Professional Profile

Give me a lever and a place to stand and I will move the world… Archimedes

Professional Profile – Nick Keca: I’m an outcome-oriented leader with a collaborative style enabling relationships with stakeholders spanning C-level executives to associates, and across business functions.

I’m a transformational change and performance improvement professional with a broad range of cross-functional capabilities. These include leading large scale transformation, change (business and IT) and operational performance development programmes within Financial Services, customer services, Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), Engineering manufacturing, and a variety of other industry sectors; and involving organisation design, target operating model development and performance improvement.

My professional development is augmented by continuous learning, including an Executive Doctorate in Organisational Psychology where I’ve gained expertise in the influence of personality on performance outcomes through collaborative working in multi-disciplinary virtual teams.

INDUSTRY SECTOR EXPERIENCE:

SERVICE SECTOR: Customer services; Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) (telco, retail, financial services, payment and loyalty card schemes, energy, utility, technology); Financial Services (Retails Banking, Mortgages, Life-and Pensions); Legal Services (regulated complaints, claims management, civil litigation)

MANUFACTURING SECTOR: Engineering manufacturing (continuous process, batch, precision engineering and MTO); precision machine tool manufacturing; CNC machining; welding and fabrication; Packaging and Distribution.

NOT-for-PROFIT: Charity; Higher Education Institution (University)

WORK EXPERIENCE:

⇒ Interim and permanent Managing Director and General Management remits.

⇒ Strategy, thought leadership, new product/proposition development, product lifecycle management.

⇒ Organisational development, strategic operating model development and implementation; culture/behaviour change

⇒ Business development, Sales, account management, channel / relationship management, pricing, tendering, bid management, negotiating, contract management.

⇒ Transformation and change leadership, including: acquisitions (PE backed), mergers, restructuring, up/down scaling, capital investment, service transition, implementation, partner/vendor/supply chain management, operations management, business process transformation and automation, six-sigma; and IT change (automation, digitisation, infrastructure, telecoms, services).

⇒ BPO remits spanning bid to service transition, service delivery and vendor management; large scale contact centre operations management and operational performance development covering the full spectrum of customer service provision, including: home-shore / near-shore / off-shore, FL customer service, customer experience, contact reduction, self-service, multi-site call centre operations.

⇒ Regulatory compliance, risk management, and customer remediation programmes in Financial Services (Retail Banking, Mortgages and Life & Pensions, Banking Payments).

⇒ Strategic, operational, financial, and project planning

⇒ Individual and Team performance development and coaching

⇒ Organisational Psychology, personality psychology, psychometric assessment, personality development.

⇒ Employee relations, collective bargaining, TUPE, team coaching and performance development.

COMPETENCIES:

INTERNATIONAL: Ex-pat and direct assignments in North America, Europe and Pacific Asia. Broad International customer facing experience since 1990. International client facing roles supporting the World’s biggest brands.

BUSINESS TYPE: New business start-ups, private companies, National/Multi-nationals, PLCs ranging from 3 to 120,000 employees and including Matrix Management Structures. B2B and B2C environments

COMMERCIAL: marketing, sales, account management, bid management, negotiations, contract management

FINANCIAL: Financial planning and management. Profit and Loss account ownership since 1997 up to £500m. Debtor book factoring, Asset finance – mainstream and private equity, acquisition finance, bank, treasury – Forex, Hedging, LOC, Forecasting, management accounting, business case development, reporting.

INDUSTRIES WORKED/SERVED: Financial Services, Retail Banking, Mortgages, Legal Services, Business Process Outsourcing, Engineering Manufacturing, Machine Tools, Fabrication, Welding, Marine, Oil and Gas, Petrochemical, LNG, Energy/power, Nuclear, Aerospace, Automotive, Defence, Utilities, Business Consulting.⇒ MANUFACTURING SCALE: Bespoke 1 off design/Make to Order (MTO), Batches – 2 to millions, Continuous process 24x7x365 (labour and capital intensive)

LEADERSHIP: large scale, multi-site operations employing collocated and virtual, multi-disciplinary teams and 3rd party partners/vendors; full spectrum of customer care: multi-lingual, multi-channel, multi-shore, insource/outsource, partner/vendor management, IB/OB, sales, retentions, collections, payments, tech support, fulfilment

IT: Applications development of automated high-volume systems, web development, Database development, Process workflow, Document management, imaging, document automation, content management, WordPress.

GOVERNMENT/REGULATORS: Department of Constitutional Affairs (UK Gov), Department of Health, Ministry of Justice, Financial Services Authority (FSA), Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Financial Ombudsman Service, Financial Services Compensation Scheme, Welsh Development Agency, Scottish Enterprise, Belgium Department of Employment

ANALYTICAL: Advanced analytical skills, deep knowledge of sophisticated statistical tools and techniques, including descriptive and inferential statistics, correlation, regression analysis, Hierarchical Linear Modelling/Structural Equation Modelling (SEM)

ORGANISATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY: Deep knowledge of the influence of personality on the behaviours of organisational teams; and the (useful) practical application of personality assessment data in composing and coaching teams for success.

