Generally, you sit down to a meal or coffee with the executive in question; they answer your questions and try to convince you to join. That conversation might

Generally, you sit down to a meal or coffee with the executive in question; they answer your questions and try to convince you to join. That conversation might span a few sit-downs or extend into e-mails. If you eventually say “yes”, you’ll be funneled into the hiring pipeline midstream, skipping the entire front-end process. It’s largely a formality — HR is told to hire you unless there’s a glaring red flag. When I’ve been in that position, I wasn’t even asked for my resume until after we’d already negotiated my compensation, solely for inclusion in my HR file.