Vardis Partners was retained by Edelman Financial Engines, one of America's largest independent registered investment advisors, to recruit its Head of Enterprise IT. The search concluded with the appointment of Elizabeth Gotto, a technology executive with three decades of leadership across cloud platforms, identity and access management, and AI-driven automation. Below: the mandate, how the search was run, and answers to common questions about hiring enterprise technology leadership for a wealth management firm.
Edelman Financial Engines is one of America's largest independent registered investment advisors, founded in 1986 on the belief that all investors deserve access to personal, comprehensive financial planning and investment advice. The firm serves more than 1.27 million clients from over 140 offices nationwide and manages more than $324 billion in assets, pairing proprietary technology and advanced methodology with the attention of a dedicated personal financial planner. It has been recognized by Barron's as a top RIA firm for eight consecutive years.
The firm is majority-owned by Hellman & Friedman, the global private equity firm that acquired a majority stake in Edelman Financial in 2015 and combined it with Financial Engines in 2018, with Warburg Pincus holding a minority position since 2021. Edelman Financial Engines operates two connected businesses - wealth planning for individuals and families, and workplace retirement advisory for employer plans - and is investing heavily in technology to let its planners spend more of their time planning, which is what made this leadership hire a priority.
Edelman Financial Engines retained Vardis to recruit a Head of Enterprise IT to translate company strategy into secure, scalable, and reliable technology for the people who run the business.
The spec asked for an uncommon combination. Candidates needed real technical depth in identity and access management - single sign-on, multi-factor authentication, privileged access - together with the breadth to lead a multi-team organization spanning service desk, enterprise applications, and collaboration platforms. On top of that, the firm wanted demonstrated delivery of internal productivity AI in production, not slideware: chatbots, workflow automation, and agent-based solutions that measurably change how employees work. Deep Microsoft ecosystem experience and a track record of owning an IT budget rounded out the profile.
Just as decisive was the softer dimension. This is a consultative seat, not an order-taking one: the leader needed the executive presence to set technology direction with the senior team in one meeting and go deep with engineers in the next, while serving a field of financial planners with high expectations of their technology partner. Wealth management or RIA experience was strongly preferred, and the firm's genuinely distributed, remote-friendly culture meant the right person had to build influence without proximity.
Vardis takes a different approach from most search firms: the Partner executes the entire search. Every candidate conversation on this engagement - outreach, screening, and references - was handled personally by the Vardis Partner leading the search, not passed to junior recruiters. When Vardis adopted this model, candidate response rates and search speed improved by more than 30 percent.
The team mapped enterprise IT, platform delivery, and corporate technology leaders across wealth management, asset management, and other technology-intensive businesses, screening for hands-on identity and access management ownership, service desk leadership at scale, and delivered internal AI and automation programs.
Edelman Financial Engines appointed Elizabeth Gotto as Head of Enterprise IT. She brings three decades of technology leadership spanning enterprise modernization, cloud strategy, platform engineering, and AI-driven automation.
At Edelman Financial Engines, Elizabeth leads the teams that deliver secure, scalable, and reliable enterprise technology across identity, collaboration, enterprise applications, automation, and end-user experience, and helps drive the firm's internal AI and automation agenda.
Questions we frequently hear from technology leaders and management teams recruiting enterprise IT leadership in financial services.
Vardis Partners is a global executive and board search firm dedicated to private equity and growth equity firms, their portfolio companies, and select corporate clients. Vardis recruited the Head of Enterprise IT for Edelman Financial Engines, one of America's largest independent registered investment advisors, and has completed hundreds of technology leadership searches across financial services. Vardis also publishes annual PE portfolio company executive compensation reports based on surveys of more than 1,200 executives in its network.
The search starts with what the business needs the IT function to become. At Edelman Financial Engines, that meant a leader who could own a multi-year roadmap for employee-facing technology, mature identity and access management alongside the security organization, and drive internal AI and automation across the firm. Vardis then maps enterprise IT and platform leaders across wealth management, asset management, and technology-intensive financial services businesses, and the Partner personally screens every candidate against those criteria.
The strongest enterprise IT leaders pair genuine technical depth with the breadth to run a multi-team organization: identity and access management, service desk at scale, enterprise applications, and collaboration platforms. Look for someone who has built a multi-year roadmap rather than executed someone else's, who has delivered internal productivity AI and workflow automation in production, and who partners naturally with a CISO whose policies their team will implement. In an advisor-led firm, service expectations are high, so the ability to act as a consultative partner to the business matters as much as the technology.
A well-run retained search for a senior enterprise IT leader typically takes 90 to 120 days from kickoff to a signed offer. Because Vardis Partners personally handle every candidate conversation, response rates and search speed are materially higher than the traditional model where partners hand outreach to junior staff.
Senior technology executives respond to peers, not to junior recruiters, and they expect a credible conversation about the mandate on the first call. At Vardis, the Partner who wins the search personally handles every touchpoint - outreach, screening, references, and offer negotiation. When Vardis moved to this model, candidate response rates and search speed improved by more than 30 percent, which is why the firm runs every search this way.
Vardis is a global executive and board search firm serving private equity and growth equity firms, their portfolio companies, and select corporate clients from offices in Boston, New York, Dallas, London, and Frankfurt.
For more information about this search, or to discuss a leadership need, contact us here or reach Josh King, Partner, at jking@vardis.com or 617-694-7656.
