Interim Country Head of Finance — Integration

Two kinds of margin, easily confused

A services business can see its margin rise for reasons that have little to do with how well it is run: a spell of strong pricing across the market, a surge in volume that fills utilisation, a favourable mix of work. It can see margin fall for equally temporary reasons. Structural margin is what remains when those effects are stripped out, the economics of how the business prices, staffs, delivers and bills. Telling the two apart is the core of this appointment.

Why the distinction drives decisions

When temporary effects are mistaken for structural ones, businesses invest on the strength of a good year, build cost on top of a price rise that later reverses, or cut capability in response to a dip that would have recovered on its own. A listed business also has to explain its margin to investors, which raises the stakes on getting the story right. The Interim Country Head of Finance will give leaders a margin they can actually make decisions on.

The authority to act on the answer

You will hold executive authority. You will agree how finance decisions are allocated and what local leaders may still approve, and define what evidence governs spending, capacity and controls, including how margin itself is measured. Commitments continue or end on your decision; any plan that loads cost or risk elsewhere without an owner is blocked, and investment that ignores adoption, dependencies or the bad case is turned down. You will approve who leads and how issues climb, and resolve conflicts with practice heads before resources are committed.

A margin bridge, then a habit

By the close of the first ninety days, an agreed margin bridge should exist that separates structural margin from temporary price and volume effects. By month nine, pricing, cost and investment decisions should be tested against structural margin, with someone accountable for each margin driver. By month 18, structural margin should appear as standard in the country's results, and the forecasting discipline behind it should be something the finance team runs on its own.

A margin reader with a turnaround record

You have led through an ESG transition without letting the board's story drift from the operating evidence, in businesses with at least $280 million in revenue and 1,200 or more people across six countries. Your judgement has been tried in businesses that had to keep trading while decision authority moved between people. Your ESG transition, integration and turnaround experience will be weighed, alongside capital allocation at level 4 and three capabilities at level 3: FP&A forecasting, risk judgement, and controls and reporting. You can name a well-liked commitment you closed, what the evidence said and what closing it freed. You keep open questions visible without letting them freeze a decision. Country leaders need not all agree before you act, and you expect accountability for the full 18 months.

Margin questions, three ways

Week one starts with a confidential conversation by video with the Group Chief Financial Officer. In week two the Regional President brings a case built around a margin question for you to work through. Week three takes you to the Investment Committee, in person. Each conversation is followed within two working days by our response in writing.