How Atlas Helped Sudale Search & Select Reduce Executive Search Time by 50%

About Sudale Search & Select

Sudale Search & Select is an executive search consultancy based in London, UK, specialising in senior leadership hiring across Customer Experience, Customer Support, Contact Centre Operations, and Customer Success. 

The consultancy works primarily with startups and scale-ups, including fast-growing and VC- or PE-backed businesses, helping them hire leaders who can address core operational and growth challenges.  It places a strong emphasis on candidate experience, trust, and long-term retention, with many placements remaining in role for several years, reflecting a highly considered and insight-led approach to executive hiring.

We spoke with Kerry Sudale, the founder of Sudale Search & Select, about Atlas and how it transformed her daily work, saved her time, and enabled her to double her workload without doing extra work.

Watch the full interview below, or continue reading to learn more!

How Did Atlas Transform Kerry’s Daily Work?

Before using Atlas, Kerry relied on multiple CRM systems, spending significant time on manual administration, data entry, note-taking, follow-ups, and reminders. This was particularly challenging as a parent with limited flexibility, where interruptions such as school calls could easily derail admin tasks, and she emphasized that missing small follow-through moments can quickly erode trust, especially in senior leadership hiring. 

She first encountered Atlas at the Recruitment Agency Expo in London in March and has followed the platform since its early days, becoming closely involved both as an advisor and an active user. 

Since adopting Atlas, Kerry’s daily workflow has been significantly transformed. She can now create stronger job adverts directly from briefing transcripts rather than relying on generic job descriptions, while also pulling insights quickly for shortlists and client updates. As she put it: 

Yep, so in terms of productivity, it has been a massive increase from being able to do the number of interviews that you can do, all of the follow-up for, and how speedily you can do it, how quickly you can send the shortlists and things like that.

By keeping communication more succinct and relying on automated enrichment to maintain her database, she has freed up valuable time to focus on relationship-driven business development. 

It makes it easier for shortlisting.

Kerry’s Number One Atlas Feature 

One of Kerry’s favorite features is the Atlas AI note-taker. When she was asked about that question, she immediately replied, saying:

Everybody’s always asking me what note taker I use, because what mine captures versus what theirs captures is loads better,  it’s my absolute favorite.

It captures conversations with a level of detail, structure, and accuracy that she hasn’t seen in other tools. It reliably picks up context, decisions, and key insights from meetings, which allows her to send clear, high-quality follow-ups without having to rewrite or manually piece information together afterward. 

This not only saves time but also improves trust with clients and candidates, as she can quickly share well-structured summaries that reflect exactly what was discussed.

So I just ask AI to give me a report to send to a customer, and it produces it so well that my customers say, ‘My god, it’s like you crawled into my head and put these out on the paper.’

She noted that clients and contacts frequently ask what note-taking tool she uses, as the quality and clarity of her follow-ups and reports consistently stand out. Many are surprised to learn that it’s built directly into Atlas.

From Weeks to Days: The Productivity Impact of Atlas

Kerry highlighted a significant improvement in productivity since adopting Atlas, particularly in how much time it has saved across the recruitment lifecycle. She explained that tasks which traditionally slowed down executive search, such as interview documentation, reporting, shortlisting, and follow-ups, are now completed far more quickly and with greater consistency. 

In practical terms, Atlas has enabled her to reduce the length of a typical headhunt search by around 50%, cutting research and reporting phases from roughly six weeks down to about three. This time saving is especially valuable for clients relying on costly interim leaders, as it shortens vacancy periods and reduces operational risk. 

Beyond search delivery, Atlas has also streamlined post-placement administration, including document handling and invoicing, removing hours of manual work and allowing her to reinvest that time into client relationships and business development rather than admin.

It’s halved a traditional search, what would usually take six weeks, I can now do in three.

Why Atlas Customer Support Makes the Difference

One of the most important things is the customer support of a platform, because it’s all technology; maybe there’s a bug somewhere, maybe an update causes an issue, or maybe it’s something minor that still needs to be fixed quickly. And when that happens, you need fast replies, easy solutions, and a team you can trust.

Kerry highlighted this strongly in our discussion, explaining that with other CRM systems, she experienced a lot of “deflection” and slow response times, which can be damaging when you’ve promised a client a shortlist by a certain time.

With Atlas, she said the team is “nimble,” support is responsive, making the experience feel reliable and genuinely helpful when it matters most.

Response times and how quickly you can get to a human are really valuable.

What Atlas Means to Kerry

Atlas is more than just a recruitment CRM. It helps recruiters focus on what really matters: clear insight, relevant information, and getting things done. Instead of overcomplicating workflows with heavy integrations or forced personalisation, Atlas turns everyday conversations and data into practical insights recruiters can actually use.

She also highlights how accessible the product is, noting that Atlas is easy to understand and adopt because recruiters can watch real demos and Loom videos that show exactly how features work in practice and guide users step by step. 

Its AI supports recruiters by surfacing patterns and shared challenges, helping them make better decisions rather than just personalising surface details.

As Kerry explains, the real value lies in how the system supports decision-making and follow-through: 

It’s really easy to leverage data to create insights that are easily shareable for your candidates and clients without spending hours on research.

She also highlights that Atlas reduces noise and admin, allowing recruiters to scale without losing quality:

 It’s removed the need for admin days; everything just pops up in the to-do list.

Ultimately, Atlas enables recruiters to work smarter and faster, helping them increase the volume whilst keeping the quality the same, which is why Kerry describes the platform as “intuitive, intelligent, and insight-centric.”