About us

Shaping the Future of
Recruitment.

Northstack was founded in 2020 by Alex Park as a deliberately small alternative to the high-volume, low-discipline tech recruitment firms that dominate the UK market. Six years in, we are still six consultants, still in one office, and still doing the work that way.

Our Story

A firm built on the observation that
most tech recruitment is bad.

Alex spent eight years inside the larger tech recruitment firms before founding Northstack in 2020. The pattern across those firms was consistent: senior briefs were taken on as a courtesy and handed to whichever junior consultant had capacity that week. Shortlists were thrown together from a database. Offer-accept rates were below 70%. The work was, in every measurable sense, mediocre — and the market had got used to it.

The thesis behind Northstack was simple. There is a real market — small but not tiny — for tech recruitment done well. The senior engineers and engineering leaders who get hired by the strongest UK tech businesses do not get there through bulk-list email campaigns. They are reached through relationships, considered briefing work, and the patient work of long-form conversation.

Six years in, we are six partners and senior consultants. We complete 60–80 placements a year, almost all at Staff level and above. Our offer-accept rate is 92%. We have one office, in Shoreditch, and no plans to open another.

— Alex Park, Founder

How we work

Four principles
we hold ourselves to.

01

Specialist, not generalist.

We work four practices because we'd rather know four well than twenty superficially. Our consultants come from the disciplines they recruit in — most have done the job before recruiting for it.

02

Honest, not optimistic.

We tell clients which searches will be hard and why. We tell candidates when a role isn't right for them, even if they want it. Optimism without substance is what gives recruitment its reputation.

03

Small, not scaling.

We turn down more work than we take. The economics of senior recruitment reward depth over volume, and the work we do is too important to rush. We grow when the right people join, not when the spreadsheet says so.

04

Long, not transactional.

Most of our work comes from candidates we placed years ago who are now hiring, and clients we hired into who are now hiring others. Our retention rate matters to us because it's the truest measure of whether we got it right.

The team

Six consultants.
Each one a specialist.

Every consultant at Northstack has spent their career in a specific discipline. We don't rotate people between practices. The person who runs your search has spent five-plus years doing exactly that kind of work.

Rachel Marlow

Rachel Marlow

Founding Partner — Commerce
Reading

Co-founded Marlow & Finch in 2008 after twelve years at Hays. Leads the Commerce practice — sales, marketing, commercial, and general management appointments across the South East. The firm's longest-tenured client relationships are her own.

rachel@marlowfinch.co.uk LinkedIn
James Finch

James Finch

Founding Partner — Finance
Reading

Co-founded Marlow & Finch in 2008. Leads the Finance practice — qualified and PQ finance appointments across permanent, interim, and contract. ACA-qualified, having spent five years in audit before moving into search. The thoughtful counterweight to Rachel's commercial instinct.

james@marlowfinch.co.uk LinkedIn
Priya Shah

Priya Shah

Senior Consultant — Finance
Reading

Senior Finance consultant focused on the part-qualified and qualified end of the market — Management Accountants through to Senior Finance Business Partners. CIMA part-qualified herself, which informs the way she frames the candidate conversation. Joined Marlow & Finch in 2019.

priya@marlowfinch.co.uk LinkedIn
Thomas Okonkwo

Thomas Okonkwo

Senior Consultant — Operations
Reading

Heads Operations recruitment at Marlow & Finch — supply chain, logistics, production, and procurement. Eight years in industry before recruitment (warehouse management at DHL, then operations at Ocado), which informs the briefing conversation in a way most operations recruiters can't match.

thomas@marlowfinch.co.uk LinkedIn
Emily Clarke

Emily Clarke

Senior Consultant — Executive Support
London

Leads the Executive Support practice from the London office. Specialises in senior EA, Chief of Staff, and Office Manager appointments across family offices, professional services, and private equity. The practice she built is now the firm's most profitable on a per-consultant basis.

emily@marlowfinch.co.uk LinkedIn
Daniel Wright

Daniel Wright

Senior Consultant — Technology
Brighton

Heads Technology recruitment from the Brighton office — software developers, technical leadership, and the small but steady stream of contract and interim technology briefs the firm runs each year. Self-taught developer before recruitment, with the unusual ability to actually read a candidate's GitHub.

daniel@marlowfinch.co.uk LinkedIn

Let's talk about
the work.

We respond to every brief within one working day. No obligation, no pressure, no follow-up unless we hear from you

Brief usOr just say hello