Corporate Brochure

JLI-Boston is a retainer-based executive search firm whose exclusive focus is the plastics industry. Plain and simple.

Mission

JLI-Boston was established to provide comprehensive and reliable executive search assistance exclusively to a small, well-defined group of non-competing clients in the plastics and packaging industries--many of which were actively seeking higher levels of service and reliability than had traditionally been provided by the contingency-based recruiters or franchise "agencies" they had formerly used.

As a retainer search firm, we can support your organization's current and future needs throughout the U.S. in three key ways:

• Comprehensive, timely searches for the plastics industry's Best-in-Class leaders, professionals, and teams composed of these people,
• Research and counseling on corporate compensation practices and programs, and
• Confidential strategic and and organizational analysis, including succession planning.

JLI-Boston traditionally "partners" closely with its clients, applying its considerable plastics industry expertise and insight on their behalf to successfully conduct critical search projects in the complex world of plastics. By working closely with senior management, JLI-Boston has provided its clients with the critical professional talent they need at all levels of their operations--senior executive, senior management, technical, sales/marketing, and manufacturing.

Our primary responsibility in all of this--one that we take very seriously--is to identify and attract the plastics industry's Best-in-Class professionals--strong leaders and brilliant specialists who will impact our client's interests, capabilities, and market position. Consistently meeting this challenge requires JLI-Boston to have:

• A deep understanding of each client's business objectives, management culture, and competitive environment,
• Long-term relationships with many of the industry's brightest professionals, some of whom may be currently seeking advancement outside their current organizations,
• A search approach that is thorough, creative, selective, and discrete.

The end-result? A long-term partnership built by improving each client's strategic position every time we assist, thereby consistently contributing to the client's long-term successes and growth, time and again.

Process

Each search is custom-planned and conducted on an exclusive basis for our clients. It begins by building a thorough understanding of the client's organization--its history, culture, products, markets, and long-term objectives, with particular attention focused on the success factors required in such an environment.

This deep understanding enables a more selective and thorough search process, leading to a more finely-tuned selection of prospective managers and others who can best contribute and advance the company toward its business objectives. In short, we're sharpshooters.

Our search approach is flexible and custom-planned for each client, but most assignments share the following:

• Joint development of a detailed Position Description.
  
• Identification and preliminary profiling of carefully-selected "Long List" candidates.
• Joint determination of the resultant "Short List".
  
• Face-to-face interviews with the "Short List" candidates.
  
• Logistics support for subsequent candidate interviews at selected client sites.
• Detailed, concurrent final referencing.
• Assistance in formulating and negotiating the final offer, as desired.

Experience

JLI-Boston has provided clients with search support in a wide range of management and specialized individual contributor search assignments in the U.S. and Western Europe over the years. Most of our searches are U.S. based with base salary targets in the $60,000 - $150,000+ range (exclusive of bonus, commissions, or other incentive compensation).

• Functional Experience
  • Senior Management. (President, VP, General Management.)
  • Sales/Marketing. (Management, Product Management, Market Development, Field Sales, e-Business, etc.)
    
  • Engineering. (Management, Plant, Process, Tech Service, Design, CAE, Applications, etc.)
    
  • Manufacturing / Operations. (Plant Management, Project, Engineering, Process.)
    
  • Research & Development. (Management, Scientific, Applied, Product Development.)
    
  • Corporate /Staff. (Corporate Planning, Market Research, Management Consulting, etc.)

• Sector Experience
  • Resins and Compounds. (Commodity, Engineering, Specialty)
  • Processing. (Injection molding, extrusion, blow molding, compounding, thermoforming, etc.)
    
  • Parts/Components. (Molded, Sheet, Film, Bottles, Multilayer, etc.)
    
  • Distribution. (Resins, Compounds.)
  • e-Business.

• Market Experience
  • Automotive
  • Building and Construction
  • Computer / Business Equipment
  • Consumer / Industrial
  • Electrical / Electronic
  • Medical
  • Packaging
  • Telecommunications

Management

Nick Fountas is JLI-Boston's Managing Director and key principal, providing over 25 years of experience in the plastics, packaging, and medical device industries. Since 1990, Mr. Fountas has been engaged in a broad variety of senior- and mid-level searches for U.S. and European firms engaged in the plastics industry--mainly well-known suppliers of plastic resins, compounds, injection molding, and other plastics processing services. He lead-manages every search assignment conducted by JLI-Boston, supported by the firm's team of recruiters and research professionals.

Since earning a BS Plastics Engineering from the University of Lowell (now U. Mass.-Lowell), Mr. Fountas has been continuously engaged in a range of professional activities in the plastics industry. He began his professional career as Technology and Marketing Editor for Plastics World magazine. After completing his M.B.A. at New York University, his subsequent management consulting work included over 60 strategy, acquisition, and competitive intelligence projects for global plastics and chemicals clients in the U.S., Europe, and Japan.

His community service work includes Board of Directors of three important industry groups--the Injection Molding and Medical Plastics Divisions of the Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) and the Plastics Advisory Board at U. Mass-Lowell. In addition, he frequently serves as a moderator at technical conferences sponsored by the SPE and SPI.