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Non-executive directors (NEDs) play a critical role in the governance and oversight of organisations, providing an independent and objective perspective on strategic decisions. Their experience and insight can be critical in helping companies grow, develop and negotiate periods of rapid change. They can provide a steadying perspective…

As SMEs look to create more value they need to pull the ‘leadership lever’ “We believe that the people in a senior leadership team are the primary levers that the SME and its stakeholders possess to effectively drive their value creation plans.” Our focus Here at Rowan,…

Over the course of the previous 18 months or so, baby products e-com retailer Online4baby has embarked upon a remarkable growth journey. The business’ £40m turnover in 21 was a large increase from 2019’s £14m. This ambition has only grown with time, and the aim is to grow significantly…

If you’re ambitious to take the next step in your career and are looking for a new venture, then a private equity backed business provides a range of opportunities and challenges. It’s a fast moving, competitive world that demands excellence as well as the ability to respond…

In the second episode of the ‘In Conversation With…’ series, Johnathan Massey, the head of our Non-Exec practice, sat down with Malcolm Hughes, Chair; serial Chairman of businesses in a variety of sectors, to discuss the ‘buy and build’ strategy that has brought him consistent success: Part…

Rowan’s banking consultant Iain Duncan weighs in on the Bank of England’s base rate rise to 1.25% on Thursday 16th June. “Last Thursday saw the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee raise the Base Rate to 1.25%, the highest rate in the UK for 13 years. With inflation now expected…

Rowan’s new Life Sciences & Healthcare division, led by Josh Guest, has gained a new Senior Consultant this week: Jennifer Crompton Jenn is focused on appointing industry-specific, scientifically or technically niche senior leadership positions for life sciences companies, such as pharmaceuticals and biotech. With over a decade of…

Rowan’s new trio; Associate Director Tammy Hopla, Senior Consultant Jack Bottomley and Executive Researcher Emma Milton have been featured in a number of publications this week, including Insider Media and Business Up North. Indicative of our upward trajectory, the trio join after a record year (2021) and record quarter (Q1 2022) for Rowan. Since initial…

Kate joins Peter Holt‘s Finance team as an Executive Researcher, replacing the newly promoted Sarah Morrell. She will work on director- and senior manager-level mandates for Pete, Sarah, Carl Meyler, Sara Jackson and Cassie Cherry, alongside fellow Executive Researcher Emma Milton. Kate spent over a decade in primary education and brings a wealth of experience…

We’re delighted to announce Tom’s arrival to Rowan, where he will work in Louise Stephenson (Associate CIPD)‘s Sales & Marketing team. Tom is currently studying for a Business Management degree, and joins over the Summer, where he will work closely with Louise, Lexi Graty, Scott Wilkinson BA, MIRP and Fiona Flack on senior…

The Finance Directors’ network, hosted by Rowan Executive Search in association with Barclays, MHA Moore and Smalley and Baker Tilly, returns to the Allerton Manor Golf Club in Liverpool on the 14th of June. At this event we welcome a panel of speakers, including Jocelyn Morgan, Greg Doran, Kieran Donovan, Andrew Feeke and Stephen Gregson, who will be sharing their thoughts…

A huge congratulations to the Finance team’s Sarah Morrell, who recently made the step up from Executive Researcher to Associate Director! Sarah works alongside Peter Holt, Carl Meyler, Cassie Cherry and Sara Jackson, and will now lead on Finance leader and future leader appointments for our SME clients in the North and further…

Johnathan Massey, the head of our Non-Exec practice, sat down recently with Martin Boddy – NX Chairman at 6B, Space 48 and Money Alive and former CEO in the Regtech and Fintech space – to discuss how best to use data and data analytics to boost value creation. Part 1 of 3….

This time last week we were taking in the sites of our Northern neighbour’s capital, and a few of us were nursing sore heads from whiskey-tasting the day before! Business growth is our priority, but our ESG efforts are equally important to us; so we make sure…

You may or may not be aware, but this week is Mental Heath Awareness Week, led by The Mental Health Foundation. This is something we take very seriously here at Rowan, with flexible working, regular team catch-up calls and numerous trips and outings (the next one being tomorrow…

We’re delighted to welcome our newest Rowan team member, Jack Bottomley, to the business. Jack joins Louise Ellis‘ HR & Ops practice, alongside Gemma Mafe and Jennie Adamson, and will work with our SME clients to match and appoint SMT-level talent to drive business growth from an operational perspective. Jack graduated in 2016…

As we say here at Rowan Executive Search, “it’s all about the people”. And in today’s talent-short market, the right people, culture and opportunities for progression are more important than ever to the success of a growing business. So, what can an ambitious, growing SME do to ensure…

