Attention general counsel: When you have an opening to fill, are you sure that the person you really want to hire even knows you are hiring?

While there will always be more attorneys seeking in-house positions than there are openings, sourcing a great hire is more challenging than ever for several reasons:

1. Unemployment among attorneys with in-house experience is historically low.
2. Desirable candidates are busier than ever and therefore less likely to be monitoring job boards.
3. Internal recruiters in your HR department struggle when asked to identify and proactively contact the right currently employed prospects.
4. Your company may be highly resistant to using a search firm for openings below the C-suite level due to HR policies controlling those engagements.

To clarify, this month's advice is not about the vetting process. Whether or not you use a search firm to add its judgment and advice, ultimately you have to make the selection. Vetting is not nearly as nuanced or challenging as others in my line of work want you to believe. Winners reveal themselves and become obvious to everyone.

If you are not seeing winners who match what you need in a critical hire, don't settle. My self-serving, but I believe correct, advice is to use a legal search firm. This may require a political battle with your colleagues in HR. If your CEO will allow it, though, the easier path is to simply pay for the recruiter from your law department budget and take ownership of the engagement.

Make no mistake: A search firm is your best option for getting access to so-called passive candidates, the ones who otherwise would not be aware of your opening. Proactive and expert sourcing is the most important part of a search firm's value proposition.

If search firm use is simply not going to happen for you, here are two other suggestions for improving your access to winners:

1. Consider hiring from the ranks of your best outside law firms when possible. While this means forgoing someone with in-house experience, you likely know who you value. And you may even be able to lure someone over to start out on a secondment basis to see if the fit is right.

2. Invest your own time and take a DIY approach. Don't just rely on your internal recruiter. Post the opening on your LinkedIn news feed. Email the opening to your contact network. I know one general counsel who even offered her company's skybox for a concert as a thank you for a winning candidate referral.

Every general counsel understands the importance of hiring the right people.

Take your time. And do your best to take control of the process.

Mike Evers recruits attorneys for corporate legal departments throughout the United States. Visit www.everslegal.com. His firm also offers experienced in-house counsel to companies on an adjunct basis.