Exclusive: Executive recruitment shop Randall Partners is itself hiring partners, associates

With its bread-and-butter CFO and CEO searches heating up, four-person executive recruitment firm Randall Partners next year plans to more than double its own payroll by adding three to four partners and three to four associates, Private Equity Career News has learned.

Managing Partner Craig Randall (pictured), who founded the business about a year ago, said he's particularly interested in hiring recruiters with expertise and connections in health care services, SaaS businesses, industrials, consumer services and business services. The new hires can be based anywhere in the United States. But they have to be a "great cultural fit" for Randall Partners, he said.

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Gretchen Perkins joins start-up Avance as origination partner

A pioneer in developing the now-ubiquitous role of deal originator, and a high-profile advocate for private equity on Capitol Hill, Gretchen Perkins has joined start-up buyout shop Avance Investment Management to source both platform and add-on investments from her office in Miami.

Perkins spent the last 12 and a half years at Detroit-based buyout shop Huron Capital, a lower-middle-market firm with more than $1.8 billion in committed capital across six funds. As partner Perkins led deal sourcing for the firm and, in recent years, also built relationships with limited partners.

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Founder reveals her thinking behind launch of L2 Point

In an industry that has seen too few women launch their own firms, Kerstin Dittmar last week shared insights into her decision to start San Francisco-based private investment firm L2 Point.

Dittmar (pictured) said that during the first 12 years of her career she "took the less risky approach" of working for other firms. She spent nearly nine of those at TPG Sixth Street Partners, where she and her team worked on special situations and structured finance deals across a range of industries. She left in late 2018.

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New catalysts push industry towards diversity

The social justice movement that gathered steam in the wake of the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis this spring is being felt in the conference rooms of private equity firms.

"What's happened in 2020 has been an accelerant in driving diversity and inclusion in organizations," said Frank Baker, co-founder and managing partner of tech investor Siris Capital Group, speaking yesterday on a panel at the Women in Alternative Investments Virtual Career Forum, which this year admitted nearly 500 scholars.

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Exclusive: Kelly Griffin in, Joe Silver out as Sun Capital managing director of investor relations

Veteran fundraiser Kelly Griffin has taken the reins as managing director, investor relations at Boca Raton, Florida-based turnaround shop Sun Capital Partners, Private Equity Career News has learned.

It's a surprise development. Joe Silver, no longer with the firm, took the same post just 10 months ago. For the previous fourteen and a half years Silver had been a founding partner of boutique placement agency EdgeLine Capital Partners based in Los Angeles and a senior director at its predecessor, according to his Linkedin profile. Executives at Sun Capital declined to comment, and I was unable to reach Silver for comment.

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Boutique i-bank opens search for senior associate/VP

Carter Morse & Goodrich, a Southport, Connecticut-based investment bank located in a former tide mill near Long Island Sound, is looking for a mid-level professional to join a close-knit team that helps family-owned companies find buyers.

"It's a small firm and every hire matters," said Chris Reenock (pictured), a director who joined the firm last year. "We want folks who are serious about their work but who don't take themselves too seriously."

The firm is looking for someone with three to seven years of experience working in M&A or in a related field, such as accounting or corporate finance. You'll join a team of about 10 professionals that at any time might be working on six to eight transactions. Responsibilities range from interfacing with clients to taking the lead on writing CIMs and marketing materials, to managing the financial modeling work of junior professionals. The firm recently hired two first-year analysts.

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Private equity remains lucrative, but year-end bonuses may suffer 

A spate of new compensation studies due out soon surely won't dispel the notion that private equity remains a remunerative endeavor. But pandemic-related delays in fundraising, deals and exits this year could weigh on year-end bonuses for many professionals.

A sneak preview of the Carried Interest and Compensation Survey, 2020 Edition from Chicago-based Private Equity Professional (a business partner of Private Equity Career News) shows just how attractive private equity remains:

* Partners working at funds of all sizes this year earned $379,200 in salary, $265,800 in bonus (for 2019 performance) and $866,700 in carried interest, according to the survey, which included 314 funds, mainly in the United States.

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Novacap to open NYC office, staff with senior, mid-level pros

Canadian private equity shop Novacap plans to open a New York City office to get closer to the deal-making center of gravity in the United States, where the firm has made a number of acquisitions.

Manning the New York City office will be Gordon Hargraves, hired this month to be senior partner-investor relations and strategy. Hargraves most recently served as partner with Richmond, Virginia-based lower-middle- market platform provider PA Capital (Private Advisors). Hargraves will be joined by Ted Mocarski, a senior partner on the technology, media and telecommunications (TMT) team at Novacap.

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EnCap’s upstream team downsizes; clean energy team expands

In what may prove to be a microcosm for the energy sector, EnCap Investments has clipped headcount on its upstream oil-and-gas investment team, even as its clean energy team has grown to eight investment professionals since forming late last year.

The Houston-based private equity shop is one of the largest energy specialists, having invested some $22 billion in more than 240 companies since its founding in 1988. But its upstream team, investing out of a $7 billion pool earmarked for oil and gas producing properties in North America, has lost several senior and mid-level professionals in recent months.

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Partners Group hires Korn Ferry’s Kirsta Anderson as global head of HR

Partners Group, the Zug, Switzerland-based alternative asset manager with some $96 billion in AUM, has hired London-based Kirsta Anderson as managing director, global head of human resources. She has also joined its global executive board.

Anderson appears to be stepping into the shoes of Amelia Räss-Fernandez. A May 11 snapshot of the senior management page on Partners Group's Web site lists Räss-Fernandez as managing director, global head of human resources.

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