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Why choose BIE?
What's New?Interim management as part of an HR strategy
Out with the old, in with the new
How can you achieve your goals for your business? That’s the big question. Modern organisations have been constrained in what they would like to do by the remnants of previous career models, the vestiges of permanent employment thinking and the attendant inadequacies of HR resourcing strategy. Furthermore, no amount of temporary labour or consultancy advice can turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse. What is needed is a resource that can turn your thinking into actuality.
Models for change, people development and communication have a substantial similarity across industries and geographies. What the interim manager needs to know about is business – its strategies, processes, priorities and cultures – as well as his or her own specialist professional know-how. This knowledge might include, for example, how to analyse, assess and mobilise a project for the rationalisation of a manufacturing organisation around the world; how to organise and integrate new subsidiaries of a consumer goods company in its new markets; or how to retain staff post-acquisition while changing core processes.
The emphasis for the interim manager is on direct and executive action, based on seasoned experience and up-to-date know-how. Interim managers are sometimes said to be “over-qualified” for the job in hand, but this can be a simplification. It would be wrong to assign, say, a global operations veteran to the task of reorganising a depot, or a European procurement expert to negotiating a buying discount. The right degree of qualification is the range, variety and depth of business and organisational experience.
Before turning to the burning issue of where to find such paragons – somebody who can actually do what we’re desperately wishing we could do – there is one remaining attribute worth highlighting. This is the question of interim management professionalism. Is the interim manager any different from any other seasoned executive – for example, the chairman’s brother-in-law, or what’s- her-name who used to work for the competition? Can anyone sufficiently experienced do interim management?
Answer: apparently not. There is a range of qualities, perhaps not rare in the population but not universally present in executives, that is required. These qualities are described elsewhere in the guide, but they revolve around the traits of self-sufficiency, independence, detachment, completion, delivery and change-orientation. The professional interim by self-selection and by weathering carries these marks.
How to find an interim executive
One of the reasons resourcing plans have in the past been rudimentary was that there wasn’t, in reality, much choice. HR departments recruited when the chips were down; often they had to poach. Internal people invariably seemed to be under-qualified and often took umbrage. Recruiters went to the lengths of time, expense and uncertainty involved with recruiting. What has changed now is that there is an interim management market. Ten years ago, this market did not exist.
The market has developed to meet the emerging realisation that interim managers are a sound resourcing choice and an entirely practical one. There is growing demand for interims, there are qualified practitioners and there are dependable specialist providers. The speed of placing an interim into an assignment is high, and the outcome of the assignment is predictably one of satisfaction. The system works. For the uninitiated HR professional, the first step towards embracing interim management as a resourcing strategy could be to become acquainted with the leading interim agencies. Have a good, two-way conversation with them.
Understand how they do things and what they might expect of you. The best agencies do not throw CVs at unsuspecting clients. They know their interim candidates and they make sure they know you, the client. When the prospective interim and the client have been carefully and professionally brought together, it would be rare for the arrangement not to proceed. Like good recruitment, interim resourcing is efficient, cost-effective and dependable.
Seasoned executives
What are these marks of seasoning that your interim should display? Does he or she have a range and depth of experience that is more than adequate for the task at hand? Have they been around for sufficient time to contend with your business model, your customer types, your employee organisations, your territories, your ownership basis, the organisation of your board and your compensation strategy?
Is the prospective interim manager conversant with your particular change model and with your current strategy for responding to crushing competition here and now? Does he or she have enough experience to know what the rest of your sector is trying to do to forge this change?
Can the individual continue the momentum of their part of the business while they put all this change into place? What is their focus on revenue and customer loyalty when all hell is let loose? Specifically, how would the interim manager deal with customer retention? What means would they put in place to ensure systems integrity and staff retention?
These are demanding requirements for anybody, but not yet the full set of what you might demand. Remember that we are talking about resourcing and HR’s oversight of it. So in the fine grain of the devil’s detail, there must be more to consider for the vigilant HR person.
In addition to the particular remit, a good interim manager should be able to:
- Put into reality what you and your line colleagues think, challenging though it is.
- Point to more change, compatible with your views and desires for transformation and conversant with contemporary thinking, on which you can build.
- Keep up the momentum and continuity, which is crucial.
- Lead the consultation with staff members about the merits of the changes and gain their involvement and acceptance.
- Be devoid of personal prejudices. Because the brief is to manage change, one should not “fix it when it’s not bust.” They should accentuate the positive.
- Pull weight, not rank.
- Develop, individually, the allotted team, as well as the organisation of the team.
- Keep a close watch on processes and seek to define and improve them.
- Define the successor’s qualities – if there is to be one – and guide the successor’s appointment.
- Help with your new resourcing plan.
David Kitchen has had ten years’ experience as interim head of human resources in international companies across several industry sectors, including engineering, transport, metals, pharmaceutical, IT, telecoms and financial services. His HR responsibilities have spanned recruitment, training and development, equal opportunities, employee counselling, pay and conditions, employment law, manpower planning, acquisitions and reorganisations, employee communications and industrial relations. He holds a PhD in occupational psychology.
To discuss your interim management requirements with BIE call +44(0)20 7222 1010