The Rise of In-House Strategy and Change Teams

LONDON, ENGLAND, December 23, 2011 (Press-News.org) A little history...

In late 2009, as the economy started to pick up again, there was a surge in hiring activity from firms for consultancy jobs to bring on board the skills necessary to win, design and deliver new change programmes. There was the understanding that both government and private sector-led initiatives would guarantee medium-term revenue, and management consultancies and strategy houses were vying for a piece of the action after several lean years.

The top consultancies were getting involved in major transformation programmes (such as the Lloyds/HBOS integration) and needed to hire the manpower and expertise to replace headcount lost during the recession.

This saw hiring managers instructing their recruitment partners to source up to 100 roles at a time. This sort of bulk recruitment had not really been seen before in the professional services environment, according to Tim Barber, consultant with Michael Page Consultancy, Strategy & Change.

As this progressed, challenges began to arise due to the volume and speed of recruitment into client facing strategy and change roles. These were:

- Client dissatisfaction with inexperienced consultants who had no proven track record in leading critical work streams. Many clients insisted that only senior managers or partners should work on their programmes.
- New recruits didn't remain in their roles for a long time as they became frustrated by the lack of promised training and development opportunities.

Enter the in-house strategy and change teams
"As a result, organisations looked to create and grow high-forming strategy and change teams to take over the leadership of these sorts of programmes," said Tim Barber.

Organisations in the financial services, energy, utilities and retail sectors looked to attract talent from management consultancies and strategy houses to strengthen their internal consultancy functions.

Some perceived advantages to having these skills in-house include:

- Cost efficiency
- Employee retention
- Knowledge ownership
- Avoidance of potential consultancy politics/agendas

What skills are needed?

Rather than a lack of candidates, it's the specific skill sets and track records needed to affect the required change that haven't always proved easy for companies to secure. A candidate may possess the required theoretical thinking but might not be able to prove their delivery capabilities. Candidates who can perform a dual strategy and implementation role are the most sought after.

Even in the current cautious job market, hiring managers for in-house roles are often faced with competition when looking to recruit talent into their organisations.

"Top candidates out in the market are receiving multiple offers and interviewing everywhere. In order to secure these individuals, organisations need to move quickly, sell their benefits and pay at least market rate," according to Tim Barber.

In order to secure and retain the best skills, organisations could also:

- Ensure robust retention strategies are in place to engage and keep top performers.
- Sell the opportunity to move into a business leadership or P&L role.
- Promote the calibre of the leadership of their change and strategy functions
- Target disillusioned consultancy and strategy house employees and emphasise the benefits of less travel and true business rather than technology change, for example.
- Highlight any exposure to key decision makers and thought leaders.
- Find a recruitment partner with a wide network of contacts.

Specialist consultancy in strategy & change
As a specialist in our field, Michael Page Consultancy, Strategy & Change has a proven track record of placing professionals in management consultancies, strategy houses and in-house roles. We fully understand each market perspective and ensure we know the motivations of our clients to best represent and sell them to key candidates.

To discuss your organisation's goals and how the right hire could make all the difference, get in touch with the specialists at Michael Page Consultancy.

Michael Page International has 35 years expertise in professional services recruitment. Over this period we've grown organically to establish ourselves as one of the best-known and most respected consultancy companies, employing more than 5,350 people in over 156 offices and 32 countries worldwide. For more information, please see the Michael Page website at www.michaelpage.co.uk.