Wealth manager and Financial Planner Tilney Smith & Williamson has recruited Charlotte Fairhurst from Octopus Investment to help it build professional connections in London and the South East.

Ms Fairhurst will aim to expand connections with solicitors and accountants in her new role as business development director.

She will work with a team of 8 across the country who are focused on developing relationships with professional partners.  

She spent four and a half years at Octopus as strategic partnerships manager. In that role she managed relationships with national financial advisory firms, networks and service providers. 

She also led the firm’s professional connections initiatives, promoting referral relationships between financial advisers, solicitors and accountants.  She worked closely with professional bodies in the legal and accountancy professions, including ICAEW and STEP.  

Prior to Octopus Investments she worked for three years as senior account manager at Preqin, a provider of data, analytics and insights to the alternative assets community. She has recently achieved the CFA Certificate in ESG Investing. 

Michael Hanlon, director at Tilney Smith & Williamson, said: “Charlotte has extensive experience working in collaboration with professional connections and we are delighted to now be able to benefit from her expertise within our team. I look forward to working closely with Charlotte to help continue to grow our business by forming new partnerships with solicitors, accountants and others in the professional community.”   

Ms Fairhurst said: “I’ve known the Tilney Smith & Williamson team for some time and it is great now to be able to join the ambitious, newly-merged business which I’ve seen undergo rapid growth in recent years. I am excited to be working with the group’s financial planners and investment managers to help foster greater collaboration with the wider professional community.”