Early Stage

Early Stage is an independent cabinet de recrutement specialising in recruitment for Finance d'Entreprise. Founded in 2012 by two former corporate finance professionals, the firm recruits and places collaborateurs from jeune diplômé level through to collaborateur confirmé. Its founders argue that having worked in the sector themselves lets them understand both what clients need and what candidates expect, maximising the chances of a successful and lasting hire, and that it also allows them to test and assess candidates' technical knowledge in fine detail. The firm works only on an exclusive basis, which it says guarantees clients the most efficient and most targeted execution at candidate level.

The practice is concentrated on corporate finance and the transaction market around it. Its clients are principally fonds d'investissement, corporates, boutiques M&A, banques d'affaires and sociétés sous LBO. Early Stage created the market for recruiting interns into Finance d'Entreprise roles, which gives it access to a pool of candidates it maintains privileged and long term relationships with, a network that renews itself as the firm and its candidates grow older together. Alongside that network it also runs approches directes on targeted profiles, in France and internationally, depending on the assignment. The two founders are Arnaud Randazzo, a Reims Management School graduate with a corporate finance major who spent a year in a banque d'affaires and three years at the investment fund Activa Capital where he ran recruitment, integration and training for the team's youngest members, and Marc Lemarié, also a Reims Management School graduate with a corporate finance major, who spent four years in mergers and acquisitions and debt advisory as an Associate in the French team at Lincoln International.

Early Stage operates from France and runs targeted searches both domestically and internationally. Since its creation it has scrupulously respected the profession's charte déontologique, which covers absolute confidentiality throughout the recruitment process and afterwards, following up on candidates' integration, a ban on approaching candidates working at its own clients, and free replacement if a placed candidate is dismissed or resigns within six months of joining. Its site provides separate routes for entreprises, who can review its working method and terms of engagement, and for candidats, who can submit a CV and browse current vacancies.