Strategic Transformation Director

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Strategic Transformation – Director

EY-Parthenon, Financial Services, London

At EY, we are committed to helping our clients shape their future with confidence in an increasingly uncertain world. As AI, technological advancements, shifting consumer preferences, and evolving geopolitical dynamics drive significant change, we stand ready to guide organisations through these complexities.

Our purpose is to build a better working world—not only for our clients and communities but also by providing our people with exceptional and challenging development opportunities that empower them to thrive.

Join EY and help to build a better working world.

The Opportunity

EY-Parthenon is a leading global strategy consultancy and M&A practice, with over 25,000 dedicated professionals. Our core offerings involve helping clients to reimagine their business models through strategic advisory services, M&A execution and enterprise-wide, strategic transformation.

This opportunity relates to EY-Parthenon’s Strategic Transformation practice, where we are making significant investment. We help Financial Services clients to translate business strategy into an actionable transformation agenda, define where value will be created, and maintain the line of sight from strategic choices through mobilisation, delivery and benefits realisation.

Our Strategic Transformation mandates can be at Group level in a client’s organisation or focused on a specific line of business or proposition. Across that spectrum, our work is:

• Strategy-led – focused on the priorities that matter most to clients: growth, efficiency and sustainable competitive advantage.
• End-to-end – connecting proposition and customer experience with the operating model, risk and controls, data and technology required to deliver them.
• Value-focused – ensuring transformation translates into tangible financial outcomes across P&L, balance sheet and ROTE.

We offer genuine opportunities to work on some of the world's highest profile strategic transformations in a market leading team. As we are making significant investment in this practice, we believe there are development opportunities for team members to help shape the practice and take early responsibility.

Your key responsibilities

As a Director, you will advise senior executives on their most important strategic and transformation priorities, shape complex transformation agendas and orchestrate integrated EY teams to deliver them. You will combine strategy-grade problem solving with delivery pragmatism, ensuring transformation remains grounded in business value.

As part of your day-to-day role, you will shape and lead complex engagements, working with cross-functional teams in a high-pressure environment. Your client work will include design, planning and execution of strategic transformation, including:

• Business model reinvention (at enterprise or line of business level)
• New ventures (strategic partnerships, market entry)
• Proposition reinvention or launch of a new proposition
• Enterprise-level efficiency and cost reduction programmes
• Set-up and operation of Strategy Execution Office for client organisations

You will take senior accountability for the quality and commercial performance of your engagements, maintaining strong relationships with executive-level client stakeholders and ensuring that significant issues, risks and decisions are identified and addressed effectively.

Beyond individual engagements, you will play an important role in growing the Strategic Transformation business. You will build trusted relationships with senior clients, identify and shape new opportunities, lead proposals and bring together capabilities from across EY to address complex client challenges.

You will also help build the capability and market profile of the practice, developing propositions and intellectual capital, contributing external perspectives and thought leadership, and strengthening connectivity across EY.

As a senior leader in the team, you will coach and develop Senior Managers and other team members, creating high-performing teams and helping build the next generation of Strategic Transformation leaders.

