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CommSol Associates welcomes Michael Turrall to the team

CommSol Associates welcomes Michael Turrall to the team

World,Business,Background

CommSol is delighted to announce that Michael Turrall has joined CommSol as an Associate Director, supporting the Alternative Asset and Alternative Fund Accounting spaces for our clients, an area of significant importance and growth for the Firm.

As a little background, Michael has over 20 years of experience working in the financial services sector.  An accomplished Chartered Management Accountant with a broad experience of working within private equity, hedge funds, fund administration and alternative investment management.  Michael has previously worked for starts ups as well as for multibillion dollar international banks. Michael has a strong track record of initiating change, reorganisation and applying processes and controls into various workplaces, as well as an in-depth understanding of all processes from fund launch to fund liquidation.

Michael is a successful senior manager with a proven track record of reducing costs, optimising efficiencies, improving third party relationships and ensuring deliverables are met. He has a results driven track record, experienced in leading teams and ensuring projects reach completion, he is able to bring individuals, teams and departments together to work towards a common cause.

Steve Clifford, CEO of CommSol Associates said :

“I am delighted that Michael has joined CommSol. He has deep knowledge and experience in the Alternative Asset and Alternative Fund Accounting spaces that will help us build, maintain and deliver a great offering within this very important element of the industry. We are here to ensure our Clients have the best insights and support possible and having Michael onboard is another step towards achieving that.”

Michael Turrall commented :

 “I am extremely excited about joining CommSol. As a Client lead implementation strategy and execution firm, we are uniquely positioned to help our customers to support the Alternative Asset and Alternative Fund Accounting spaces that are best-in class for our clients.”

Michael will be supporting Luxembourg, Dublin, the U.K. as well as additional locations such as Cayman Islands, BVI, and Singapore for us along with the broader support of the international team.

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CommSol welcomes Siddharth Karmarkar as we launch in India

CommSol welcomes Siddharth Karmarkar as we launch in India

Welcome Siddharth Karmarkar! As we at CommSol continue develop our strategic footprint and listen to our clients needs, Asia is a region that we are being asked to, and very much want to, support. As such, it gives me great pleasure to advise that Siddharth Karmarkar (Sid) has joined the CommSol family as Associate Director & Head – India. This is great news and a very welcome appointment for us in the region. Sid will look to support clients locally, as well as in the region more broadly, alongside his team that will be assisting him.

As a little background, Sid brings over 17+ years of deep experience in strategy management, having worked for likes of American Express, Société Générale, HSBC and JPMorgan, across the globe. He is a qualified Chartered Accountant and is passionate about transformation, change and performance management, with deep interests in technology and growth hacking. He is currently furthering a formal education in management at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A), that is ranked amongst the Top B-Schools globally.

Sid will be based in Mumbai, India and with him on board, we are on a strong footing to support our clients in India and Asia more broadly, through ‘follow the sun’ approach, leveraging global expertise to domestic markets and ensure deeper value-add to our international clients, keeping the ROI at the helm.

Sid commenting on his appointment: “It is tough times, but in the long run, things even out and optimism has always been underlying to mankind’s very existence. At the cusp of where India stands with little under $3T GDP, it is this optimism, that we see, as an opportunity to have CommSol work with India Inc and help businesses fast track growth, leveraging on time tested best practices implemented in mid-large organisations. Over the coming years, we would assist domestic organisations to scale to global standards and attract much-deserved credibility and parallelly ensure deeper value add to our international clients through following the sun approach of servicing, keeping ROI at the helm.”

We very much look forward to working with our clients and partners in this strategically important area for us in India and Asia as a whole.

Some refreshing news in challenging times.

Steve

CEO & Founder

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Steve Clifford presents to a record number of viewers at the Indian Institute Management on “Business Strategy and Transformation”

Steve Clifford presents to a record number of viewers at the Indian Institute Management on “Business Strategy and Transformation”

Steve Clifford, Founder & CEO, from CommSol Associates was recently invited by the Indian Institute of Management – Ahmedabad, India (IIM-A) to deliver a leadership session on “Business Strategy and Transformation”. IIM-A has been recently ranked #1 B-School of India by HRD, Govt. of India in their NIRF 2020 Report (1).

According to Prof. Sanjay Verma, the Hon. Faculty from the institute who organized this session, there was a record of over 800+ official registrations and over 6000+ viewers watched Steve deliver the session on multiple social/digital platforms from across the globe. “The purpose of holding this session was two-fold.  Firstly to have a global and experienced leader talk about the subject with the Institute’s esteemed alumni and secondly, give a perspective of how optimistic global players look at India now (post nCovid19) and the opportunities that made us put our first footprint in the region”, said Siddharth Karmarkar, Associate Director & Head – India, who recently studied Advanced General Management himself at the Institute.

The presentation along with the recorded video has been embedded for your reference.

