The market for hiring top executives in India is surging with many executive search firms reporting 100% growth in hiring since last year, reports The Economic Times. Hiring mandates, the firms say, have picked up in the last two months, driving some to expand their operations to meet the demand. The demand is not only for replacement hiring, to find a leader for a post that's gone vacant, but also for growth hiring, which are for new roles being created by companies through expansions. "What used to be 90% replacement hiring and 10% growth hiring is now 70% replacement hiring versus 30% growth hiring. A significant uptake in growth hiring is a positive sign," said Ronesh Puri, managing director of executive search firm Executive Access India.

Pankaj Arora, managing director of management at Russell Reynolds Associates, said executive hiring is predominantly driven by growth that came with the liquidity and the post-Covid rebound.