In my view the recent market turmoil has not had an impact upon demand within the financial services sector for interim managers. That is not to say that it has not had an impact at all. I have experienced a changing landscape within my practice in 2008 as opposed to 2007 with very different skillsets being coveted by clients.
Last year a substantial portion of interim requirements involved the delivery of large scale change programmes, new product launches and M&A reviews giving rise to significant demand for interim Programme/Project Managers, Marketers and Strategy Directors. This has now morphed into a far more defensive client appetite for interim skills with Procurement, HR and finance being sought with a view to delivering cost reduction exercises.
From a Provider perspective demand for interims within the financial services sector has remained robust through the recent financial crisis. Furthermore, I am optimistic for interim demand in 2009 as result of the fallout from this year as I expect the financial services sector to experience wide scale integration programmes and tightening regulatory pressures from the FSA.
I agree with Andrew, having just completed an assignment in financial services and had several very recent discussions with senior executives in the sector.
It seems to me that the issue now is that whether we call it integration, consolidation, right-sizing, rationalisation or any other of the soft words, everyone is looking to cut out unnecessary activities and expenditure. The danger is that this will turn into a “numbers” game, with across-the-board cost reduction targets being imposed arbitrarily (regrettably mainly by Finance Directors).
Our role as independent, objective and battle-hardened partners is to help the management to cut out non-value adding activities while preserving and nurturing the value-adding ones.
Can we do it ? Obama’s got the answer !
But we have an intellectual challenge in getting our message across! We need to persuade the management that they can’t do this to optimum effect using only internal resources ( who as well as having the business-as-usual to run understandably have their own self preservation instincts) and that it is not as counter-intuitive as it seems to incur the extra cost of an interim when they are trying to reduce costs in total.
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Dialogue is the regular posting place for the news and opinions of interim management specialists, Interim partners.
November 11th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
In my view the recent market turmoil has not had an impact upon demand within the financial services sector for interim managers. That is not to say that it has not had an impact at all. I have experienced a changing landscape within my practice in 2008 as opposed to 2007 with very different skillsets being coveted by clients.
Last year a substantial portion of interim requirements involved the delivery of large scale change programmes, new product launches and M&A reviews giving rise to significant demand for interim Programme/Project Managers, Marketers and Strategy Directors. This has now morphed into a far more defensive client appetite for interim skills with Procurement, HR and finance being sought with a view to delivering cost reduction exercises.
From a Provider perspective demand for interims within the financial services sector has remained robust through the recent financial crisis. Furthermore, I am optimistic for interim demand in 2009 as result of the fallout from this year as I expect the financial services sector to experience wide scale integration programmes and tightening regulatory pressures from the FSA.
December 4th, 2008 at 12:25 pm
I agree with Andrew, having just completed an assignment in financial services and had several very recent discussions with senior executives in the sector.
It seems to me that the issue now is that whether we call it integration, consolidation, right-sizing, rationalisation or any other of the soft words, everyone is looking to cut out unnecessary activities and expenditure. The danger is that this will turn into a “numbers” game, with across-the-board cost reduction targets being imposed arbitrarily (regrettably mainly by Finance Directors).
Our role as independent, objective and battle-hardened partners is to help the management to cut out non-value adding activities while preserving and nurturing the value-adding ones.
Can we do it ? Obama’s got the answer !
But we have an intellectual challenge in getting our message across! We need to persuade the management that they can’t do this to optimum effect using only internal resources ( who as well as having the business-as-usual to run understandably have their own self preservation instincts) and that it is not as counter-intuitive as it seems to incur the extra cost of an interim when they are trying to reduce costs in total.