Customer-Concentration Strategic Recovery Leader

The mandate

One energy customer accounts for most current revenue, absorbs a disproportionate share of specialist engineering and funds working capital through milestone payments. The relationship created valuable methods and references, but customer-specific tools, approval pathways and non-compete interpretations make redeployment uncertain. Renewal discussions begin soon, while diversification pursuits rely on experts already reserved for the incumbent. The strategy director exited after the board rejected a generic sales-growth plan, leaving an executive gap in concentration recovery.

The first thirty days require a relationship-dependency map covering contracts, backlog, margin, cash, milestones, people, equipment, data, intellectual property, references, approvals and customer-specific obligations. By day sixty, the leader must establish loss, renewal, partial-renewal and delayed-award cases, including which capabilities and cash can actually be redeployed. The ninety-day window must set negotiation boundaries and fund a small number of credible diversification moves without weakening live delivery.

Decision rights include chairing concentration recovery, releasing approved capacity, stopping unsupported pursuits, requiring contract and IP evidence and approving diversification spend within delegated limits. The interim may reprioritise noncontracted work while protecting delivery obligations. Customer negotiation, contract amendment, pricing beyond authority, IP ownership, employment reductions, capital and market-entry decisions remain with authorised executives, counsel and the board.

The assignment must leave permanent resilience rather than anti-customer behaviour. The leader will appoint or prepare a portfolio-resilience head, embed quarterly concentration tests and observe the successor lead one renewal phase plus two diversification gates. Handover will identify reserved capacity, customer permissions, reference rights, milestone cash, reusable methods, pursuit evidence, relationship sensitivities and decisions requiring chief executive involvement.

The remit excludes undermining the key account, breaching confidentiality, soliciting restricted customers, directing engineering, determining IP rights, making revenue-recognition decisions and manufacturing diversification pipeline. The leader cannot label generic capability reusable without technical evidence or sacrifice committed service to improve concentration ratios. Account leadership, engineering, counsel, finance and the board retain their authority.

Why this seat is open

The exit left account leaders protecting renewal, business development promoting pipeline and finance measuring exposure, with no executive joining capacity, cash and rights. The coming renewal window makes waiting for permanent recruitment impractical. A temporary leader can establish bounded choices, protect the relationship and transfer a credible diversification discipline without taking negotiation authority.

What you will own

• Map contract, backlog, margin, cash, milestones, capacity, equipment, data, IP, references and approval dependence.
• Test loss, partial renewal, delay and stronger-renewal scenarios for liquidity, workload, cost and strategic freedom.
• Separate reusable capability from customer-specific method, restricted information, tooling, workflow and relationship access.
• Set diversification criteria covering customer need, proof, rights, specialist capacity, cash, timing and win evidence.
• Chair capacity and pursuit decisions inside delegated authority while protecting current delivery and confidentiality.
• Establish renewal boundaries, concentration indicators, trigger actions and board escalation for irreversible commitments.
• Transfer relationship maps, scenario actions, pursuit gates, decision logs and observed reviews to the successor.

Candidate qualifications

• Has led customer-concentration recovery in engineering, energy services, defence or another relationship-intensive business through contract renewal cycles.
• Understands milestone cash, capacity reservation, intellectual property, references, approvals, backlog and key-account economics.
• Can protect a dominant relationship while challenging dependency and unsupported diversification narratives.
• Has distinguished transferable capability from customer-specific assets, permissions, methods and confidential knowledge.
• Brings credible coordination with chief executives, customers, engineering, projects, finance, counsel and business development.
• Has handed concentration governance through live renewal and diversification gates to permanent leadership.

Non-negotiables

• Can work onsite in Oslo and attend monthly customer, project and diversification reviews.
• Brings direct dominant-customer strategy; general key-account sales or pipeline management alone is insufficient.
• Will not breach confidentiality, invent pipeline, misuse references or sacrifice committed service for ratio improvement.
• Has no undisclosed relationship with the dominant customer, competitors, advisers, target accounts or key suppliers.

1. 49 words maximum. Which customer-specific asset would you test before calling engineering capability transferable?
2. 49 words maximum. How would you fund diversification without weakening the dominant customer’s live delivery?
3. 49 words maximum. What must the successor demonstrate during a renewal decision?