Evergreen Talent Cultivation

The Challenge

01

Our client had identified two flagship strategies to drive future AUM growth: Multi-Sector Fixed Income and European Credit.

02

Both were keystones of the client’s European growth plan and each required an ‘upgrade hire’ that had to be right first time.

03

Both sectors have a small and well-known talent pool. Whole-market coverage was essential to identify the strongest portfolio managers and assess their openness to a move.

The Solution

Best-Fit Research and Talent Cultivation

We applied our Best-Fit Research process to map the top-performing teams in European Credit and Multi-Sector Fixed Income, identifying current trends and advising our client on where the strongest fund managers were concentrated.

Using informal referencing, we identified the candidates most likely to match our client’s culture and investment philosophy, and agreed a target list of preferred candidates with the client.

We approached this select group and facilitated introductory meetings with the client, establishing a dialogue without pressure or commitment on either side.

We maintained regular contact between the preferred candidates and our client over a period of years, allowing the relationship to develop at its own pace and genuine interest to emerge organically.

Testimonial from client

Rupert was instrumental in helping us understand the talent we had in-house: the gaps we had in skills to meet our strategic goals, and the landscape for talent externally. His approach was truly consultative: he never pressured us to take a candidate to complete a search and always kept the culture and fit at the forefront of his mind. Rupert was an indispensable partner and helped us grow our business more than 5x during a decade of engagement with our team. My only hesitation in recommending him is I don’t want him working for the competition

Global CIO Fixed Income, FTSE 100 Global Asset Manager

The Results

<2 yrs

Within two years, Godliman placed a top-decile Institutional Credit Manager as Head of European Credit.

>£30 Bn

Over the last fourteen years, under his leadership, AUM in his franchise have increased to >£30 Bn aum.

<3 yrs

Within three years, Godliman placed a senior Multi-Sector Fund Manager to enable succession planning. Five years on, he became Head of the team.

Case Studies Related Case Studies

Team Build-Out – Real Assets

Building a five-person Real Estate team to internalise a £2bn property portfolio, with Godliman’s advisory work helping to secure board approval for the project.

Retained Team Lift-Out

A global search to identify and place a top-performing Emerging Markets Debt team, which grew AUM from $1.5bn to over $30bn over the following eight years.

Private Credit Team Build

Building a five-person pan-European Private Credit team from scratch across London, Frankfurt and Paris, for a client with no prior illiquid debt capability.