Advisory boards are turning away from trophy members and opting more for candidates with a winning formula for making money, Financial News reports. In the early days of private equity, for example, the hiring of a former politician or diplomat was considered a key to success, as they bring with them the heft to open doors by lending prestige and credibility to a firm and attracting publicity and investors. That was then. Enter the age of the specialist. As industry has grown, so have the players matured, and as there is no longer a need of a high-profile individual to get the ball rolling, p.e. firms in particular are tapping industrial specialist to lend a hand. “It’s not a case of out with the old, in with the new,” Managing Partner Hugh Lenon of U.K.-based Phoenix Equity Partners told FN. “We are supplementing our advisor board with several sector specialists. We’re allowing our sector teams to appoint industry-specific advisers, so they’re likely to be younger, probably having run their own businesses.” Even bigger firms such as 3i and The Carlyle Group are following the trend. The old approach, however, seems still to be favored by generalist firms, as big names serve as “a marketing ploy, particularly with investors,” Jeff Montgomery of GMT Communications Partners, said in an FN interview. “Limited partners gain comfort from the presence of a John Major or a George Bush, so from a fundraising perspective they can be very useful. They are in paid positions and they meet maybe once a year.” But specialist firms see things differently. Says Montgomery, as an industry-focused firm, “there’s a clear benefit to having a handful of senior industry executives. It’s easy to see the connection between their wealth of specialist knowledge and the added value they bring to the firm and our portfolio companies.”