Family Office Recruitment

Exec Capital is a specialist executive recruitment firm with a dedicated family office practice. We place Chief Executives, Chief Financial Officers, investment professionals, company secretaries and operational leadership with single family offices, multi-family offices and family-owned businesses managing private wealth across the UK and internationally. Family office recruitment is a distinct discipline — the candidate profile, the hiring process and the cultural expectations differ fundamentally from corporate executive search, and the pool of genuinely experienced family office professionals is narrow.

The UK family office market has grown substantially over the past decade. The Campden Wealth European Family Office Report estimates there are over 700 family offices operating in the UK, managing assets that typically range from £50m to several billion pounds. London in particular has become one of the world’s leading centres for family office activity, rivalling Zurich and Singapore in terms of the concentration of ultra-high-net-worth families and their associated investment and governance structures. The global wealth management sector has seen consistent growth in family office formation as UHNW individuals seek greater control, privacy and bespoke service than traditional private banks can provide.

Family Office Recruitment Services

Exec Capital’s family office practice covers executive search across all senior functions within the family office structure — from the CEO or Family Office Director who oversees the entire operation, through to the CFO who manages investment reporting and entity structures, the company secretary who maintains governance discipline, and specialist investment professionals who manage specific asset classes. Each search is conducted on a retained, confidential basis.

Family Office CEO and CFO Recruitment

The two most commonly searched roles within family office executive recruitment are the Family Office CEO — sometimes titled Family Office Director or Chief Investment Officer depending on the structure — and the Family Office CFO. Both roles carry specific requirements that differ materially from their corporate equivalents.

A family office CEO must simultaneously manage investment strategy, family governance, operational oversight of often complex multi-entity structures, and the personal and interpersonal dynamics of the founding family. The role demands a combination of institutional investment knowledge, private wealth experience, exceptional discretion and the interpersonal intelligence to navigate family relationships that may span multiple generations with differing objectives. The Institute of Directors and the Chartered Governance Institute both publish guidance on governance structures for private family offices that is worth reviewing when constructing a CEO brief.

A family office CFO must manage consolidated reporting across multiple entities — typically spanning investment portfolios, trading companies, property holdings and personal financial structures — as well as tax planning, treasury, regulatory filings and liaison with external advisers. This requires an individual who is technically proficient as a qualified accountant (typically ACA, ACCA or CPA-qualified) and commercially experienced enough to advise on investment and business decisions at board level. The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales provides useful guidance on financial leadership in private wealth structures.

How to Hire for a Family Office

Hiring for a family office differs from corporate executive recruitment in several important respects. Understanding these differences helps principals and trustees structure a search that actually works:

Confidentiality is not optional. Family offices typically do not wish to advertise the family’s wealth, structure or governance arrangements publicly. Advertising a senior family office vacancy reveals far more than most principals realise — asset scale, structure type, governance approach and the family’s identity can all be inferred. A retained headhunting approach, where the search is conducted entirely through direct confidential outreach, is the only appropriate methodology for most family office appointments.

The candidate pool is genuinely narrow. There are far fewer experienced family office executives than there are family offices seeking to hire them. The pool of individuals who have operated at CFO or CEO level within a family office — rather than within a corporate wealth manager or private bank — is particularly thin. Direct access to this pool through professional relationships, rather than database searches, is essential.

Cultural fit matters more than in corporate search. A family office executive works in a high-trust, high-discretion environment where personal chemistry with the principal family is as important as technical competence. Assessment must go beyond competency interviews to understand interpersonal style, values alignment and long-term commitment.

Compensation structures are non-standard. Family office compensation often involves combinations of salary, carried interest, co-investment rights and discretionary bonuses that differ from corporate structures. The Campden Wealth Global Family Office Report provides useful benchmarking on compensation structures across different family office sizes and geographies.

Types of Family Office — Recruitment Implications

The executive requirements of a family office vary significantly depending on its type and maturity:

Single family offices (SFOs) serve one family exclusively and typically range from lean operations with two to five professionals through to fully staffed institutions managing multi-billion-pound portfolios. A first-generation SFO being established following a liquidity event has very different hiring needs to a third-generation family office with mature governance structures, an investment committee and a professional board.

Multi-family offices (MFOs) serve multiple unrelated families and typically operate more like institutional asset managers, requiring executives with both investment management capability and client relationship skills. The FCA’s authorisation framework applies to most MFOs that manage investments on a discretionary basis, adding a regulatory dimension to senior appointments.

Family investment companies (FICs) and family limited partnerships are increasingly used structures for UK wealth planning following changes to trust taxation. Senior professionals within these structures need to understand both the investment management and the tax and legal framework within which the vehicle operates. The HMRC guidance on family investment companies sets out the key structural and tax considerations.

Family Office Governance and the Role of the Executive

Governance is the foundation of long-term family office success. The most professionally run family offices have clearly defined investment policy statements, family constitutions, conflict of interest policies, and formal review processes for executive performance. The Private Wealth Institute and the Family Wealth Alliance both publish best practice guidance on family office governance structures.

From a recruitment perspective, a family office with clear governance documentation is significantly easier to recruit for — candidates can understand what the role actually involves, what authority they will have, how their performance will be assessed, and who they are accountable to. Exec Capital advises principals on structuring the brief before any search begins, drawing on our experience of what works and what consistently fails in family office executive appointments.

Related Services

Executive Headhunters  ·
Wealth Management Recruitment  ·
Private Equity Recruitment  ·
CEO Recruitment  ·
CFO Recruitment  ·
NED Recruitment  ·
Campden Wealth  ·
ICAEW  ·
Institute of Directors  ·
HMRC — Family Investment Companies