SERVICE SECTOR CLIENTS:

AXA, Zurich, Getronics, Accenture, Dell, Microsoft, HP, Cisco, Nokia, Apple, BT, Toshiba, Virgin Media, Sky, Sony, T-Mobile, Deutsche Telekom, TalkTalk, eBay, Expedia, PayPal, Samsung, Unilever, P&G, Nectar, Henkel, Deutsche Bank, American Express, Bosch, RBS, Lloyds Banking Group, Capital One, Citi, BNP Paribas, Lego, LG, Philips, GMAC, BMW, Sitel, Firstsource, British Gas, Centrica, UCAS, NHS, DWP, HMRC, University of Birmingham, Vlaamse

MANUFACTURING SECTOR CLIENTS:

Halliburton, Bechtel, Reliance, MW Kellogg, ABB, TATA, GKN, Walkersteel, British Steel/Corus, Krupp, Thyssen, Klockner, Mitsubishi, Mitsui, Samsung, LG, Hyundai, Hitachi, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Rolls Royce, BMW, Jaguar, Rover, Ford, Kvaerner, Vickers, BP, Shell, GEC, Kone, Otis,Schindler, Orenstein & Koppel, British Nuclear Fuels, Atomic Energy Research, CERN, BAE Systems

WORK HISTORY

Dec 2011 to present – Scire Quam Ltd

These consulting and interim management roles were undertaken whilst completing a part time Executive Doctorate in Organisational Psychology.

Providing consulting and interim management support to enterprise transformational change and performance development programmes across a range of industry sectors spanning SMEs to multinationals. Examples of recent assignments: –

Examples of recent assignments: –

⇒ Regulatory compliance programme (customer remediation) within a large retail bank involving outreach to 500k customers through a change team of 200+, multi-channel contact centres, mailings, and payments.

⇒ Multi-jurisdiction, customer centric data regulatory tax compliance programme within a large UK retail bank.

⇒ Strategic contact centre infrastructure upgrade programme within a large UK Building Society.

⇒ Large-scale outsourcing programme within a UK retail bank involving customer service contact centres, telecommunications and IT infrastructure.

⇒ Target Operating Model development and implementation in a large UK Retail Bank.

⇒ Digital Document development project– an Agile IT software application development (solution design to post implementation support) creating a bespoke, cloud based, digital document management application.

⇒ Annual Operating Plan: – a business change assignment working with the top management team (CEO to function heads) to prepare the Annual Operating Plan for the business.

Aug 2008 to Mar 2011 – SITEL Corporation

Various executive leadership roles reporting to the Global CEO in this global (PE backed) business process outsourcing organisation employing c75,000 staff, based in 127 sites located in 26 countries, providing best-in-class B2B/B2C customer support solutions to the world’s biggest brands. For example: –

Jan 2010 to Mar 2011 – Managing Director, Global Transformation and Process
Reporting to – President and CEO

A global Corporate role with a broad executive remit to develop a new target operating model encapsulating mission critical activities spanning: people, processes and systems within a matrix management structure. My remit covered the spectrum of operating model development including: strategy, culture, leadership, organisation design (people, processes, and technology), employee value proposition development, governance and reporting. It also included a stretch target of $100m SG&A reduction.

Mar 2010 to Mar 2011 (role ran concurrently with the role above) – Managing Director & General Manager, Benelux and Nordics
Reporting to President and CEO

(NOTE: this role ran concurrently with the role above)

Responsibilities: A senior executive role to develop the performance capability of an operating division (Global BPO organisation) employing c2,000+ customer service staff in multiple locations across: Belgium, Netherlands and Denmark. This role had P&L/budget accountability to c€100m. The customer support model covered a complex mix of B2B/B2C contact centre operations ranging from simple front-line support, regulated PCI compliant services, multi-lingual technical support, back office operations and managing client’s inhouse customer service operations.

Aug 2009 to Jan 2010 – Managing Director, Northern EMEA

Reporting to President and CEO

Responsibilities: Interim executive leadership role with an operational performance development remit accountable for more than 10,000 colleagues spread across 32 European sites (+12 client sites) in nine countries and with budget/P&L accountability to c£450m. This was a complex, multinational, omni-channel/shore, client facing role supporting many of the world’s best known brands with world class customer care solutions.

Aug 2008 to Aug 2009 – Regional Director, UK & Ireland
Reporting to Managing Director, North EMEA

Executive operational leadership of a large-scale contact centre transformation/performance development remit for a strategically important, multinational telecommunications client with multiple (omni-channel/omni-shore) business lines supported by c1,000 customer service colleagues located in multiple sites. This role had P&L accountability to c£70m.

Jan 2008 to Aug 2008 – Scio Quam Ltd, Director

Supporting a large regulatory compliance programme (Treating Customers Fairly) within a large UK Financial Services firm serving retail consumers and sales distributors (B2B and B2C) with life & pensions products serviced by c3,500 staff in various UK sites.

Mar 2003 to Dec 2007 – Know How, Director.

Consultant and developer of automated legal services complaints management applications. Broad remit including strategic operating model development delivered through high volume digital complaint management solutions, business process automation, workflow/ document automation and e-Commerce.

Others…

1997 to 2003 – Brockington & Scott / UEC Industries, Managing Director

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