Executive search for private equity.

A sponsor hires differently

A corporate hires for stewardship. The question is whether someone can run the function well for the next five years.

A sponsor hires against a plan with a date on it. The question is narrower and harder: can this person deliver this change, in this business, before the hold period closes. Tenure counts for less than evidence. A twenty-year career at one company tells you about loyalty, not about what happens when the systems are taken away and the reporting has to be rebuilt from nothing.

That difference is the whole brief. It is why a strong corporate CFO so often struggles inside a portfolio company, and why the search has to be run against the ownership context rather than against a job description.

When sponsors engage us

At a carve-out. The parent's finance function leaves with the parent. Someone has to stand up reporting, controls and a close process on a transitional services clock the seller controls. More on the carve-out finance gap.

After a take-private. Public company reporting rhythms do not survive contact with a leveraged balance sheet. The function usually needs rebuilding around cash.

When the first institutional money arrives. A founder or family business that has never reported to an investor needs a finance leader who can speak to a board without turning the company into a bureaucracy.

Mid buy-and-build. Acquisitions arrive faster than integration. The reporting has to stay clean while the company keeps changing shape.

Ahead of exit. Diligence finds what the numbers cannot withstand. That work starts eighteen months out, not three.

What we screen for

Delivery under ownership pressure, not title progression.

• Transformation delivery. Evidence of change delivered under time pressure.
• Carve-out and separation. Standing up a finance function as the parent's systems withdraw.
• Value creation plan. The sponsor's thesis turned into operational targets and delivery.
• Buy-and-build integration. Acquired teams, entities and functions brought into one rhythm.
• Performance turnaround. Margin and cash recovered in businesses under real pressure.
• Exit readiness. The business, and its numbers, built to withstand diligence.

Which of these matters most depends on the transaction rather than the sector. Which deal types actually create a vacancy.

How the search runs

Retained, and deliberately small. Searches are run by the principal, not handed to a research team. We map comparable companies directly rather than working a database, which is how we reach people who are not visible to the wider market and are not expecting a call.

The work is confidential by default. Candidate names, portfolio company details and live mandates are discussed once the right basis is in place, and not before.

Coverage

London office. Within Europe the focus is the United Kingdom, Benelux, DACH and the Nordics, working in Dutch, English, German and French. We also run European mandates for US sponsors holding assets on this side of the Atlantic.