Our team had the chance to attend and sponsor the Hunt Scanlon September 2022 PE Conference in San Francisco – Driving Growth & Value Through Effective Leadership. Along with listening to thought leaders share their insights on a variety of panels, our Founder & CEO, Sean Mooney, also had the chance to sit on a panel hosted by Jennifer Perry of FMG Leading. The panel covered the topic of identifying and developing non-c-suite roles that have an outsized impact on value creation and included fellow thought leaders Raj Karanam of Sun Capital Partners, Kate Berkeley of Gryphon Investors, Darcy Casarella of New Enterprise Associates, Kevin Kernan of JM Search, and Valerie Frederickson of Frederickson Partners.
It was great to gather with so many thought leaders in the private equity human capital space at the Hunt Scanlon event. Here are some of the key takeaways we gleaned from Sean’s panel & the others:
- Human capital continues to be a growing priority in private equity. A common theme from fellow attendees was recognition that talent-focused conversations weren’t prominent in PE as recent as 2 years ago, and many human capital leaders are either new to private equity, or to the human capital function. This was a topic we also discussed at our August 2022 PE Human Capital Forum (RSVP for our upcoming human capital event here).
- A strong human capital function has 3 key components: people, processes, & technology.
- People: Firms are taking a more proactive approach in getting the right people in place internally to assess and facilitate talent decisions.
- Processes: Human capital leaders are ensuring they have effective processes in place for building/managing networks, talent pipelines, and interview processes.
- Technology: In order to support their people and their processes, firms are leveraging technology to help them.
- Talent to value is more important than ever. While getting the C-suite right remains the top & most critical priority, understanding what talent below the C-suite generates outsized value to their role, and then getting that talent right, is of growing importance in turbulent economic times. Identifying & assessing these roles is helpful immediately post-investment and if right sizing needs to occur.
- Talent is becoming increasingly integrated with value creation plans. Leading firms are incorporating talent strategy into value creation plans from the get-go to ensure there is alignment.
Human capital continues to be the largest functional area in the BluWave Activity Index. We support clients with their human capital needs through everything from connecting them with pre-close recruiters, interim CFOs, & more. Let us connect you to the exact-fit human capital resources you need –start your project.
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