Case study · Board & Executive Practice
Audit Committee Chair for a FTSE 250 regulated financial services group.
The Nomination Committee required a new Audit Committee Chair with substantive regulated financial services experience, active independence, and the temperament to steer through a period of significant regulatory change.
Client type: FTSE 250, regulated financial services
Role: Non-Executive Director and incoming Audit Committee Chair
Search type: Retained, aligned with UK Corporate Governance Code and Parker Review commitments
Timeline: 18 weeks brief to appointed
Outcome: Appointment confirmed; Nomination Committee reported the process externally
The brief
The retiring Audit Committee Chair had held the seat for six years. The incoming Chair was required to combine deep audit-committee experience with active knowledge of the regulator’s current operational-resilience expectations and the ongoing implications of DORA for UK-headquartered financial services entities.
The Nomination Committee’s brief was explicit on diversity of experience and background: the board matrix would benefit from an experienced NED whose primary career had been outside a Big Four audit partnership. Independence was to be tested against portfolio concentration as well as the standard Code criteria.
What we did
We ran a market map focused on three candidate pools: former CFOs of similarly-sized regulated financial services groups; sitting NEDs of adjacent FTSE 250 companies with existing audit or risk committee experience; and a small number of former senior regulators. Every candidate was screened for compressed independence pre-checks before the first meeting — a step we now run on every board search.
The longlist ran to twenty-two; the shortlist to five. The Nomination Committee met all five over a three-week period, and the successful candidate was interviewed by the full Board before an offer was made.
The outcome
The appointment was confirmed at the Nomination Committee meeting following the final interview. The Committee subsequently reported the process publicly in the following year’s Corporate Governance Statement, referencing both the executive search firm engaged and the diversity of experience on the final shortlist. The appointee took the Audit Committee Chair seat at the following AGM.
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