The Roland Berger partner is a new member of the board.
(Photo: Roland Berger)
Dusseldorf The 300 partners of the largest German management consultancy Roland Berger have made new appointments to their management bodies. The board gets four new members and is becoming more international and female.
Partners Hasmeet Kaur (innovation), Maria Mikhaylenko (IT), Per Breuer (human resources) and Matthias Rückriegel (finance) will join the committee. Stefan Schaible remains CEO, with Marcus Berret and Denis Depoux standing by his side.
In addition to the expansion of the board with global responsibility, the consultancy is also reorganizing the management for what is still the most important region: Torsten Henzelmann (55) will be responsible for business in Germany, Austria and Switzerland in the future. The senior partner specializes in the energy industry. The global consulting unit for which he is responsible is also responsible for projects in the areas of infrastructure and transport.
Henzelmann replaces Sascha Haghani. The 55-year-old, who has been with Roland Berger for over 30 years, will remain head of the traditionally important restructuring division. This was recently strengthened and repositioned with the takeover of Candidus, a personnel consultancy specializing in interim management. Since then, consultants have also been able to temporarily implement their projects as restructuring managers.
Management structure is reaching its limits in the face of growth
The managing directors of the USA and Middle East regions, Robert Henske and René Seyger, are also relinquishing their offices as regional managers in order to “achieve consistent personal separation between management and the supervisory board”.
However, all three will retain their supervisory board mandates. At Roland Berger, the supervisory body is traditionally staffed internally. Founder Roland Berger (85) himself is no longer represented in any of the management bodies of the consultancy and no longer holds any shares.
The personnel shift had become necessary because Roland Berger has grown strongly again in recent years and this year wants to reach the billion mark in sales for the first time. “Our management structures have reached their limits,” explains CEO Stefan Schaible.
The new head of Germany replaces Sascha Haghani – who in turn remains the head of the important restructuring division.
(Photo: Roland Berger)
That is why the partnership is now strengthening its management bodies. “We are also giving a new generation of partners more responsibility.” In addition, “functions that are critical to growth, such as finance and controlling, human resources, innovation and knowledge management, would be brought directly to the global board”.
After a few difficult years in the operative business, Roland Berger has restructured itself. Since 2020, the consultancy has been growing again and is also profitable. The largest German management company before Simon Kucher, Qperior and Horvath is now looking to catch up with the world leaders with McKinsey, Boston Consulting and Bain.
In order to play an international role, according to industry experts such as consulting professor Dietmar Fink from the Scientific Society for Management and Consulting (WGMB), a management consultancy needs “1.5 to two billion euros in sales”. With less business volume, the financial and personal strength is missing.
With the new management organization, CEO Stefan Schaible has laid the foundation for further growth. The search for investors to finance this, however, continues.
More: Roland Berger boss Stefan Schaible: “We want to play a global role.”