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  1. Source: https://indianexpress.com/article/education/nirf-nirf-ranking-nirf-2020-best-b-school-iim-best-college-mba-colleges-best-mba-institutemagement-college-india-best-college-india-nirf-ranking-koving-iit-ranking-iim-rankingm-top-college/

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Anextere in Japan joins forces with CommSol in Europe and India

Anextere in Japan joins forces with CommSol in Europe and India

Anextere K.K. of Japan and CommSol Associates Limited (“CommSol”) based in the UK, with additional offices in Luxembourg, Dublin and Mumbai, have signed a Joint Venture deal to enable both Companies to extend their service offerings in Europe, Asia and Japan.

This Joint Venture reflects both Company’s desire to collaborate with like-minded organisations that share a similar vision and purpose as well as continuing to add real value to their clients.

Kevin Riendeau, CEO of Anextere commented “Broadening our global reach and implementation capabilities via our partnership with CommSol Associates is key to delivering holistic results for our clients in Japan and wider Asia who demand global solutions. Steve is a forward-looking leader and partner and has assembled a strong team of industry experts who seamlessly compliment the Anextere team`s experience and capabilities. We look forward to further growing our relationship and closely working together to tap into global trends and initiatives which will impact our clients locally”.

Steve Clifford, CEO of CommSol commented “Supporting Japan from a CommSol perspective is very important to us and our clients as well as being part of our overall strategy as demand has risen. Kevin is a great partner and the synergies were very obvious from our discussions leading up to this point. Having the ability to now support Japan with the Anextere team is great news as we will have local and relevant deep industry experience in country and more broadly in the region and back into India and Europe. The team and I are very much looking forward to working with the Anextere team going forward.”

About Anextere:

Anextere is a business and technology solutions company with unique expertise to address financial institution’s business, risk, technology and process challenges. Based in Japan, our team covers Japan and wider Asia with four core service offerings: Management Consultancy, Business Process Digitization, Risk Management Solutions and AI-enabled Machine Translations.

About CommSol:

CommSol is a leading niche financial services consultancy firm specialising in implementation strategy and execution. Based in the UK, with teams covering the UK, Dublin, Luxembourg and Continental Europe, as well as India and Southern Asia, the company’s mission is to support client needs with their business and regulatory change agendas as well as their resourcing requirements with extensive and relevant industry experience.

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CommSol welcomes Pavan Desai as we expand our presence in India

CommSol welcomes Pavan Desai as we expand our presence in India

Pavan is an enterprising leader, chartered accountant and an executive coach with over 25 years of experience with leading MNCs such as GE, JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank and BNP Paribas and is known for building teams across global service organizations and bringing transformational change. From set-up to scale-up of shared service organizations including new operations and CoEs, he has an expertise to create structures for transition, and transformation of processes, defining target operating models, controls, risk mitigation and governance frameworks.

 “We are delighted to have Pavan on board CommSol as we build our India footprint. With Pavan’s proven experience in creating robust framework for finance, risk, operations and IT-support platforms, we are well equipped to service our clients in India who are looking to leverage international expertise to optimize their businesses to global delivery standards. His hand-on experience of having played CXO roles in global organisations will benefit our global and local clients with a quality advisory as an extended arm of their management. He will be based in Mumbai” – Siddharth Karmarkar, Associate Director and Head – India

Pavan is also certified in Six Sigma, Project management and Yogic concepts/training and is also an Erickson Certified Coach. He is passionate about CSR and has been working with NGOs in the areas of Education and Ecology.

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CommSol Associates welcomes Chris Whaley to the team

CommSol Associates welcomes Chris Whaley to the team

Chris brings 15+ years experience in programme management across a number of sectors and continues the CommSol mindset of providing clients with tailored holistic solutions. Chris brings product, user experience and technology aspects to the team using Agile methodologies, as well as coaching.

He will support Robert Liebl in further developing the CommSol – Luxembourg footprint.

We wish him all the best in this new role.  Please see Chris’ Bio below:

Chris Whaley is an innovative and seasoned program delivery and change agent. Over 15+ years of building products and delivering change he has built the understanding, empathy and know how to create lasting and holistic movement and value in organisations.

He has worked in Asset management, media and TMT globally.   Within these sectors, he has headed program management and operational functions, platform and product teams, and delivered large scale platform and regulatory change.

He believes in the “SHiFT”…creating and embedding a Sustainable, Humanly intrinsic, Fundamental Transformation.  No product, delivery or change is purely technological, or process based.  It is holistic.

Chris approaches this with a strong and ingrained A(a)gile mindset and ways of working.  Combining this with strong product and “coach as a leader” mentality, he enables the flow of change and value so organisations can start to learn, grow and recognise value sooner, not later.

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Digital Transformation

Digital Transformation

Digital Transformation is the adoption of digital technology to transform services or businesses, through replacing non-digital or manual processes with digital processes or replacing older digital technology with newer digital technology.

