Interim Management

An Interim Manager is the right choice when it is not sensible or possible to hire a permanent person.  For instance, when you know you will need skills only for a short period of time, such as buying or selling something, merging two operations, integrating a business, moving, setting up a new venture, downsizing……the list is lengthy.  You know that the work is largely project based and that once completed you will not be able to redeploy those scarce skills elsewhere in your business.  It would be wrong, and very expensive, to hire someone permanently knowing that you will be letting them go inside two years.

Interim managers are a special breed.  They differ from consultants in that they have “line” expertise, yet know that they have a specific task to perform, and that they will probably have to manage though company politics; they are dedicated to that task and “as good as their last role”.  The comparison is that Consultants tend to be hired to provide advice and Project Managers to do just that.  Sometimes a role can contain elements of each, in which case we can provide someone with experience of each of the roles.

Interim Managers are not friends of friends looking for another role or undecided between whether they want a permanent job or to become an interim manager.  Those are dangerous hires.  All our Interim Managers are “informally referenced”, which means we use our network to find out whether they will deliver for our clients.

A brief summary of Interim, Consulting and Project Management skills in our network is:-

• 80% have operated at Board level or run a substantial business unit
• 25% have actively been involved in buying and merging or selling and divesting a business
• 40% have been Big 5 trained and so have the benefit of consultative experience and now focus on operational delivery
• 25% can conduct business in at least two languages
• 40% have set up a new business
• 35% have closed one down
• 35% have run or directed multimillion pound projects or programmes
• 55% have managed through a recession

With over 6,000 board and senior director level Interim Executives in our network, with skills across 27 executive and management disciplines, we can usually provide you with details of three fully screened candidates within 72 hours of your call.   As a rough indication our network includes:-