Dave Opton

Founder & CEO ExecuNet

Last Reviewed: September 18, 2026

Executive Summary

Dave Opton is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of ExecuNet, a career-management and networking organization built specifically for senior and C-level executives, which he founded in July 1988 and has led continuously ever since. The premise came directly from his own prior career in corporate human resources: he had spent years on the hiring side, and knew that the executives he recruited had almost nowhere to go when they needed to make a move themselves. Job boards did not exist, senior roles were rarely advertised, and an executive quietly exploring options could not risk being seen doing so. ExecuNet was built as a confidential, members-only environment addressing exactly that problem, and has now operated for more than three and a half decades.

Career Highlights

• Founded ExecuNet in July 1988 and has led it continuously for over thirty-five years.
• Built it into a Forbes-recognized resource for executive career strategy, coaching, and access to select senior roles.
• Applied roughly 35 years of human resources experience to a members-only model built on peer connection rather than transactional job listings.
• Former Vice President of International Personnel at Sterling Drug.
• Former corporate staff personnel manager at Xerox Corporation.
• Holds a BA in American Literature from Indiana University Bloomington.

Professional Journey

Opton took a BA in American Literature at Indiana University Bloomington and built the first phase of his career in corporate human resources. He worked as a personnel manager on the corporate staff at Xerox, then moved to Sterling Drug — the pharmaceutical company later absorbed into what became Sanofi — as Vice President of International Personnel, a role he held until founding ExecuNet.

That decade on the employer side of the table gave him a clear view of an asymmetry. Companies had search firms, HR departments, and networks to find senior talent. Senior talent had almost nothing. An executive between roles, or considering a move, faced a market where the best opportunities were never posted, where approaching a recruiter cold rarely worked, and where any visible search risked their current position. The people best equipped to help each other — other executives who had been through it — had no venue in which to meet.

He founded ExecuNet in July 1988 to be that venue. The model was membership rather than advertising: executives paid to join a confidential network, gaining access to vetted senior opportunities, career coaching, personal-branding guidance, and, critically, one another. The peer element was the durable part. Job listings are a commodity, and the subsequent arrival of online job boards, and later of professional social networks, commoditized them further. What those platforms did not replicate was a closed environment where senior people could speak candidly about a transition without it becoming public.

That focus is why the organization has outlasted most of its contemporaries, operating continuously for more than three and a half decades through several complete transformations of the recruiting industry. Opton has remained its Chief Executive Officer throughout and continues to publish career-strategy guidance for executives navigating moves into C-suite roles.

Education

Indiana University Bloomington

BA, American Literature