How the Tables Are Turning in Recruitment

Traditionally, family offices have looked to other parts of the financial sector to hire the bulk of staff, bringing in those with experience at asset managers or banks to operate the business. Recruiters will scour these firms for the talent that they think will be a good fit for the family and that individual will pivot to the family office side. 

But recently I’ve been told that the flow of talent is reversing, as large institutional groups with family office capabilities — or aspirations to that end — look to hire from within single family offices.

Just in the U.S., the number of organizations setting up shop to offer family office support services or investment strategies is staggering — and only likely to keep growing. Populating those teams requires an in-depth knowledge of the industry that SFO veterans are best placed to provide.

Brian Adams, partner at recruitment firm Mack International, told me that it was actually at II’s family office event at Laguna Beach that he realized the true extent of how expansive the family office support industry has become. But finding the right people to run teams is proving difficult for some.

“There’s huge variability between who has family office credibility and who doesn’t, and for platforms that pull people from other institutional worlds that just don’t really know the family office space, it’s going to be a real challenge,” he said. “Whereas people who have networks and connections are going to gain traction a lot quicker.”

He referred to informal networks of family office leaders that take place across the country, such as cocktail parties or dinner events, where real networking can occur.

Yet the challenge faced by would-be hirers of family office talent is that people at family offices do not tend to have aspirations for the sell side. “It's going to be very tricky to find the right person that feels comfortable taking on that role,” Adams said. “It could be a great opportunity but you’ve got to find somebody that not only knows family office, but has comfort building transactionally oriented relationships.”

Other attributes of family office staff also make them attractive job candidates, including their flexibility and adaptability.

During a call a couple of weeks ago, the leader of a family office told me that a recruiter had called him to ask for advice on this very topic. The firm was looking for someone that had deep knowledge of the operational components of portfolio management and research, but was not just pigeonholed to that vertical. “Family offices wear lots of hats, and that the arena was the right place to pluck from to get a broader skill set,” he said.