Mastella Search finds the senior leaders who let family and founder-owned businesses keep going, and keep growing, without depending on one person. We find the managing director, operations or finance director, or non-executive the business needs next, confidentially, and help you hand over to them.
Most of our work starts with an owner, or a family, who wants the business to run well without depending on them.
Confidential search for the managing director, COO, finance director or non-executive who takes on what the owner has been carrying. Run end to end by a senior consultant, and built around the handover rather than the job title.
A first managing director from outside the family, experienced directors alongside the next generation, or a management team in place before a sale, MBO or employee ownership trust. We shape each search around what the family intends for the business.
A sale is only one of them. Many owners want the business to carry on well, in the family or otherwise, without everything depending on them.
The customers, the pricing and the big decisions still run through you, and you want that to change, whether or not you plan to sell.
The next generation is too young, works elsewhere, or wants to own shares without running the company.
A son or daughter is stepping up and needs experienced people alongside them, usually an operations or finance director, or a non-executive who has done it before.
Growth, a second site or larger customers need a level of management the family has never had to provide.
Buyers, lenders and trustees all ask the same question: who runs the business once the owner has gone?
Which comes first depends on what the owner personally holds today. Most transitions need two of them over two to three years.
Holds the P&L, the customers and the decisions the owner used to make personally.
Takes the daily running of the business off the owner. Often the fastest route to a real step back.
Builds the numbers and controls that the family, the bank and any future buyer can rely on.
Gives the board experience from outside the family. Often the first appointment, and the person who supports a new MD or a family successor through the handover.
“They genuinely understood the engineering brief — the shortlist was sharp and the hire is performing well a year in.”
“Discreet, fast, and senior enough to challenge our spec where it needed challenging. A different category of search firm.”
Established family and founder-owned businesses, most often in manufacturing, logistics and supply chain, engineering, energy and the built environment.
Production, operations, quality, and continuous improvement — from shop-floor technicians to plant leadership.
Haulage, warehousing, distribution and supply chain businesses, from transport and depot managers to operations and managing directors.
Mechanical, electrical, controls and design engineering businesses, from field service and graduate engineers through to engineering directors.
Writing on succession, leadership hiring and handing over a family or founder-owned business.
Appointing the first CEO from outside the family: what the family must settle first, the board around the role, where candidates come from and why it fails.
For an owner stepping back, the first senior hire is usually a COO or an MD. How to tell which the business needs, and what goes wrong with each.
What a sale asks of the finance function, where due diligence finds the gaps, and when to hire a financial controller, a finance director or a part-time FD.
What to decide before recruiting an MD for an owner-led business: the scope of the handover, internal versus external, equity, and timing against an exit.
How buyers price key-person risk in founder-led businesses, what they test in diligence, and the senior hires that reduce the discount before a sale.
In an EOT sale the founder is paid from future profits, so the leadership team left behind matters. The hires, governance and timing to plan for.
We also recruit engineers, technical specialists and operational managers for the same kinds of businesses, from field service engineers to engineering directors.
Tell us where you are: thinking about stepping back, bringing in a first director from outside the family, or preparing for a sale. We will come back quickly with something useful.