Asset Director

Client / Mandate complexity

A growing secondaries fund was seeking to bring in their first value creation professional to develop their capability in supporting their GP-led stakes deals. The Partner leading the GP-led stakes deal team identified a need to develop an internal function to support the team by providing focus on value creation, more robust governance and monitoring post deal.

Constraints or sensitivities

This is a relatively new function for many secondaries funds, where often a Senior Investment Partner plays this role, but as firms grow, more funds are seeking to address the issue, often by placing experienced Investment Directors into the seat. As a consequence, only larger US funds had already invested in the function and so there was no one to approach in the UK market with prior experience of the role.

Market mapping and intelligence

To source the best people, we looked at investment professionals from secondaries funds, direct investment professionals from LP’s and M&A Advisory firms, as well as consultants who knew the secondaries market.

Candidate evaluation process

As this was a new role, the remit was initially unclear. The search therefore focused on finding someone with the right technical capability and personality to shape the position as it developed. A key part of our work was clearly communicating the opportunity to candidates and helping the client define how the role would operate. We also designed a panel interview based on a live case study, allowing both sides to test how the role might work in practice. Throughout the process, we shared examples of how larger funds had built similar value creation functions, helping the client think about the longer-term development of the role.

Successful placement details

The search concluded with the appointment of an experienced investment professional from an LP, who had a strong background in supporting value creation.