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The Widespread
Use of "Interim Managers"
By Pri Notowidigdo
 Our rapidly-changing economy and environment in Indonesia are leading organizations to expand and contract their workforce according to demand. What has emerged is a widespread use of contracting out work and the rise of "interim managers."
What is an "interim manager?" Margaret Coles, a journalist who specializes on management issues, described the interim manager as "a new breed of corporate person, who steps in on short notice, sorting out problems, setting up operations or filling whatever gap has suddenly appeared in the management
structure."
The interim manager provides an effective solution to corporate crises and other managerial issues of finding resources. The organization hires a qualified, highly experienced, freelance executive and drops him into a business dilemma and provides him with a specific mandate and a limited length of time to implement it.
The interim manager can play diverse roles. He can bridge a gap or fill one while an organization is looking for a permanent manager. He can also manage a crisis following an unexpected departure or death of a senior employee. He can take charge of a specific project such as a factory move. Or, he can be a
"trouble-shooter" and manage a turnaround especially for a company in trouble.
You may now be asking: "Aren't we talking about management
consultants?" No, there's a difference. Consultants, in general, offer recommendations and strategic planning. The role of interim managers is to implement, in the short term, but with a view to the long-term interests of the client.
Consultants often have little experience in implementation. Yet, this is increasingly what clients demand. And, to be fair to consultants like myself, major consultancy firms are aware of this and have taken appropriate measures to increasingly implementation as well.
Apart from the benefits to organizations, interim management also meets the individual's desire for autonomy and appeals to the successful, experienced professional with entrepreneurial spirit.
Take the case of Pak Hari Mussinggih (a fictitious name), a senior information technology professional. He was fired at the age of 56 and became an interim manager at 57.
"When I was fired, my first reaction was to get another full-time job which I did," he says. "But I could see that I was going to be out of a job again in about one and a half years. When I reflected on my career, I realized that what I was really good at was managing change. However, once the change was in place, a different type of manager was needed. That meant that I was going to be looking for a new job every one and a half to two
years."
Pak Hari's response was to offer his services as an interim manager and positioned himself as
The Portable CIO™. The first few assignments came from networking. After a while, he became visible in the market, and was often approached by senior executive search consultants like myself for interim management responsibilities with their corporate clients.
A benefit for Pak Hari was that prospective employers regarded his age as value added. Pak Hari found that while there were often other candidates who were younger and had better academic qualifications, what the client saw in him was a lot of experience.
For the individual like Pak Hari, or maybe like yourself, there were a number of
valuable lessons learned from being an interim manager. One lesson was that Pak Hari has learned the value of maintaining a balance between learning and doing, and very importantly, of planning ahead to create options.
Another lesson is to use the flexibility, which comes from taking greater charge of your own career path, to ensure a healthy balance between work and the other critical lifestreams - social/domestic, personal health, and general development of the mind.
A third lesson has been the power of networks. Almost every career move he has made and all the most interesting jobs he has done, have come through knowing someone or being known.
An interim manager career is not for everyone. If you value security, an ordered and disciplined life, are not adventurous, then it will certainly not be for you. Yet for an increasing proportion of seasoned managers, interim management is going to be a significant part of their future. Perhaps it will be for you.
Pri Notowidigdo is an executive search consultant with The Amrop Hever Group, an organization that finds senior executives worldwide. (E-mail:
jakarta@amrophever.com
)
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