Across all industries there has been rapid development of new and emerging technologies helping businesses to digitalise their assets and data flow.  In addition, implementing processes, governance and a continuous roadmap of evolution is critical to driving long term change, scale and ROI.

The Challenge

Following a series of M&A and rapid organic growth a global tier 1 asset manager needed to align its client engagement strategy across multiple touch points and divisions.  The urgency to do this came after the CEO took a client call that informed a disjointed engagement experience from 7 different parts of the business in recent weeks.  The top line challenge was to transform all means of managing client information into a single CRM instance that would drive consistency in sales processes, client engagement and information sharing.

Our Approach

Three cloud-based CRM platforms were considered in addition to mobilising a core global programme team, roadmap and set of workstreams governed centrally by the team.   All driven by a set of clearly defined business outcomes relating to the client lifecycle, rules of client engagement, sales progression, on-boarding, forecasting and measuring effectiveness.    In addition, inclusive in the programme was a commitment to creating a global COE operating model to ensure the solution is scalable, supported, keeps pace with business growth and delivers ROI.

The Outcome

Our team successfully led a global transformation program to implement a single CRM platform and data architecture covering all regions and four separate lines of business impacting 50+ functions and 1,200 senior stakeholders.  The project improved the client experience by unifying all touchpoints creating a single client view and engagement strategy e.g. each multi-national client implemented a strategic account plan enabled and accessed by CRM.

The impacts of the transformation were far reaching including the adoption of Cloud technology, information security compliance/controls and commercially brokering a consistent set of rules for managing the client, sales process, onboarding, financial forecasting and workflow integration with RFP, Product Desks and Client Servicing operations.

In addition, our team led the operating model design and implementation of a newly formed global organisation covering London, New York. Columbus, Mumbai and Hong Kong to manage the CRM platform, business reporting and global sales support.

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Location Strategy and Change management

Location Strategy and Change management

Summary: Restructuring the services Model for a top tier Asset Manager

Servicing an ever growing global footprint, where clients expect repeatable, consistent and transparent administration services of their Funds all while a downward pressure on margins is the driving feature, this top tier Asset manager looked as to how better to structure their services for  consistent, repeatable processes at a more efficient price point. Harnessing and building expertise that could be shared over multiple teams.

Location Strategy and Change management Case Study

Location Strategy

Location Strategy is more than just moving processes to onshore/offshore locations. It involves looking at how best to service the client, dependant on the services being provided, and utilising the company’s existing or expanded footprint to optimise this. It takes into account co-locatable processes, alignment of central or core services and location as well as regulatory and business continuity best practices. It must be driven by what the key unique competencies are of existing service locations and what is repeatable, structured and requires consistency in its outputs. Pure resource cost arbitrage, is only one element to be considered, but should not be the driver.

 

Change Management

Moving of core processes is not just lift and drop. Level of maturity of a process, structure and quality of documentation need to be identified prior to moving. Where do the processes sit in terms of criticality of the end output? Systems required to support not just the process but also the management of process and data at arms length. Carry over of controls or adjustment of these, given that they may not be co-located. The skills available for training, oversight, management have to be re-considered as well as people impacts. This is where a thought through change management plan can assist the migration achieve the objectives, all while maintaining a stable platform from which is being built and realising the benefits to the client once migrated.

 

The Challenge

Move multiple locations, doing similar or various parts of core back and middle office services, into a global centre of excellence, servicing a global footprint. Design for varying cut-off times, delivery times and multiple jurisdictions. Ensure common, repeatable processes across all serviced location for better quality, timeliness and lower cost than existing. Leverage knowledge to improve.

 

Our Approach

Review of the organisation, to establish support, risk appetite and footprint of co-locatable processes. Commonality of processes and not how it was being done by location currently. Using the principles of Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve and Control, we brought the core common processes together. Ensured they were stable, structured and then trained via different methods to the new teams. Interaction between new and existing teams was key and the approach of extension of the team rather than hand over as a managed service was key.

Once established with KPI’s being met, the new teams were encouraged to review for efficiency of the processes and develop the model further, in conjunction with the locations they serviced. This further rounded out the transfer of knowledge and set up the teams to have trust in each other.

 

The Outcome

A Global service centre of excellence was created, servicing a follow the sun model with built in business continuity and a continuous improvement approach of processes. This led to further taking on more critical processes as experience was gained. In total 24+ Core processes moved, 1800 head count and servicing 12+ Regional service centres.

 

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Mnuchin says hopes Pelosi interested in COVID-19 talks amid postal efforts

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump wants to move forward with more economic aid amid the coronavirus pandemic, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Tuesday, adding that he hopes House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is open to further talks as lawmakers prepare to take up funding of the U.S. Postal Service.

“Hopefully since Speaker Pelosi is coming back to look at postal, hopefully she’ll be more interested in sitting down,” Mnuchin told CNBC in an interview. Asked about the possibility of a narrower COVID-19 aid deal, Mnuchin said there was a need to help smaller businesses, adding: “The president would like us to move forward with this.”