November 2004
Special report on Feaco - Sesma Conference 2004 in Athens
Interview:
Remi Redley, Gil Gidron, Jean Luc Placet
We must put our sails in good winds
The Consulting Conference Athens 2004 jointly organized by FEACO, the European Federation of Management Consulting Firms and SESMA, the Hellenic Association of Management Consultants was the perfect event for having a cross interview with Remi Redley, Chairman of FEACO and President of BDU, the Association of German Consultants, Gil Gidron, former Chairman of FEACO and Jean Luc Placet, Administrator of FEACO and President of Syntec Conseil en Management, the French federation
Last year in Lublijana one of the FEACO official words was «consulting is not in crisis». However the FEACO Report 2003, slightly better than the 2002, has since shown a flat and quite inhomogeneous market. What can be said on that topic?
Remi Redley : Local markets are not similar. Spain is doing well, UK too but Germany has had some trouble last year as France has, so we should not expect to see better than 2 to 3% of market growth this year, no more, depending mainly on France and UK results. Germany is limited by political issues so the environment is far from perfect for the companies leading to disappearence and lack of attractiveness. However on the overall the market is picking up slowly.
Do we have some explanations for this slow recovery and strong inhomogeneity of the European consulting market ?
Jean Luc Placet : It is a cyclical process. The period 95-2001 was good then... it slowed. We are still in the low part of the cycle and must accept that !Dont forget that consulting is local activity specialized by product lines, mainly : Business, IT, HR and Outsourcing... For the last years IT was booming then collapsed and is now coming up to normality. Certainly before we had a 15% growth per year which is defenitly over. But we must recognize that we have created a 41 to 42 Billion Euros market, which is a big asset and that 2 to 6% of growth of this market is not that bad. Also about the heterogenous market we have to consider discrepencies resulting from the fact that some countries such as UK include Outsourcing in Consulting, which is not the case for Germany in its FEACO figures as well as France for which only IT companies include Outsourcing in their figures.
A second official FEACO word in Lublijana was that East would open, a situation for which consultants should be ready. Now then in Athens the question is where are we in that process?
Remi Redley : Clients are already there : Luftansa has its technical support in China and its call center in Poland. Clients have to be there before the consultants, at least in the largest countries.
Jean Luc Placet : the trend is amazing !
Remi Redley : FEACO was founded by France and the other big and small countries and companies... and it is clear that within 5 to 10 years it will be possible to work with Easternians.
Jean Luc Placet : History is going much more rapidly than time in the business
Gil Gidron : What’s more, industrial investment is moving eastward. Rapidly
Jean Luc Placet : However the very problem is not the East but the birth rate ! If it declines rapidly the economy can be bad
So East is opening and its markets too. In this respect FEACO conferences held in Lublijana then Athens, where delegations from Japan and Hong Kong were welcomed should rather be strong warnings to participants. For that reasons how is it that only locals did attend these meetings (with only 3 frenches in Lublijana and officialy 5 in Greece for instance)?
Jean Luc placet : The first reason is an economical one: we have been through 3 years of economical decline. A second reason is more technical : the annual meeting is a 15 years old tradition whereas today you can get instant information from your compuer. So why should you attend ?
Gil Gidron : What’s more, big consulting companies have devloped internal international meetings. So it is clear that we have to review the way we do meetings. For consulting firms, «Time is Money».
In that respect what are the next stages for the FEACO activity and what can be the role of consultants in the devlopment process toward a «competitive knowledge - based european economy» (to make use of this years meeting title)?
Gil Gidron : For sure we want to get to the next stages and we might list them as follows :
- To consolidate the FEACO development
- To reinforce the governance
- To involve more large multinational firms, a reason why we change the bylaw
so that they could join the FEACO . In the future membership would be
different
- and to keep national associations
How is this translated into action ?
Jean Luc Placet: We have always had the will to create a european federation. These 5 last years we have introduced and integrated Latvia, Estonia, Slovakia, Slovenia... Others might enter the federation during our next meeting at the Hotel Savoy in London. We want to represent the European Consulting in one voice. And it is to that purpose that the FEACO conference 2006 might be held in Hong Kong in collaboration with the chinese MCA HK, the american AMCF and the japanese Zen Noh Ren federations.
That sounds like a «tour of surprise». What might then be the official FEACO word for this year’s Meeting?
