Managing Director & COO
A global insights and branding agency group. £25m t/o with over 100 staff
THE BRIEF
The original brief was to hire an inward focused, operational Managing Director to work with the Founder / Owner of this digital media agency, the largest business within the group. The short story is that the successful candidate was identified as having COO group potential and we hired that position first, closely followed by hiring the MD based on the original brief.
THE PROCESS
King Executive used a talent mapping process across the Southwest to identify candidates with digital and/or multidisciplinary marketing expertise. We targeted mainly passive candidates who were either Managing Partners, Operations Directors or Managing Directors that were used to fostering, leading and developing teams with strong operational expertise. The main purpose of the role was to execute the strategic plan – working in collaboration with the senior leaders in group functions such as finance, people, sales and marketing and effectively in line with the group plans for these areas.
The person needed to have high EQ, enjoy developing people, a firm but fair approach together with the potential to also be client facing.
THE RESULT
As per the introduction, we first hired a COO to take on some of the strategic focus of the whole group’s further acquisitions and client strategy. Followed by a Managing Director who had been a Managing Partner and was ‘MD’ ready. He demonstrated someone with strong ambition, strong people leadership and was delighted to secure this milestone opportunity in his career.