What positions do Interim Managers hold?

Servitalent started offering Interim Management services 10 years ago. Since then, it has been committed to positioning and promoting this activity in Spain.

As a company, we believe that Interim Management is a strategic tool for providing management experts who meet the needs of different types of businesses.

The Report on the State of Interim Management in Spain, which has become a reference in the sector, is one of the tools used by Servitalent to achieve this objective. The results of the study are included in the fourth edition of the Interim Management Hiring Guide, prepared by our company.

Servitalent's main objective is to continue promoting this activity in Spain and abroad, supporting the development of the market and providing approximate figures to help professionals working in this field and companies that are considering using this service.

Some characteristics of the missions of an Interim Manager.

This past year has been a difficult year in many aspects, although the predictions of a recession after the summer have not been fulfilled in general terms, although it is true that the situation has varied from one sector to another. During the past year, on a macro level, there has been a trend of consolidation and some growth, but new factors that were intuited or began to show their first symptoms at the end of the previous year, such as the war in Ukraine, inflation and the volatility of energy prices, have come to the fore and have marked the evolution of the economy in general and of many sectors in particular. It is true that there have been other sectors that have managed to weather the storm and the possible crisis situation has been transferred to a certain extent to the first half of 2023, although some countries other than ours have already experienced it more intensely in the second half of last year.

What the past year has once again shown us is that the environment continues to be volatile and with a high degree of uncertainty, which means that companies still have to prioritise short-term decisions, although with a medium and long-term vision, and that cash generation is key to gaining peace of mind, as well as knowing and having the capacity and flexibility to manage change. Therefore, there are aspects that have become very important, including management and leadership capacity, both in terms of economic and human resources, medium-term vision with short-term control and flexibility, the search for new business opportunities or pivoting and/or adapting our current lines of business, access to new markets, the search for financing, both through traditional and new channels, together with the optimisation of these resources by increasing their cost, talent management, with the search for, attraction and retention of talent as the key through attractive HR policies with challenging projects, providing flexibility and prioritising commitment to people, fine-tuning processes and procedures due to the narrowing of margins to guarantee a minimum profitability that ensures the viability of the companies and the development and implementation of actions to position our brands that communicate our differential value propositions. As a result, the most sought-after interim management positions in 2022 were General Management (23%), Advisor (16%), Financial Management (14%), Sales and Business Development Management (12%), HR Management (8%), Operations Management (7%) and Marketing Management (6%).

Regarding the dedication of Interim Managers in their missions, part-time (62%) has increased again compared to full-time (38%), after having achieved almost a balance between the two in 2021. We understand that the uncertainties caused by the aforementioned factors and the crisis forecasts for the second half of the year have led companies to be prudent in their investments, as we consider this type of service as such. Likewise, interim management is becoming increasingly popular among SMEs, which do not normally require such intense missions to meet their needs, nor do they have the economic capacity to hire full-time staff.

Finally, in terms of the duration of assignments, last year saw a significant growth in the period of more than 12 months, which accounted for 49%, compared to 31% in 2021, at the expense of assignments in the range of 7 to 12 months, which stood at 36%, compared to 58% in 2021. What these data indicate, together with dedication, is that companies have needed more time for interim managers to be involved, as their dedication has been more partial and, in addition, they have had to face different challenges over time, which shows the ability of these professionals to adapt very flexibly to the needs of each company, making them a very suitable tool for managing these uncertain environments that are becoming increasingly common, often unexpected and that have a longer duration over time.

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