Director - People in M&A

Job description

The Team

The Strategy Transactions / Deal Execution practice is part of KPMG's Strategy Group within Advisory. It brings together industry and functional expertise to support clients across the deal lifecycle, from evaluating a transaction or carve-out through to integration, separation and value delivery.

The People in M&A team helps clients address the workforce and organisational factors that determine whether a deal succeeds in practice. We support clients across the employee journey, from early strategy through execution, with a particular focus on human resources due diligence, people-related synergies and value creation. The team assesses workforce risks and opportunities, supports organisation design and employee transitions, and helps clients maximise transaction value through people.

The Role 

Provide senior leadership for the People in M&A practice, originating and leading complex client engagements and helping clients identify workforce risks, synergies and value creation opportunities across the deal lifecycle.

Key accountabilities
• Deliver sustainable growth by originating opportunities and strengthening relationships across the UK and European private equity and mergers and acquisitions community.
• Secure trusted adviser relationships with senior clients by anticipating requirements and providing clear, commercially relevant advice.
• Deliver complex People in M&A engagements to high standards of client impact, quality, profitability and risk management.
• Maintain the credibility and quality of client outputs through robust challenge, review and senior oversight of analysis and recommendations.
• Grow the practice through go-to-market activity, thought leadership, marketing, proposals and new business development initiatives.
• Build team capability and followership by providing visible leadership, coaching and inspiration to junior colleagues.
• Maintain compliance with the firm’s risk management frameworks by identifying and reviewing key judgements and consulting appropriately.
• Represent the People in M&A team and KPMG credibly with clients, the wider firm and the broader market.

Key responsibilities
• Lead pre-deal human resources due diligence, vendor due diligence, people-related synergy and value creation engagements.
• Scope, design and run complex integration and/or separation projects, acting as the primary client liaison and ensuring delivery meets client requirements.
• Lead the presentation of findings to senior clients and constructively challenge client and internal thinking, drawing on experience of running large integration and separation programmes.
• Guide teams to produce client-ready deliverables that exceed expectations with limited senior input.
• Review complex analyses and financial models to ensure that conclusions are credible, accurate and commercially relevant.
• Distil large volumes of technical and workforce data into the strategic insights most important to clients.
• Initiate and lead marketing, sales, proposal, scoping and pricing activity for medium-sized and large consulting assignments.
• Take new business development ideas from concept through design and execution to client conversations.
• Lead selected internal priorities, including team management, technical tools and coordination with service suppliers.
• Collaborate across KPMG and with external stakeholders to deliver integrated client solutions.

The Person

Key skills, experience 
• Extensive experience in human resources due diligence, value creation and People in M&A.
• Significant experience in a leading strategy consulting business, Big Four firm, or strategy or corporate development team in industry.
• Proven experience scoping and leading medium-sized and large HR M&A engagements with strong client outputs and project economics.
• Demonstrable ability to originate sales opportunities, maintain senior client relationships and lead proposals, scope and pricing.
• Strong analytical, numerical and commercial skills, including reviewing technical data and building complex financial models.
• Excellent written, verbal and presentation skills, with the credibility to influence and challenge senior stakeholders.

Qualifications 
• Strong academic track record.
• Additional language skills are desirable but not essential.