Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. Acquires Frederickson Partners
May 24, 2022 – Acquisitions continue to make news in the recruiting industry, with a number of notable purchases in recent months. Today, Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., one of the world’s largest consulting and risk management companies, has acquired global HR search firm Frederickson Partners. Frederickson Partners has locations in a dozen cities across the U.S., including San Francisco, New York, Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles and Nashville, and also serves global tech hubs in London, Berlin, Paris, Mexico City, Bogota, Seoul and São Paulo. Founder Valerie Frederickson and her team will continue to operate under the direction of Scott Hamilton, global managing director, human resources & compensation consulting for Gallagher’s employee benefits consulting and brokerage operations.
“Frederickson Partners will expand Gallagher’s executive search capabilities across all industries and offers us significant opportunities for collaboration and growth,” said J. Patrick Gallagher Jr., chairman, president and CEO. “I am very excited to welcome Valerie and her team to our growing, global company.”
Related: Frederickson Partners Recruits Chief People Officer for Cartiga
Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., a global insurance brokerage, risk management and consulting services firm, is headquartered in Rolling Meadows, IL. The company has operations in 49 countries and offers client-service capabilities in more than 150 countries around the world through a network of correspondent brokers and consultants.
Veteran HR Consultants
Founded in 1995, Frederickson Partners has completed over 2,500 HR executive searches and HR consulting engagements, according to the firm, maintaining relationships with more than 10,000 rising and established HR executives worldwide. The firm specializes in the placement of chief human resources officers, chief people officers, heads of talent acquisition, and their high growth teams.
Related: Frederickson Partners Seeks Chief People and Inclusion Officer for Second Harvest of Silicon Valley
Based in Menlo Park, CA, the search firm is deeply rooted in the technology sector, with experience in biotech, clean energy, cloud and data storage, E-commerce, fintech, gaming, hardware, IoT, media, semiconductors, and telecommunications. Clients include Alphabet, Creative Artists Agency (CAA), Gartner, Gilead, Intel, Pinterest, Qualtrics, Roche, ServiceNow, StockX, The Nature Conservancy, Twitter, Uber, and Workday.
Changing the World, One HR Leader at a Time
Since civil rights activist Cezar Chavez came to speak to her second-grade class about the plight of the farm workers, Valerie Frederickson has worked to help others improve their lives and, in the processs, make for a better world.
As the teenage daughter of parents devoted to desegregation and diversity, Valerie spent her summers volunteering at an orphanage in Mexico. As a college student, she organized a series of career seminars for liberal arts majors, cajoling executives from leading companies to come and speak and share their wisdom with students who did not have degrees that translated directly into business. And as founder and chief executive officer of the Silicon Valley human resources and people executive search firm Frederickson Partners, she has forged a reputation for not only finding great talent but for her commitment to diversity and inclusion, both in the slates of candidates she presents and within her own Menlo Park, CA-based firm. Read more >
Ms. Frederickson has helped hundreds of companies during the past 20-plus years build and improve their human resources organizations. HR executives and C-level executives often seek her guidance and counsel when reorganizing their HR functions. She has conducted confidential, replacement, and upgrade searches of HR executives, and placed heads of HR at companies such as C3 IoT, GE, Genentech, Mozilla, Qualtrics, and hundreds more.
Other Acquisitions
Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. has acquired other executive search firms in recent years. In 2020, the organization acquired Montreal-headquartered Optimum Talent. The firm’s Canadian team is composed of more than 260 colleagues in 13 offices nationwide, from Vancouver to Halifax. Internationally, the firm has a strategic partnership with Career Star Group to deliver coaching, career transition and change management solutions.
Related: Diversified Search Group Acquires Alta Associates
Optimum Talent is a provider of human resources consulting services with expertise in career management, career transition, coaching, executive search and organizational psychology. It operates in three targeted segments: search solutions, leadership assessment & development, and career transition & outplacement. Ron Dahms, Mike Bacchus and their associates will continue to operate from their current locations under the direction of Melanie Jeannotte, CEO of Gallagher’s benefit and HR consulting division in Canada, and Scott Hamilton, global managing director of Gallagher’s human resources and compensation consulting practice.
Arthur J. Gallagher also acquired The Human Capital Group. “Gallagher’s mission, culture and values align with The Human Capital Group’s – to provide value-based services to clients in an intentional, respectful and high-integrity manner,” the search firm said. Founded in 2000, The Human Capital Group is an executive search and leadership consulting firm assisting clients domestically and internationally as they seek to find and grow transformational leaders. It has completed more than 800 searches for a wide variety of senior roles across multiple industries.
“Valerie has forged a reputation not only for finding great HR talent but for her commitment to diversity, inclusion and belonging,” said Scott A. Scanlon, CEO of Hunt Scanlon Ventures. “This is a wonderful transaction for Valerie and her team and so well-deserved.” Mr. Scanlon said that HR is now recognized for the important strategic role it plays in the core issues companies face, including growth strategy, M&A, restructuring, DE&I, culture transformation, and board governance. “Human resources is much more than a recruiting function,” he added. “With a global workforce shifting in complexity and as the people function undergoes an enormous period of transition, HR now plays a gatekeeper role more than ever.”
Related: ZRG Acquires Walking the Talk
Contributed by Scott A. Scanlon, Editor-in-Chief; Dale M. Zupsansky, Managing Editor; and Stephen Sawicki, Managing Editor – Hunt Scanlon Media
