Interim President, International Markets — Renewal (Education)

Building the team the next phase will need

International education businesses are often led by a mix of founders' appointees, acquired management teams and leaders promoted for their local knowledge. That mix can serve a business well for years, and then the next phase of ownership asks a different question: is this the team, and the structure, that can carry the business forward? The Interim President, International Markets is appointed to answer it across the international portfolio, and to put the answer in place within 12 months.

The work is as much about design as about people. It means deciding which roles the international business genuinely needs, what each one decides, where accountability for academic quality sits in relation to commercial performance, and how country leaders relate to the centre. Only once that design is clear does it make sense to judge who fills it.

The authority to settle it

The role carries interim executive authority and reports to the Board Chair. You will map which calls belong to the centre and which to each market, including the limits within which local leaders act, and decide what evidence a market must bring before the centre funds it, adds capacity or relaxes a control. You choose which inherited commitments proceed, which wait and which end. You can halt a scheme that pushes its cost or risk onto others with nobody taking responsibility, and reject investment cases that lack an account of take-up, of what else they depend on or of the downside. You approve how the international leadership team is built and how issues climb through it, work out disagreements with country leadership before money is released, and decide how often, and in what form, the board sees progress, exceptions and unresolved choices.

Twelve months to a settled team

During the first ninety days, the international leadership structure for the next phase of ownership should be designed, with roles, decision rights and escalation routes agreed with the Board Chair. Around month nine the key international leadership roles should be filled or confirmed, and inherited market commitments should have been kept, held or closed on evidence. By month 12 the international markets should be led by a settled team with succession cover behind each critical role, and with a board rhythm ready for the next phase.

A record across many markets

Eight countries, 3,500 people and revenue of $660 million or more is the minimum breadth of business you should have led, and you know education and learning services from decisions that were yours, among them a commitment with no real backing that you halted before it caused harm. Before letting an exception continue, you have established who actually pays for it. The Board Chair will test your geographic expansion first, then professionalisation and buy-side M&A; strategy formation should be at level 4, with P&L ownership, operating cadence and risk judgement each at level 3. After the board has decided you remain accountable, closing out the dull exceptions as well as the visible ones, and halting a commitment will not wait on every market agreeing.

How the structure gets tested

Your design is examined four times. The Board Chair hears it first, in confidence and on screen, in week 1. In week three the Regional President works it through with you in a session. The fifth week tests it in person before a group of functional executives, and in week seven the full board takes its view. You will have our written response within five working days of each.