| | By Mick James
Here at
Top-Consultant.com we
like to follow the
fortunes of
consultancies both big
and small. One of my
favourites to watch is
where the two
coincide—that is, where
a big business brand
begins to build a
consultancy arm.
Take Hitachi
Consulting, one of the
newer of the 800 or so
companies that live
under the Hitachi
umbrella. They’ve had a
presence in the UK since
2006, but really burst
on our consciousness
with the acquisition of
Impact Plus, a small but
high profile UK
consultancy, and last
year further broadened
its capabilities with
the acquisition of IT
specialists Edenbrook.
It’s an integration
that’s gone very well,
according to Mark
Robinson, Managing Vice
President Sales and
Marketing, who was
formerly with Edenbrook.
In purely quantitative
terms the combined unit
has just had its best
ever quarter, which is
no small achievement
when you take into
account the combined
pressure of the
recession and the
post-merger integration.
But there’s also a
more qualitative aspect,
says Robinson: “Our
attrition rates have
actually gone down since
the acquisition.
People’s horizons have
been altered, the type
of work they can do has
changed.”
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Partly this is due to
the natural fit between
the firms:
“In terms of culture
we were pretty similar
in the way we work, so
we didn’t have to do a
huge amount of change
management. It was more
that we had all these
new capabilities,” he
says. “Edenbrook focused
on blue chip companies,
so we would compete with
the Big 5 on technical
business, and we were
looking to add business
consulting to the
portfolio. The
difference now is that
whereas before when you
needed someone you would
bring in a contractor or
an associate, now you
can bring in a
colleague.”
One thing that
Robinson has noticed is
the power of the Hitachi
brand and global
presence—which people
recognise even if they
don’t immediately
associate the name with
consultancy.
“We’d be competing
successfully against a
Big 5 firm but the
client would ask ’can
you do a pan-European
rollout’,” he says. “Now
we’re just one business,
the same people but
under the Hitachi
brand.”
The expanded Hitachi
has recently relocated
to new offices in the up
and coming More London
development to the east
of London Bridge.
“That sets the right
tone with customers and
the people who work for
us,” says Robinson.
“We’ve deliberately gone | |
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| | integrate those people
into our teas—the fact
that they live in a
low-cost environment
means that we can offer
them at a lower price to
our clients.”
Robinson is also
excited by the way the
coming together of the
two firms has opened up
new sectors. Hitachi had
a strong presence in the
public sector, where
Edenbrook hadn’t played
there before, while
Edenbrook has opened
doors in the media and
transport sectors.
This particular
sector brings in another
string to Hitachi
Consulting’s bow, which
is the interaction with
other companies in the
Hitachi group. Hitachi
Rail is a leading
supplier of high-tech
trains, and recently won
orders worth £7.5bn to
renew the UK’s intercity
rolling stock.
“We’re already
talking to one of the
large train companies
and have brought in
people from Hitachi Rail
to talk to them,” says
Robinson. And there are
many other areas—Hitachi
Data Systems for
example, with its
leading edge work around
cloud computing and
virtualization.
Parallel to this are
the consulting
opportunities within
Hitachi itself: “The
difficulty in
consultancy is finding
the opportunity at the
right time so if we can
proactively go and see
them, we can counter
that. We’ve now got
someone dedicated to | |
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| | that in terms of sales,
which is the first time
we’ve done that.”
Robinson estimates
the chunk of the
consultancy market in
the UK, which Hitachi’s
skillset addresses, is
worth around £6bn in
total, so he feels that
the firm’s growth
targets are achievable.
The recession has even
helped slightly, in that
some clients are more
inclined to look around
for a better deal rather
than stick with an
incumbent supplier. What
is more of a constraint
is finding the people
with the right skills
and depth of experience
to fulfil Hitachi’s
requirements.
But here again
Robinson believes the
company has a good story
to tell: “We’re
recruiting the typical
consultant who might
have a lifestyle issue
with their current firm,
or maybe feels the
organisation isn’t
dynamic enough.” He also
sees consultants with
other firms getting sick
of unfulfilled promises
and “nonsensical grading
structures.”
“We regularly survey
our staff to see what
they think of the
company, are they happy
or not,” he says. “One
of the things they say
they like is that what
they were told would
happen at their initial
interview happened in
reality. People like
that we are giving them
something interesting
and challenging to
do—the stories that we
tell them are the things
people like to know.” | |
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| | for an open-plan layout
to break down the
barriers, everyone
hot-desks and that
encourages people to
come up with ideas and
talk to each other.”
The increasing size
of the UK unit has led
to a subtle change in
the dynamics of the
firm. Where previously
Hitachi Consulting might
have been perceived as a
US-led initiative
expanding in to Europe,
now it’s much more of a
“three-continent”
strategy, spearheaded by
the units in the UK, US
and Japan, with a free
flow of ideas between
all three.
“One of the things
that struck us was the
synergy between the UK
and the US. For example,
our Oracle business is
as strong here as in the
US, so together we’re a
very big presence,” says
Robinson.
So while the UK might
take methodology and IP
from the US in some
areas, in others such as
managed services the UK
practice is leading the
way, with a rapidly
growing presence in
India.
That’s an area where
Robinson believes
Hitachi has a different
story to tell: “A lot of
people use offshore as a
cheap resource—we did it
because we couldn’t find
the people we needed in
the IT, genuine II
professionals with 8-10
years of experience.
We’re not throwing the
work over the fence, we | |
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