Directeur de Transformation

Led the organisation redesign of the Writer, a communication content provider for large multinational clients.

• Clarified process flow and prioritised requirements for digital transformation that was underway
• Right-sized teams to achieve a quicker throughput on projects
• Defined performance metrics to foster end-to-end accountability

• Developed a business case and master plan for the entry of Wise, a SaaS provider, into 7 European markets through a global partnership, with creation of legal entities and selection of local suppliers to establish a continental presence
• Groomed an internal resource to take over the role once the partnership is incepted

Reorganised for Inspirit Capital a carved-out paper mill

• Clarified roles & responsibilities for all activities and developed metrics to track their fulfilment
• Identified missing coverage in procurement, project management and quality/ certification
• Reframed meetings cadence and attendance to devolve accountability much lower in the organisation and free time for the management team

Led the organisation redesign of the Writer, a communication content provider for large multinational clients.

• Clarified process flow and prioritised requirements for digital transformation that was underway
• Right-sized teams to achieve a quicker throughput on projects
• Defined performance metrics to foster end-to-end accountability

Performed the operational review of the French BU of an engineering business owned by Graphite Capital.
* Investigated projects with large variance to budget to surface process issues. Identified problems with roles and responsibilities around estimation, delivery & tracking and variation recovery.
* Presented a set of recommendations to reduce variability of estimation, ensure a more robust approach to tracking, clarify the capabilities required at all stages of projects and capture systematically lessons learned

Led a sales effectiveness assessment and implemented recommendation to support aggressive growth plans for Nylacast, a £25M cast nylon manufacturer owned by Equistone sales cycle penetration development plans

* Supported the Executive Chair during the turnaround of a distressed bus operator across the UK.
* Developed a 100-day turnaround plan to generate operational margin improvements of 4% with focus on rostering & allocation, RMO activities and fuel efficiencies

Supported the CEO in the preparation for the equity sale triggered by Carlyle generate savings corresponding to 30% of current EBITDA.
* Integrated an executive chauffeur service company acquired two years before, starting with finance consolidation and following with harmonisation of car allocation, maintenance and procurement.
* Challenged the corporate view that sluggish trade was a demand problem that price changes would address, advocating instead that supply was ill-managed. Led a proof of concept to simplify the logic behind the allocation of cars, with the view to free capacity by 12% for additional rides.
* Build the business case for the transition of the drivers' status from self-employed to worker by sizing the liabilities to ensure an hourly pay above national minimum wage, holiday pay and a pension contribution.

Launched Accelerate, a group transformation programme at Arriva, a public transportation operator active in fourteen countries with 60,000 drivers. Accelerate aimed to define and implement operational best practices across bus and train, covering in priority the dominant cost centres (procurement, driver allocation and rostering, fuel efficiency and maintenance).
* Put in place programmatic workings with a pull approach to change. Set up a design hothouse process, involving all divisions in the problem diagnostic and its solution design. Built a lean team to facilitate the hothouses, establish a thorough reporting and track benefits.
* Positioned the managing directors of the twenty-four operating companies as the local champions of the implementation, and asked them to define their own saving ambition. Stretched the role of Finance at Arriva, by putting it in ownership of the benefits realisation.
* Scoped the elements of procurement that needed to be pooled between the different entities and defined a new Procurement function organised around category managers and specialist buyers.

Led the sales turnaround for Teleplan, a €300M electronics after-market service company owned by Gilde.
* Deployed revamped processes for acquisition and retention of programs, focusing on pipeline qualification and value selling. Steered the choice of new CRM, with an initial focus on process maps and performance metrics as system requirements. Got sales on a path of 10-15% increase.
* Voiced to the Management Team the need to eradicate a prevailing culture of fear and blame before anything could sustainably change. Established management processes to support the ways of working and escalate sales issues. Built bottom-up metrics to track performance and free the Management Team of the temptation to micro-manage their organisation.

Turned around the sales force of Selecta, a €500M French distribution service company owned by KKR.
* Redefined its market segmentation, and established profitability criteria based on the existing customer base.
* Defined closed lists of prospects for sales reps, of a size based on the contracts duration and the workload of preparing bids. Assessed the skillset of the salesforce, with recommendations for training/ hire/ redeployment.
* Identified reasons for losing contracts, and developed tools to prioritise actions to keep customers satisfied.
* Mobilised the Regional Directors as local implementation champions. Trained sales staff on new approaches with the local champions and equipped the management with tools to monitor performance, leading to a sales pick-up of 25%. Defined business requirements for a CRM upgrade, with the establishment of the process workflows, the decision gates, and data quality checks.