Skills and attributes for success

• Financial Services expertise: 10+ years industry and / or consulting experience in a Financial Services environment. For our senior roles, we are looking for deeper sector specialisation in one or two specific domains, including:
  • Consumer Banking
  • Capital markets / wholesale banking
  • Wealth Management
  • Asset Management
  • General Insurance
  • Life Insurance & Pensions
• Transformation leadership: proven track record of leading large-scale strategic transformation engagements, from shaping the transformation ambition and value case through design and execution.
• Consulting experience: has operated at a senior level in a consulting / professional services environment.
• Strategic insight: brings a strong point of view on the forces reshaping Financial Services and can translate these into C-suite transformation agendas and investment priorities.
• Enterprise perspective: understands how decisions interact across business model, customer, operations, technology, data, finance, risk and organisation.
• Commercial acumen: able to identify the principal drivers of enterprise value and frame transformation in terms of growth, cost, capital, risk, P&L and ROTE outcomes.
• Quantitative and qualitative analysis: able to direct complex analysis, assess the strength of the evidence, challenge conclusions and draw out recommendations.
• Operating model: able to lead the design of operating models for Financial Services businesses and understand the implications for customers, organisation, processes, risk and controls, data and technology.
• Technology awareness: able to engage credibly with senior business and technology leaders and articulate how technology choices, architecture and delivery constraints affect transformation outcomes.
• AI literate: has a clear point of view on how AI is reshaping Financial Services business and operating models and can identify opportunities to embed AI into transformation agendas.
• Executive Communication: highly effective communicator with the presence and judgement to engage senior executives, simplify complex issues and influence difficult decisions.
• Relationship management: establishes credibility with senior client teams and builds relationships that extend beyond the immediate engagement.
• Selling skills: identifies, shapes and helps convert significant opportunities; builds propositions and mobilises the broader capabilities of EY around client needs.

Client responsibilities

• Builds trusted and influential relationships with senior stakeholders on client accounts.
• Shapes and leads complex engagements delivering Strategic Transformation services.
• Acts as a senior adviser to client decision makers in developing and executing their strategic transformation.
• Delivers a high degree of client satisfaction with the engagement process and deliverables and is able to drive additional and repeated engagements.
• Identifies, shapes and develops new opportunities, bringing together the best of EY’s capabilities to address broader client needs.
• Builds EY's external profile through market relationships, propositions, points of view and thought leadership.

People responsibilities

• Responsible for overall team performance on engagements.

• Helps people to develop through effectively supervising, coaching and mentoring junior staff.

• Plays an active role in building the Strategic Transformation practice, including recruiting, retaining and training Strategic Transformation professionals.

• Builds and strengthens the team’s intellectual capital, encouraging the development and reuse of distinctive methodologies, propositions and insights.

• Understands and communicates workplace policies and procedures to staff.

• Builds strong relationships across EY and actively connects capabilities across service lines and disciplines to create integrated teams for clients.

What are the benefits of the role?

• High profile: you will have the opportunity to work on some of the world's largest transformations, as an EY-Parthenon strategic advisor.
• Growth: the Strategic Transformation team is a high growth part of the business. This will present significant development opportunities.
• Team environment: as a growing and successful team, we have a great sense of energy and enthusiasm. The team also benefits from a collaborative approach and strong support from the wider organisation.
• Variety: each assignment will be different, offering you the chance to work across a wide range of banking, asset management, and insurance transformations.
• Mobility: our work can sometimes involve travel and the opportunity to develop your career internationally.

What working at EY offers

We offer a competitive remuneration package where you’ll be rewarded for your individual and team performance. Our comprehensive Total Rewards package includes support for flexible working and career development, and with FlexEY you can select benefits that suit your needs, covering holidays, health and well-being, insurance, savings and a wide range of discounts, offers and promotions. Plus, we offer:

• Support, coaching and feedback from engaging colleagues
• Opportunities to develop new skills and progress your career
• The freedom and flexibility to handle your role in a way that’s right for you

If you can confidently demonstrate that you meet the criteria above, please contact us as soon as possible.

EY is committed to being an inclusive employer and we are happy to consider flexible working arrangements. We strive to achieve the right balance for our people, enabling us to deliver excellent client service whilst allowing you to build your career without sacrificing your personal priorities. While our client-facing professionals can be required to travel regularly, and at times be based at client sites, our flexible working arrangements can help you to achieve a lifestyle balance

Please note: Prior to finalising your application, you will be asked to provide personal information across several dimensions of diversity and inclusiveness. The information you provide is kept entirely confidential and will not be used to evaluate your candidacy. We collect this data to help us analyse our recruitment process holistically and implement actions that promote diversity and inclusiveness. While optional, we encourage you to provide this information to hold us accountable towards our goal of building a better working world. We ask because it matters!

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