Sepcialist Recruitment for Found-led firms

Specialist Recruitment for
Growth & Founder-Led Companies

Supporting founders, PE-backed leadership teams, and ambitious privately owned businesses through the senior hires that define the next stage of growth.

Start a conversation

Who we work with

Growth and founder-led businesses share a common challenge: the hiring decisions that got you here are rarely the ones that take you further. We work with three types of business at this stage.

Founder-led businesses

Privately owned, founder-managed businesses at an inflection point, whether that is first external investment, a leadership transition, succession planning, or preparing for a sale. The founder is still the decision-maker and the culture is still their fingerprint.

PE-backed businesses

Businesses with private equity backing that need to build or upgrade the leadership team to meet the demands of the investment thesis. The clock is running and the investor has expectations. Speed, quality, and cultural fit all matter in equal measure.

High-growth privately owned

Ambitious, scaling businesses that have grown beyond the team that built them and need senior hires to match the next stage, without the institutional infrastructure of a listed or PE-backed company behind them.

The hire that changes the trajectory of the business

In a growth or founder-led business, a senior hire lands differently than it does in a large corporate. There is no committee to share the decision. There is no established team to absorb a misstep. When a CFO, COO, or commercial leader joins your business, they shape it from day one.

We work with founders and leadership teams who understand that. They are not looking for a recruiter who will send them a shortlist and step back. They want a search partner who will challenge the brief where it needs challenging, be honest about the candidate market, and stay close to the process until the right person is in the role.

That is what we do. Our sister company Fram Search has a strong track record across financial services, bringing a level of market knowledge and candidate access that generalist firms cannot match.

The hiring moments we are built for

Growth and founder-led businesses generate a recognisable set of senior hiring needs. The context varies, but the decisions tend to follow the same pattern.

The first CFO or Finance Director

The moment a founder realises the finance function needs professional leadership is one of the most consequential hiring decisions they will make. Too junior and the business outgrows the hire within twelve months. Too corporate and the culture suffers. We find the right level for where the business actually is, not where it hopes to be.

The COO who frees the founder

When a founder is spending more time running the business than growing it, the COO hire is overdue. We recruit operational leaders who can take the day-to-day off the founder's plate without imposing a corporate operating model on a business that does not need one.

Commercial leadership ahead of a growth push

A Head of Sales or Commercial Director who can build a function rather than just manage one. The profile is specific: someone who has done it before at a similar stage, in a business without the safety net of an established brand or a large marketing budget.

PE-backed leadership upgrade

Private equity investors typically have a clear view of the team changes required to deliver the investment thesis. We work with PE-backed businesses to make those changes quickly and well, whether that means recruiting into a new role or finding a replacement for an incumbent who has reached their ceiling.

Founder succession planning

Succession is rarely a single hire. It is a process: identifying who can take on what, over what timeline, and how to manage the transition without disrupting the business or unsettling the team. We support founders who are thinking about this seriously, not just looking for a replacement name on an org chart.

Pre-sale or pre-investment leadership strengthening

A business preparing for sale or a significant investment round is often advised to strengthen its leadership team before going to market. The right senior hire at this stage can materially affect the valuation conversation. We understand that context and run searches with the appropriate urgency and discretion.

Fram Professionals

sister company of

Fram Search

A track record that runs deeper in financial services

Fram Professionals is the sister company of Fram Search, a specialist executive search firm with over sixteen years of experience placing senior talent at growth-stage and founder-led businesses across financial services in the UK.

That track record is directly relevant to the growth and founder-led businesses we work with. This is particularly true for those in financial services, fintech, and adjacent sectors where the candidate market is specialist and relationships matter. We are not learning this market. We have been operating in it for sixteen years.

For businesses outside financial services, we bring the same search rigour and the same commitment to getting it right, built on a model that has been tested through every market condition since 2008.

Visit Fram Search

How we work

Fram Professionals offers retained executive search and contingent recruitment, applying the same direct-approach methodology to both.

We work on a fully retained basis for senior, confidential or business-critical appointments. For other hires, our exclusive contingent service applies the same active search methodology.

That means dedicated resource from day one, a properly managed process, and complete discretion.

In a growth environments, that discretion is not a courtesy - it is a commercial necessity.

Learn more