Partner – Organisation and Talent — Machine-Learning Infrastructure Stack

The mandate

Clients are asking for organisation advice tied directly to strategic delivery rather than isolated design or assessment. For machine-learning infrastructure businesses, commercialisation changes executive roles, product and platform interfaces, decision rights and scarce-capability demands. Generic spans-and-layers work cannot answer those questions. The Partner – Organisation and Talent will build trusted counsel around the operating choices required to convert technical capability into commercial performance.

The context encompasses approximately CHF 850 million in AI product and services revenue and roughly 275 employees and material partners across Switzerland, Zurich and the wider region. The advisory remit connects organisation, leadership, talent, operating model and change with product, infrastructure and customer economics. It requires technical curiosity and the confidence to challenge preferred people solutions that do not address the strategic constraint.

The desired outcomes are trusted counsel, more effective senior teams and repeatable intellectual property. Repeatability should come from sharp questions, evidence and methods, not fixed organisation charts. Every engagement must show how leadership and organisation decisions alter delivery, adoption, cost or value.

Why this seat is open

This is a planned replacement with an orderly transition from the incumbent. The firm has allowed four to six months for assessment, diligence and controlled client communication. The permanent onsite role is based in Zurich, supports international relocation and reports to the Global Managing Partner and regional partner council.

What you will own

You will define propositions around consequential organisation questions in infrastructure commercialisation: platform versus product ownership, research-to-market interfaces, enterprise sales and delivery, critical capability supply and senior-team effectiveness. Each proposition needs a decision owner, business outcome, evidence base and multidisciplinary delivery model.

Senior-client origination and counsel are direct accountabilities. You will create board conversations, diagnose the real constraint and decline work where sponsorship or strategic connection is absent. Engagement teams should combine organisation expertise with product, technology, data and commercial judgement. Advice must be implementable within client capacity.

Senior-team work requires independence and care. You will connect roles, accountabilities, behaviour and talent decisions to the operating agenda, distinguishing facilitated alignment from avoided conflict. Assessment and succession evidence should be transparent enough for consequential decisions while protecting individuals and client trust.

You will develop reusable diagnostics, decision frameworks and transition tools from proven engagements. Across the 275-person employee and partner perimeter, principals require accountable client exposure and future partners need origination development. Economics should reflect senior counsel and client value without creating excessive dependence on the appointee.

Implementation follow-through is essential to credibility. Organisation decisions should translate into named role appointments, changed forums, leadership routines and workforce movements, each linked to the strategic milestone it enables. The practice will revisit those decisions after launch, learn where design assumptions failed and incorporate verified lessons into its methods.

The first 12 months

In the first 90 days, review client demand, current engagements, intellectual property, economics and leadership bench. Speak with boards and executives at different stages of infrastructure commercialisation. Agree a focused proposition thesis, account priorities, engagement standards and succession plan with the partner council.

Between months four and nine, originate signature work, strengthen multidisciplinary delivery and retire generic offers without a strategic outcome. Build intellectual property from live cases, fill leadership gaps and demonstrate one client senior-team intervention that changes execution evidence, not simply reported alignment.

At month twelve, trusted counsel, senior-team effectiveness and reusable methods should form a repeatable practice pattern. The next plan needs to reconcile pipeline, fees, partner leverage and talent. Set downside actions if propositions fail to gain board access or demonstrate client outcomes.

What the board will measure

First-year practice economics should finish within 10% of approval, with variance explained early. Forecasts across three quarters must align contracted fees, cash, client outcomes and partner capacity. A defined constraint in senior-team or organisation effectiveness should improve measurably from an agreed baseline.

Priority client, conduct and delivery risks must close by governance dates and remain corrected. At least 90% of critical talent should remain, with ready-now cover for 70% of direct reports. Severe client escalations need disposition within 30 days and material surprises must enter the appropriate forum.

The person

You are a Partner, Organisation Practice Leader or senior talent adviser with 22–28 years in AI, enterprise software, data infrastructure, cloud, analytics, applied research or an adjacent advisory environment. You have owned at least CHF 500 million of book, budget or client-value portfolio and led at least 200 people.

Your record joins board-level organisation counsel with measurable strategic delivery. You can show senior-team choices, operating-model change, repeatable IP and the development of future partners. The board will test where your evidence challenged a client’s preferred structure. References must distinguish your contribution and show benefits lasting beyond the engagement.

Compensation and terms

Compensation is expected at CHF 320,000–430,000 base plus annual incentive, positioned for the final remit and candidate mix. Any long-term element follows usual performance and vesting requirements. Up to six months can be allowed for an orderly transfer of client duties and conflict clearance. The partner will engage routinely with group risk and people governance.

Confidentiality

The client name, exact footprint, transaction history and live engagements sit outside this brief. Qualified candidates will receive details under a mutual undertaking; composite facts must not be circulated or reverse-engineered.