We’re very excited to announce our newest Associate Director-level hire: Tammy Hopla! Tammy is an ACCA-qualified Finance Director, who is using her considerable commercial experience, finance industry knowledge and extensive network of contacts to pivot into a senior position within Rowan. She will work in the C-Suite team…

Time flies! Our banking and financial Consultant Iain Duncan is celebrating his one-year anniversary with Rowan today. Iain has become an integral part of our set-up; bringing his practical experience, banking insight and the business contacts he’s made over the years to Rowan in an advisory capacity, working closely…

Choosing an Executive Search partner can be difficult: there are few barriers to entry in the industry and plenty of businesses to choose from. Rowan Executive Search is widely known as the North’s leading Search provider for the SME, so what is it we do that makes…

Recently Louise Stephenson (Associate CIPD) and Peter Holt ran a highly successful event with HSBC at The Ivy for digital marketing leaders and SME owners. Speakers included Online4baby‘s Tom Fotheringham and HSBC‘s James Sawley, but what were our key takeaways? 1. Covid forced many businesses to pivot online to stay alive and for many newer businesses, this gave…

Johnathan joined Rowan to head up our Non-Executive and Chair division, having gained a wealth of experience and developed a number of relationships in this world during his previous careers across private equity and corporate finance. However, as Rowan has grown over the past 12 months taken…

Rowan Executive Search and HSBC‘s joint event at The Ivy Manchester last week was a roaring success! We were brilliantly catered for by The Ivy with an outstanding 2-course breakfast, and HSBC’s James Sawley was a great host, who had some real insight to share. Special thanks also to guest speaker Online4baby‘s Tom Fotheringham….

We focus on our clients and candidates most of the time. After all, our mantra here at Rowan is, “People-Powered Growth”. But who are the people that make us what we are, and what do they do on a day-to-day basis to help us maintain our status…

Today is International Women’s Day, and we asked our own Molly Chalfont Pollard to contribute some thoughts on how Rowan attempts to #Breakthebias. Molly is passionate about intersectional feminism and is also a contributing writer for Our Words, the book club and magazine of Our Streets Now, a campaign demanding the…

As we say here at Rowan, “it’s all about the people”, and we wouldn’t be the industry leader we are without our fantastic employees. Today just so happens to be ‘National Employee Appreciation day’, and we want to take a minute to appreciate everyone in the business;…

Eco-friendly baby care products retailer Mypura has secured a £4.25m investment from private equity firm Maven Capital Partners. Guy Fennell, Mypura founder and CEO, said: “Maven’s investment and expertise will help us scale up to the next level in 2022. Ultimately, the funding will help us make it…

We’ve talked at length about the value system that underpins everything we do here at Rowan; from our candidate care to the way we work with our clients on appointing leaders and future leaders, to our own internal recruitment policy. Those values are:AuthenticityCommitmentProgressivenessCollaborationRigour Let’s look at the…

We’ve talked at length about the value system that underpins everything we do here at Rowan; from our candidate care to the way we work with our clients on appointing leaders and future leaders, to our own internal recruitment policy. Those values are: AuthenticityCommitmentProgressivenessCollaborationRigour Let’s look at…

A year ago to the day, Rowan hired Luke Williams (this post’s author) to a newly created, internal position within the business – Content Designer. Everybody knows Paul Waite and the rest of Rowan’s Directors and Associate Directors, but what goes on behind the scenes here at Rowan? What do I…

We’ve been picked up again by Insider Media, amongst others, for our recent hires of Lexi Graty, Molly Chalfont Pollard, Sara Jackson and Jennie Adamson. True to our values-based recruitment strategy, three of our four new ‘Rowanites’ come to us with no prior recruitment or Search experience. Lexi and Jennie have backgrounds in…

Congratulations to the Finance team’s Carl Meyler, who has recently been promoted to a Director position at Rowan Executive Search. A ‘Rowanite’ of almost 8 years, Carl was here when the Finance team was in its infancy. He’s had a real hand in the strategic direction and success of…

We’ve added further capacity to our Executive Search and Assessment offering with the opening of Rowan Life Sciences Division. Read the full story in TheBusinessDesk.com here: https://www.thebusinessdesk.com/northwest/news/2092591-executive-search-firm-boosts-life-sciences-service-with-acquisition

Today is ‘International Family Business Day’, so we sat down with long-time Rowan client Stephen Lord, the 4th-generation owner of industrial services supplier the John Lord Group (comprised of Canal Engineering Ltd, Rizistal, John Lord Specialist Flooring and SLS Design), who shared his thoughts on the challenges & considerations when running…

