The leader you want already has the job.
The person you brief is the person who delivers.
A boutique, founder-led search firm placing the leaders who take assets from discovery to production, across the global natural resources sector: at the board, the C-suite, the country, and the project face. So we go and find them.
A career of mandates across six continents.
One desk in Dubai. Mandates across six continents.
A representative view, not a complete record.
View the coverage as a list
A true search partner. Not a vendor.
The person you brief is the person who delivers.
Templeton Global Search is a boutique firm by design. Every mandate is overseen personally by our founder, who brings 28 years in executive search, 20 of them inside mining and natural resources, alongside the industry relationships and assessment framework built from a career spent in the sector.
Clients work directly with the founder, from first brief to final placement. We serve listed majors, mid-cap operators, junior explorers, and PE-backed portfolio companies: a deliberately selective practice built on long-term relationships rather than transactional volume.
Placing senior leaders since 1998.
For most search firms, natural resources is one sector among many. Here it is the only one, built over two decades in the field. The executives who succeed in these roles are rarely the most visible candidates. They are reached through trust, assessed through rigour, and placed by someone who understands the difference between a CV and a career.
Paul Templeton has recruited senior leaders since 1998, and has specialised in executive search for the mining sector since 2006, including a period at Korn Ferry, one of the world's pre-eminent search firms. He spent 14 years at a leading boutique, where he built the mining practice from the ground up and became part of the leadership team that bought out the founder.
Over that time he has partnered with some of the largest names in the sector, alongside a wide range of mid-caps and junior explorers. Much of his work has centred on remote, complex and emerging operations, where the judgement of whether a candidate will genuinely succeed, not merely whether they look right on paper, is the difference between a placement that lasts and one that fails.
From the largest diversified majors to the junior explorer with a single asset, and the investors behind both.
A representative selection of recently completed searches. Client identities are confidential.
One sector. Leadership only.
We place leaders at four levels only, and run every search personally.
Board & C-Suite
CEO, CFO, COO, and board-level mandates for mining houses, energy companies, and natural resource organisations, including CEO succession planning and planned governance transitions. We assess for character and judgement under pressure, not the credentials a CV already shows.
Country & Regional Leadership
Regional Presidents, Country Managers, and General Managers who answer to a government, a community across the fence, and a head office at once, in jurisdictions where the wrong call is expensive.
Project & Technical Leadership
Programme and Project Directors and senior technical leadership for greenfield, brownfield, and the mine-related infrastructure that brings an asset into production: rail, power, ports, and water. The roles that determine whether capital project execution is delivered on time, on budget, and to reserve.
- Chair & Non-Executive Director
- Chief Executive Officer
- Chief Financial Officer
- Chief Operating Officer
- Chief Development & Sustainability Officer
- Regional President
- Country Manager
- General Manager · Asset
- VP Operations
- Head of External Affairs
- Programme & Project Director
- Study & Construction Director
- VP Projects
- Head of Technical Services
- Processing & Metallurgy Director
From the ground to the grid.
Most search firms recruit for one part of this chain. We work across all of it.
Built to keep the appointment from failing.
Immersive Brief
We invest time at the outset to understand your business, culture, and the precise leadership profile required, beyond the position description.
Market Mapping
A thorough, global mapping of the candidate universe, drawing on our network and proprietary research to identify active and passive talent.
Rigorous Assessment
Structured competency interviews, reference triangulation, and leadership assessment: an unvarnished view of each candidate's suitability.
Close & Transition
We manage the offer process, facilitate onboarding, and remain available during the critical first months of every new appointment.
Long-form analysis on mining leadership.
Long-form analysis on leadership in mining, critical minerals and the energy transition, drawn from senior search across the sector.
Frequently asked questions
Who is Templeton Global Search?
Templeton Global Search is a boutique, founder-led executive search firm based in Dubai focused solely on natural resources: mining, critical minerals and the energy transition. It works with boards and leadership teams on board, C-suite, country and project leadership appointments, with particular focus on leadership-continuity for mid-cap producers.
What sectors does Templeton Global Search cover?
One sector only: natural resources. That means mining and metals, critical minerals such as lithium, cobalt, nickel, copper and rare earths, and the energy transition. Within it, the firm places leaders at four levels: board and C-suite, country and regional leadership, and project and technical leadership.
Where is Templeton Global Search based?
The firm is based at Meydan Grandstand, Nad Al Sheba, Dubai, U.A.E., and works worldwide: completed senior mandates span 42 countries across six continents.
Begin a conversation.
A board seat, a country leader, a project director: whatever the mandate, your enquiry reaches Paul Templeton directly and gets a personal reply.
You will deal with the founder, not a coordinator.
paul@templetonglobalsearch.comAn executive considering a move? Share your details confidentially — candidate approaches are handled with the same discretion as client mandates.