Framed the turnaround of the Real Estate function of Auchan, a French supermarket chain.
Projects tended to drift on budget and timeline, challenging their target ROI.
* Mapped out the value chain of real estate projects, with corresponding resources deployment and handovers to then simplify the work flow.
* Developed a competency framework, identifying weaknesses and needs to hire/ redeploy/ train resources to improve the quality of project initiation decisions, cost controls, and quality checks of suppliers' delivery.
* Sorted governance issues linked to non-compliance to the new process to enable cost avoidance of €330m on big projects over a period of 3 years.

Part of BT managing the local access network, connecting communication providers to their customers Responsible for the process transformation to increase efficiency across the entire product portfolio.
* Led a transformation to establish operational ownership of processes for the 19,000 field engineers. Established a hierarchical definition of the processes, down to operational procedures, and the ways in which behaviours had to change. Raised job efficiency by 23%, enabling savings of £119m per year.
* Transformed a 4,800 staff customer service centre, increasing speed and quality of complaints handling with a headcount reduction of 35%, consolidating 24 sites into 7.
* Shrunk from 18 to 10 months the time-to-market for new products by building a library of reusable capabilities, with clear requirement definition to simplify the IT support and the definition of tasks for operators.
* Coached junior managers to lead and inspire their teams as part of the Inspirational Leadership Program.

Global management consultancy combining strategic insights and deep operations expertise Responsible for teams of consultants to drive delivery of projects and benefit realisation.
* Moved a plant of Emerson, a manufacturing conglomerate, from make-to-forecast to make-to-stock for the fast-selling items, in order to stabilise a chaotic operation. Rebalanced the inventory levels for all related parts. Engaged the suppliers on the shift in demand for their parts.
Reshaped the procurement approach from Far-East suppliers with long lead times to Eastern European ones with less than a week supply response.
* Facilitated for Boeing the conversion of four manufacturing workshops from a batch process to a one-part flow system at the B737 assembly line in Renton, WA. Got staff in a can-do mindset by getting quick implementation and quick assessment of improvements ("if you need to fail, fail fast"). Changes improved capacity by 70%, reduced defect by 45% and delivery time by 85%.
* Led a 40-staff team on a 90-day project to rewrite the bill of materials for a foam manufacturer owned by TPG, with 55% of production and 85% of revenues covered within 5 weeks.
Restated activity-based costing of production and enabled product pricing to be profitable again.
* Supported the operating model shift to pan-European for the Coca-Cola bottling company.
Defined scope of central headquarters functions and accountability matrix with local teams in Finance and HR. Defined and implemented process for Sales & Production Planning to reach stock out rate of less than 0.5%.
* Set up the PMO for a turnaround involving plant closures and portfolio rationalisation for Smiths Medical, a medical device manufacturer. Vetted people able to drive the turnaround, killed all "nice-to-have" initiatives in the pipeline and chunked down the turnaround plan based on the available pool of project managers.

Leading member of Shell's Internal Business Consultancy, a 35-staff group put on business-critical missions instigated by central functions (e.g. Group IT, Group HR, Group Finance, Group Strategy) turnaround to reduce the headcount by 45%. Led a baseline assessment, and set up events to bring up changes in the behaviours and leadership style of the management team.
* Designed and managed the transition to shared services for Shell France at Berre, a petrochemical site with six distinct operators. Scope covered HR, site health & safety and maintenance. Developed material for union negotiation to get change ratified and implemented, including a downgrade of the social benefits for staff.
* Took part to the financial turnaround of Shell Brazil. Defined and implemented a clean-up of the B2B portfolio based on customer profitability and solvency. Clarified financial processes for client vetting Established a set of standard services to simplify the definition of work scope and the negotiation of contracts. Got unpaid receivables from £220m to £4m through negotiated settlements and billing input improvements

A €500M aeronautical manufacturing company with 1,500 employees Lead engineer in charge of research and space developments projects for ESA and NASA, stretching from design to manufacturing and testing.