting: function, level, geography or remote scope, the industries and company sizes that produce the right people, and the must-haves that are visible from outside, such as a regulated license or a type of product.

Write down the companies you cannot recruit from. For an agency, that usually means clients covered by an off-limits or non-solicitation clause; see non-solicitation clauses for recruiters. Agreements between companies not to hire each other's staff are a different matter and can breach antitrust law; see no-poach agreements and antitrust law.

Step 2: List and tier the target companies

• Tier A: direct competitors doing the same work at a similar scale.
• Tier B: adjacent industries with the same function, such as a medical device payroll team for a pharmaceutical role.
• Tier C: companies with the same problem in a different setting, such as anyone who has recently migrated a payroll system.

Good sources for the list: industry association member directories, conference sponsor and exhibitor lists, "competitors" sections in public companies' annual reports, which you can search with the SEC's EDGAR full-text search, and, for UK companies, Companies House. Start with ten to fifteen Tier A and B companies. Add Tier C only if the first tiers run short.

Step 3: Chart each team from public sources

For each target company, work out how the function is organized: who leads it, how many layers there are, and where the role you are filling would sit. Public sources each show part of the picture:

On that last row: LinkedIn's User Agreement (effective November 3, 2025, as of October 2026) prohibits using software, scripts, crawlers or browser plugins "to scrape or copy the Services, including profiles". Research profiles by hand or with LinkedIn's own recruiting products, not with extensions that export data in bulk.

Step 4: Place named people and record the source

Build the map as a spreadsheet, one row per person, so it can be filtered, sorted and refreshed. Record where each fact came from and when; a map is only as good as its oldest row.

Company | Tier | Team | Name | Title | Level | Reports to |
Time in role | Location | Source + date checked | Move signals |
Contacted? (date, by whom) | Response | Notes

Keep it to work facts. Personal details such as family, health or age have no place in a map, and inferring them creates both legal and fairness risks.

Step 5: Add move signals

A map tells you who could do the job; signals suggest who might listen. Common ones:

• Time in role. Someone well past the point where people in that function usually step up, with no promotion in sight.
• A new boss. A leader hired in above them, especially from outside.
• Company change. An acquisition, merger, reorganization, office closure or layoff announcement.
• Scope change. Their product or region was sold, closed or merged into another team.
• Their own signals. Speaking about a new specialty, finishing a qualification, or an "open to work" setting.

Treat signals as reasons to contact someone sooner, never as facts about them. A person in a reorganized team may be delighted with the result.

Step 6: Turn the map into a plan

1. Prioritize. Rank people by fit and signals; contact the top tier first.
2. Sequence by company. Avoid messaging five people in one small team on the same day; they talk.
3. Ask for referrals. People who are not interested often know who is; the map tells you whether a name they give you is a fit.
4. Track coverage. For each target company: charted or not, named people, contacted, replied, interested.
5. Refresh. Re-check titles and moves before each new search; mark rows older than six months as stale.

An example summary with invented numbers: 12 target companies charted, 64 named people, 40 contacted, 18 replied, 7 interested, 3 shortlisted. Those numbers also tell a hiring manager how deep the market is.

How do agencies use talent maps in pitches and executive search?

In pitches, an anonymized map shows a prospective client that you know their market: how many people at the target level sit at each competitor, which teams are growing, and where the realistic candidates are. Share counts and structure, not names. A slide that says "14 people at this level across six competitors, half of them in two cities" is persuasive and exposes nobody.

In retained executive search, the map is often the backbone of the engagement: it shapes the long list, the progress reports and the explanation of who was approached and why. The retained search proposal checklist covers how to scope it in the proposal, the executive search candidate report template covers reporting on the people who come out of it, and retained vs contingency recruiting explains why mapping is usually part of retained work rather than contingency.

Do not hand a client a named map of people who have not agreed to be put forward. Beyond the ownership risk, for people in the EU or UK the GDPR expects them to be told about the processing at the latest when their data is first disclosed to another recipient (UK GDPR Article 14(3)).

What privacy rules apply to a talent map?

• EU and UK. A map is personal data. You need a lawful basis, often legitimate interests, and the person must generally be told within one month of you obtaining the data, or at first contact if sooner (Article 14(3)). See legitimate interest in recruitment.
• California. For businesses covered by the CCPA, personal information about candidates is covered; see CCPA and job applicant data.
• Platform terms. Respect the terms of every site you research, including the scraping ban quoted above.
• Retention. Set a review date for every map and delete rows you no longer need.

This is general information, not legal advice; check the rules where the people on your map live.

Talent mapping mistakes

• Mapping everything. A 600-row map nobody contacts is worse than a 60-row map worked properly.
• No sources or dates. Without them, nobody can tell which rows to trust.
• Mapping titles instead of work. "Director" means different things at a 50-person and a 50,000-person company; record scope and team size.
• Forgetting off-limits companies until a client complains.
• Letting the map die after one search. Refreshed, it is the starting point for the next one.