You get what you pay for - a search firm will get you a good CV and save you time.
If the CEO really has enough time to recruit a top-class FD, he should (a) consider giving up his day job and become a recruiter OR (b) concentrate on the day job and deliver the £30k+ it's going to cost to recruit an excellent candidate. Any CEO who believes that they can do better than trained professionals (which proper search firms are) is delusional or under-worked.
In my experience (and few years ago I'd have been the sort of person your friend would have been looking to recruit), companies looking to recruit senior people with direct adverts etc come across as penny-pinching and give the impression that the CEO has a rather large ego and is trying do do things outside of their competence areas. I would avoid such companies like the plague.
Your CEO friend should concentrate harder on the interview process and ensure they recruit someone who really wants to be there for the longer term, ensuring that the right incentives are in place for longevity.
And no, I don't work in recruitment, but I've been around long enought to have seen interview processes go very wrong when management think they can save money by doing things themselves. Usually this ends up with a failed recruitment, or a poor-quality shortlist. You might save £10k, but what's the cost of the revolving-door polic at the moment. Get the right recruiter, guide them on what the long-term business needs are, and recruit only once.
