Hand-picked for profit
Increasing numbers of companies from FTSE 100 firms downwards are waking up to the business benefits of tapping into the vast reservoir of experience that exists in the expanding interim management sector.
Whether grooming themselves for sale, or trimming away excess fat in readiness for an acquisition, many companies now prefer to buy-in the know-how rather than add highly paid executives to the permanent headcount.
BIE Interim Executive, a leading player in a fragmented sector, is among the agencies ready to provide board level candidates at the drop of a hat.
Director Sue Smith explains: “We are really the reverse of a search consultant.
“They start with a blank piece of paper, then go out and find the candidates. We already have the candidates, and are confident that when the client picks up the phone it is just a question of availability.”
Smith is currently working with a firm who are making a European acquisition. They are seeking a human resources specialist to help weave two very different cultures into a single business unit.
“The approach came yesterday,” she says. “I put them in touch with an English HR executive based in Spain who will be having a telephone conversation with them tomorrow morning, with a view to meeting them as soon as possible.”
Using conventional head-hunting techniques, she claims, that kind of vacancy could take weeks, even months, to fill. “What we do is not dissimilar to the approach of management consultancies, such as PwC or Deloitte,” Smith says. “Partners win the business, and then decide who can be deployed to do the job. What we have is a virtual team of pre-screened people with good track records, and who are usually available at very short notice.”
New career path
In most cases, they are big hitters at the top of their game who have opted for interim work in exchange for the flexibility it gives them – people like Stephen Taylor, who held a number of high-profile positions with employers like Diageo and Harrods before personal circumstances set him on an alternative career path.
Life as an interim executive has brought him into close contact with the world of mergers and acquisitions. A few years back, while working as employee relations and reward director with Barclays – an interim placement – he was involved with the bank’s acquisition of Woolwich Building Society.
“There were people there with the HR skills, but what I was doing was bringing everything together,” says Smith, who now runs his own company, People Innovations. “I was there to ensure we delivered our contribution to the synergy savings that were coming from integration.”
Since embracing interim management in 1997, Taylor has worked for companies like BT, OGC, and MFI. He says: “I’m cheaper than a consultant, and I’m there for the delivery as well as the design phase.”
Sue Smith believes that interim managers have an increasingly important role in business, particularly because of the flexibility the sector can offer.
“There are many situations where interims can be brought in to help clients with an acquisition or the disposal of a division, and we can literally put in place anyone from a factory manager to a chairman or chief executive,” she says.
“Usually we over-skill a role, bringing in someone larger than the company might need longer term – typically somebody who has worked across a range of different businesses and sectors and who can bring a great deal of experience through a period of change,” she adds.