EXCLUSIVE: Gareth Quarry, the man who made a personal profit of £30m from the sale of Quarry Douglas to TMP Worldwide, is looking for ambitious search consultants to follow his example as part of a planned expansion of Shilton Sharp Quarry, his current company, into non-legal services.

Quarry plans to diversify SSQ from its current focus on legal recruitment and into areas such as finance, IT and marketing, taking advantage of the cross-selling opportunities pre- sented by existing clients such as international banks.

To meet these opportunities, he plans to set up entrepreneurial consultants in several new companies, giving them the opportunity to make serious money through an equity stake.

Quarry, a director of SSQ, told Recruiter: "We will fund the businesses and start them up. These people will be the chief executives of their own division, running their own business. We will give the individuals equity in the business, with an opportunity to make some serious capital."

Quarry continued: "I believe recruitment is full of entrepreneurs but a lot of them are in companies which don't give them full rein to their entrepreneurial spirit. I believe in providing the right people with just that.

"It won't happen immediately, but assuming they grow the business, in a number of years, they can make serious money. Maybe this would be through a stock market listing."

Quarry said that while he was aware of the dangers, he didn't believe that diversification would mean the company taking its eye off its core legal business, citing his track record at Quarry Douglas, now known as Hudson. Furthermore, with all the cross- selling involved, the new business areas would not be that far removed from the company's current market, he argued.

He said he hoped the new companies would be up and running in "a matter of months".

"You don't grow a recruitment business to the size we want by clutching all the equity to yourself. You have to incentivise people," he concluded.