BlackRock Inc., the world’s biggest asset manager, hired its long-time strategic and financial adviser Gary Shedlin as chief financial officer to replace Ann Marie Petach, who will move to a client-oriented role within the firm.<br /><br />Petach will be a senior managing director at BlackRock Solutions, New York-based BlackRock said yesterday in a statement. Shedlin, 49, a former vice chairman of investment banking at Morgan Stanley, will join the firm in March and become CFO after it reports its first-quarter earnings in April.<br /><br />“Gary has an intimate knowledge of BlackRock and knows our industry well,” Laurence D. Fink, chief executive officer of BlackRock, said in the statement. “I am confident that he will lead our finance operations as a partner in driving our business through our next phase of disciplined growth.”<br /><br />BlackRock has hired executives such as Philipp Hildebrand, the former head of the Swiss central bank, to help expand relationships with institutional clients overseas, and Linda Robinson, who joined as head of marketing and communications in 2011 to oversee a five-year branding campaign. Fink also revamped management as fund performance has trailed, including replacing the group that oversees investment products with five specialized units in August, the most sweeping overhaul since BlackRock acquired Barclays Global Investors in 2009.Shedlin will be responsible for BlackRock’s corporate- finance functions such as accounting and tax, treasury and risk management. He’ll also join BlackRock’s global executive committee, which added eight executives during the reorganization announced in August.