Finally of age!

Finally of age! 🎉 18 Years of Gebrüder Schwanke – A Family Business Comes of Age.

It’s official: We’re all grown up! 😉 Today, April 1, 2026, we’re celebrating our 18th birthday.

Our name says it all: Gebrüder Schwanke (Schwanke Brothers). When we founded the company together in 2008, our vision was clear: we wanted to make executive search more personal, more reliable, and more sustainable. Not as an anonymous agency, but as a family business that stands by its word—where a handshake is a binding commitment.

A great deal has happened over the past two decades. What began as a startup has grown into an international consultancy. In addition to our headquarters and our office in Hamburg, we now have an international network that extends as far as the United States. Yet, despite this expansion, our core values ​​as an owner-managed firm remain unchanged.

Proprietary Technology: Because off-the-shelf software didn’t meet our standards, we invested early on in developing our own database solutions.
Quality: Over 500 successful mandates and ISO certification speak for themselves.
Why we remain different, even as a mature organization: We don’t rely on algorithms; we conduct a "deep dive." We find the "unfindable."

Our statistics consistently show that 5 out of every 10 candidates we place are not actively searching on platforms like LinkedIn. We find these "hidden champions" precisely because we keep looking where others stop.
Diagnostics over gut feeling: We combine our network with rigorous aptitude diagnostics to ensure a strong personal and cultural fit.
Knowledge Management: We don’t just help companies find key talent; we also provide strategic advice on securing and transferring critical know-how within the organization. Eighteen years is a significant milestone. We would like to thank our fantastic team for joining us on this journey, and our clients for the trust they have placed in our work.
We look forward to the next 18 years—as brothers, as partners, and as your headhunters. 🥂