Evolving our approach to supporting interims

The Institute of Interim Management Survey provides a vital opportunity for Interim Service Providers (ISPs) to listen and reflect on the trends and experiences outlined within the results. It is a snapshot in time that provides insight into the confidence of interims looking forward, utilisation in the prior year, and critically, how they wish to work with ISPs. The ranking of ISPs and their consultants is an important measure of how the service we offer is perceived by a growing community of interim professionals.

Tile Hill is a business that wants to be known for offering the best quality service and support to interims. We are motivated to help people navigate their careers and fulfil their professional ambitions. With this in mind, we are incredibly proud to have been ranked 3^rd in the 2023 IIM Survey and to have two of our team members listed as Leading Consultants. However, we know we can continue to evolve our offer and provide even greater levels of support to those interims who chose to work with Tile Hill. The 2023 Survey provided invaluable insight ,and we have built the findings into our approach in the last year.

We hope our approach in the last 12 months has been received positively and that our support has helped interims secure new work, prepare for interviews, or maximise the fulfilment they get from their interim career. We have certainly enjoyed working alongside our interim community, and have loved finding different reasons to bring groups of people together to share ideas, best practice and celebrate successes. Whether through our inaugural networking event in May or through roundtable discussions that bring sector experts together around important themes, this sense of community is important to us, and we are proud to work alongside such talented and inspirational leaders that are contributing to making society better. Our Interim Insight Series has allowed us to further celebrate the difference that interims are making every day, and in doing so, champion interim as a career path for people to consider, and for organisations to appreciate the value interims provide.

From last year’s survey, we know there was nervousness among respondents about the ability to secure their next role against the backdrop of political and economic uncertainty. In support of this, over the last 12 months, we have increased the number of webinars and insight pieces we have produced to share our views on how interims can position themselves for success. This has included webinars on ‘How to Market Yourself,’ top tips on on how to network successfully, and how to to use LinkedIn to best effect. The survey also told us that 73% of interims were likely to use ISPs to secure work, and this prompted us to share our thoughts on how best to build relationships with recruiters. The Insights section of our website is constantly being updated with different content that offers support for interims when shaping applications, preparing for interviews, or landing successfully in assignments. I hope that when combined with high levels of personal interaction from our team, interims have felt assured, and that they have benefited from engaging with us. I personally would welcome feedback on this from anyone who has worked with Tile Hill.

We were pleased to see that a growing number of people had chosen to pursue a career as an interim manager in comparison to 2022. A trend that we expect to see continue this year as people reflect on the relationship they have with work and how they want to offer their experience and knowledge to organisations. However, we know that making the transition can be daunting, and for many, securing your first assignment is a major milestone. Over the last 12 months, we have increased the number of ‘New to Interim Webinars’ we run as part of our Tile Hill Sessions Series, and it has seen us welcome over 500 prospective and new interims to those webinars.

Linked to this, and in response to the data pointing to a continuing gender pay differential, we wanted to share our views on how interims can negotiate a fair rate for the level of experience they bring and for the role they are applying to. We all know that negotiating on our own behalf can be uncomfortable, yet it is important that those coming into the world of interim are able to secure a fair rate, and that we work as an industry to eliminate any gender pay imbalances.

Ensuring the interim community is diverse and representative of society is in everyone’s benefit, and it needs to be an inclusive community where everyone can thrive. I am confident we will continue to see more diversity in the respondents to the 2024 IIM survey, and it is important that all recruiters continue to educate themselves and evolve their inclusive recruitment principles.

Looking forward, our next Tile Hill Sessions webinar is set to take place on April 17^th focusing on how to make the most of downtime between assignments for your mental and physical wellbeing, and how to use breaks as a chance to focus on CPD and ensuring you keep your professional skills sharp. Please click here, if you would like to attend.

For all those we have worked with in the last 12 months, thank you for choosing to partner with Tile Hill. I hope you have benefited from the engagement, and we look forward to continuing our relationship in the year ahead. The 2024 IIM Survey will shortly be live and is another opportunity to provide feedback on recent experiences. We look forward to hearing the trends and feedback from the last year, using them as extra impetus into our thinking on how we evolve our approach, champion the value interims provide to organisations, and celebrate how rewarding interim can be as a way of working.

Did you find this useful or would like to hear more? If so, please remember to follow Tile Hill on LinkedIn for more news, community, and support.