Increased call for Interim Managers

They say that some hiring freezes have been in place for nearly two years. Recruitment freezes do not allow firms to replace senior staff when they retire or move on, leaving a gap in the upper echelons of a company.

Doug Baird, managing director of Interim Partners, says: "Although corporates are now much more confident about the future they still live in fear of a 'W' shaped recovery. They want to keep as much flexibility in their senior management ranks as possible. For many companies, that means using an interim executive and not hiring a full-time senior employee even to replace a departing director.

"Traditionally gap management was to cover for maternity leave or whilst a company recruited to replace a departed senior executive. Increasingly gap management is about covering vital roles until that undetermined time when a company feels comfortable enough to suspend its hiring freeze."

This is backed up by an industry report from Source for Consulting that states that demand for interim managers is set to increase in the fourth quarter of 2009 with the financial services sector leading the way.

The report found that many corporations working within this sector are planning to increase their budgets for interim executives until the second quarter of 2010 - some by as much as 50 per cent.

Interim management providers Veredus saw a record first half of the year along with a 250% increase in the number of candidates registering for work.

Although the country is slowly coming out of the recession, it sounds as if we will be relying on Interim Managers for some time to come.

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