As head of Booz Allen's North American commercial sector business, Cesare Mainardi, senior vice president, is credited with the unit's 50 percent increase in revenue contribution. The increase is not quite as impressive as it seems, Mainardi points out, when viewed in light of the consulting industry's overall performance improvement this past year. Achieving that gain came not from flogging consultants or kicking lazy butts. Rather, it resulted from "lessons I learned driving transformations for our clients."
Mainardi's formula, derived in large part from his work on the Johnson Controls, RJR, and Pfizer accounts, sounds simple when described but is difficult to execute in practice. First, the firm has to align its activities with its strategies. Then the strategy has to be translated into small pieces that can be effectively executed. Finally, the firm has to re-architect itself for change and then manage the change. Along the way, the firm must sharpen its focus and clearly communicate its strategy and focus to everyone involved. The result is a transformation that can drive substantial performance improvement.
It was at Johnson Controls that Mainardi first started to formulate this approach to business transformation. The problem was poor performance in the company's battery division. By aligning strategy and execution, the company was able to turn around the division. He further refined the approach while working for Pfizer and then RJR, where he used the same method to take out costs and position the company for a merger.
An 18-year veteran at Booz, the only firm he has ever worked for since graduating, Mainardi is very clear about the separation of work and personal life. "I hold weekends sacred. Travel in consulting is a given, but when the weekend comes, my time is devoted to my kids," he reports. He attends their sports and dance activities. One child took up the sport of fencing. Having spent so much time attending fencing events, Mainardi took up fencing, too — something, maybe, that his direct reports might want to note.
At 42, Mainardi is far from ready to rest on his successes. As the commercial sector recovers from the downturn, he sees Booz positioned to capture a bigger piece of the market. "Clients are more focused on results than ever before. This plays to our strength," he notes. The firm's penchant for combining a variety of people with different skill sets on each engagement, and its recent success in creating synergies between its government and commercial sector work, he believes, will give it a competitive edge. — Alan Radding
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