Remi Redley : If I had to keep one word I would say that now «we must put our sails in good winds»
Words collected by Bertrand Villeret
ConsultingNewsLine
Athens Astir Palace Vouliagmeni 21October 2004
The Consulting Conference Athens 2004 jointly organized by FEACO, the European Federation of Management Consulting Firms and SESMA, the Hellenic Association of Management Consultants was the perfect event for having a cross interview with Remi Redley, Chairman of FEACO and President of BDU, the Association of German Consultants, Gil Gidron, former Chairman of FEACO and Jean Luc Placet, Administrator of FEACO and President of Syntec Conseil en Management, the French federation
Last year in Lublijana one of the FEACO official words was «consulting is not in crisis». However the FEACO Report 2003, slightly better than the 2002, has since shown a flat and quite inhomogeneous market. What can be said on that topic?
Remi Redley : Local markets are not similar. Spain is doing well, UK too but Germany has had some trouble last year as France has, so we should not expect to see better than 2 to 3% of market growth this year, no more, depending mainly on France and UK results. Germany is limited by political issues so the environment is far from perfect for the companies leading to disappearence and lack of attractiveness. However on the overall the market is picking up slowly.
Do we have some explanations for this slow recovery and strong inhomogeneity of the European consulting market ?
Jean Luc Placet : It is a cyclical process. The period 95-2001 was good then... it slowed. We are still in the low part of the cycle and must accept that !Dont forget that consulting is local activity specialized by product lines, mainly : Business, IT, HR and Outsourcing... For the last years IT was booming then collapsed and is now coming up to normality. Certainly before we had a 15% growth per year which is defenitly over. But we must recognize that we have created a 41 to 42 Billion Euros market, which is a big asset and that 2 to 6% of growth of this market is not that bad. Also about the heterogenous market we have to consider discrepencies resulting from the fact that some countries such as UK include Outsourcing in Consulting, which is not the case for Germany in its FEACO figures as well as France for which only IT companies include Outsourcing in their figures.
A second official FEACO word in Lublijana was that East would open, a situation for which consultants should be ready. Now then in Athens the question is where are we in that process?
Remi Redley : Clients are already there : Luftansa has its technical support in China and its call center in Poland. Clients have to be there before the consultants, at least in the largest countries.
Jean Luc Placet : the trend is amazing !
Remi Redley : FEACO was founded by France and the other big and small countries and companies... and it is clear that within 5 to 10 years it will be possible to work with Easternians.
Jean Luc Placet : History is going much more rapidly than time in the business
Gil Gidron : What’s more, industrial investment is moving eastward. Rapidly
Jean Luc Placet : However the very problem is not the East but the birth rate ! If it declines rapidly the economy can be bad
So East is opening and its markets too. In this respect FEACO conferences held in Lublijana then Athens, where delegations from Japan and Hong Kong were welcomed should rather be strong warnings to participants. For that reasons how is it that only locals did attend these meetings (with only 3 frenches in Lublijana and officialy 5 in Greece for instance)?
Jean Luc placet : The first reason is an economical one: we have been through 3 years of economical decline. A second reason is more technical : the annual meeting is a 15 years old tradition whereas today you can get instant information from your compuer. So why should you attend ?
Gil Gidron : What’s more, big consulting companies have devloped internal international meetings. So it is clear that we have to review the way we do meetings. For consulting firms, «Time is Money».
In that respect what are the next stages for the FEACO activity and what can be the role of consultants in the devlopment process toward a «competitive knowledge - based european economy» (to make use of this years meeting title)?
Gil Gidron : For sure we want to get to the next stages and we might list them as follows :
- To consolidate the FEACO development
- To reinforce the governance
- To involve more large multinational firms, a reason why we change the bylaw
so that they could join the FEACO . In the future membership would be
different
- and to keep national associations
How is this translated into action ?
Jean Luc Placet: We have always had the will to create a european federation. These 5 last years we have introduced and integrated Latvia, Estonia, Slovakia, Slovenia... Others might enter the federation during our next meeting at the Hotel Savoy in London. We want to represent the European Consulting in one voice. And it is to that purpose that the FEACO conference 2006 might be held in Hong Kong in collaboration with the chinese MCA HK, the american AMCF and the japanese Zen Noh Ren federations.
That sounds like a «tour of surprise». What might then be the official FEACO word for this year’s Meeting?
Remi Redley : If I had to keep one word I would say that now «we must put our sails in good winds»
Words collected by Bertrand Villeret
ConsultingNewsLine
Athens Astir Palace Vouliagmeni 21October 2004
Gil Gidron
Jean Luc Placet
Remi Redley
Jean Luc Placet
Remi Redley
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