It’s the 8-year Rowan anniversary of Associate Director Katie Seabrook; employee number 6 and one of the first ‘Rowanites’ to join after the business was started by the founders over a decade ago. Since then, Katie has taken the Finance market by storm, achieving improved results year-on-year,…

Rowan Executive Search has been picked up by BusinessLive, amongst other publications, for its help supporting E-commerce retailer Online4baby restructure its Senior Leadership Team, in order to drive business growth. Rowan’s Finance practice Director Peter Holt and Sales and Marketing practice Director Louise Stephenson (Associate CIPD) worked with the business to appoint new CFO Nick Cooling and…

Massive congratulations to Executive Researcher Sarah Morrell, who celebrates her seven-year anniversary today with Rowan Executive Search! Typical of Rowan’s value-based internal recruitment policy, Sarah comes from a legal background, having started her career as a Paralegal after attaining a Law degree. She showed great aptitude for the job,…

An excellent effort from our Chair/NED practice Associate Director Johnathan Massey, as he undertakes the NSPCC‘s 23km Walk for Children with Freshwalks next Friday night. Two of our values (aside from authenticity, progressiveness and rigour) are commitment and collaboration, and John and his team will certainly need these as they hike…

In keeping with our values-based recruitment policy, Rowan recruited Claire from Archive Solutions, where, as Managing Director, she successfully oversaw an exit and trade sale to Restore plc. Claire loves helping others, and wanted to support other SMEs on their growth journeys after leaving Archive. She initially joined…

*Rowan Exit Stories* ~LDC successfully exits Rowan client SRL Traffic Systems after £24m investment~ Rowan has worked closely with SRL over a number of years, appointing a number of key hires: CFO Mike Marrison, CFO Designate John McLaughlin and Marketing Manager Stuart Coleman. LDC’s John Clarke said: “Richard [Richard Tredwin: CEO and now Non-Exec…

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…or at least it was last night as the Rowan team got together for a Christmas night out. It was great to be back together in person and if the volume of laughter around the table was anything to go…

~ The 10 questions to ask your Executive Search firm ~ As an SME owner with a critical leadership (or future leadership) appointment to make, you’re understandably keen to get it right first time. There is a wide choice of organisations offering true Executive Search services, but…

Rowan’s Paul Waite, Mark Fahy and Claire Powell worked together on this appointment, which follows Ian Storey‘s promotion to group COO at the time of the Stockport-based tech ‘recommerce’ business’ IPO.  Matthew said: “I am extremely excited to be joining a business of musicMagpie’s calibre and ambition.  “Given its unique circular economy model…

Last week we announced our investment from the LCap Group, which also owns Drax Executive and technology consultancy Aavistus. This, and our subsequent expansion across the North-West and beyond, has created a number of key opportunities within the business, at varying seniority levels. But just who are we looking…

Peter Holt, Rowan’s Head of Finance and de facto ‘Number 2’ to Paul Waite, celebrates his 9-year anniversary with Rowan today. Peter, who has worked with Paul for a total of 22 years now, has racked up some impressive achievements: – Rowan’s Finance practice performance has grown 10-fold…

Congratulations to all of the winners at last night’s Insider’s North West Dealmakers Awards 2021. We are proud to sponsor the Deal of the Year (£10m to £50m) category for another year and last night’s worthy winners were LDC for their investment into vehicle accessory manufacturer Rhino Products Ltd. We…

The SME Owner’s Podcast: Season 1, Episode 3 – “Getting the best ROI from Sales & Marketing, with Rowan’s Head of Sales & Marketing Practice Louise Stephenson” Direct link: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1753092/9386705 Amazon/Spotify/Apple links to follow.. Rowan’s MD Paul Waite sits down with our Head of Sales and Marketing Practice Louise Stephenson (Associate…

People-Powered Growth: Louise Ellis’ Maiden Rowan Anniversary Our philosophy here at Rowan is simple: appoint the right people for our clients and their businesses will grow. Put succinctly: “People-Powered Growth.” However, that mantra applies internally as well; we can only grow as a business by bringing the…

Today is World Values Day with a broad theme of ‘reconnecting’.   “We are all living through a time of enormous uncertainty and disruption. This means we need to deepen our understanding of values and how they connect us with our sense of self, with others, and with the wider world.” -> https://lnkd.in/dYKdxBA At Rowan,…

We’re all about business growth, but as a people-centric business with a very tight-knit, supportive team, we also take our ESG (Environmental, Governance and Social) responsibilities very seriously as well. We’re proud to promote good mental health and wellbeing here at Rowan, and studies have shown that…