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About the partnership

Marks Sattin has successfully represented the best in Finance, Change, Digital, and Programme Management talent for over three decades.  We have worked with start-ups and scaling businesses, to established FTSE100 and lots more in between.  

To provide our clients with a more holistic service, we have entered a commercial partnership with MSConsulting (MSC) – a boutique consultancy that shares our focus on over delivery and putting stakeholders needs first.

MSC is led by industry veterans Sat Sembi and Christos Malakouna – who have a collective quarter century within the Big4 consulting firms, where they and their teams have built an enviable reputation for professional services in finance, digital and change and for disrupting the traditional consulting model.

They are an agile, commercial and friendly face of consulting and we are delighted to be able to provide you with a fuller suite of options for your needs.  

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How it works

We have a flexible solution depending on your requirements. If you are looking to stand up a team for a project or piece of work, then MSC will provide and lead the service. Where appropriate we will complement the delivery team with best-in-class expert resources from the Marks Sattin network. If you would purely like a project resourced with an individual, the Marks Sattin team can help with that too.

We will continue to serve your interests in the best way possible. 

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Some of their services include:

  • Change & Project Management 


    • We work with Transformation and Senior Change professionals to support and help navigate their change objectives. This could be end to end support on a transformation programme, a systems implementation, setting up a portfolio office or deploying a project team to hold an external delivery partner to account.

Finance & Accounting

  • We work with CFOs and Finance Directors who need a short term but immediate strengthening of their finance team on a specific business critical deliverable or complex set of challenges.

    Whether its responding to or proactively managing issues raised by the external auditors, helping a finance team clear a backlog of issues, getting ready for an event such as a sale or IPO, or being a specialist team to advocate on the managements behalf across a range of challenges whilst they are experiencing rapid growth.

Technology

  • We work with CIOs and CTOs to stand up project teams to support their digital agenda. Whether its providing end to end support for a digital transformation, providing a managed service for multiple project resources or technical specialists for a systems implementation.

  • Governance, Risk & Compliance 

    • We work with compliance teams, often in conjunction with finance to provide project support or assurance where clients need controls and process improvement in response to rapid growth, readiness for an event such as sale or listing or where they have been recently acquired and have new obligations such as the Sarbanes Oxley Act.

    Investment & Advisory

      • Our Transactions team support clients with their M&A strategy, predominantly in the SME and mid cap market with deal values of between £10m - £20m
      • As well as Financial Due Diligence we support clients pre and post deal
      • Pre Deal – Data cleanse and preparation of the data room and liaison with advisors and deal structure
      • Post Deal – Professionalise the finance function to ensure reporting and governance are in place for the new PE or corporate environment. We also provide project and technical support to ensure any TSA requirements are met

Benefits working with MSC

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Case Studies

  • Digital Transformation to Cloud solution 

    • Issue: Our client was about to undertake a digital transformation project but had a lack of experience and internal capacity.

      Solution:

      • We deployed a project team of 5, all of whom had extensive hands on transformation delivery experience and
      • Documented the as is state.
      • Helped manage the client to design a target state, including desired business, customer and people change objectives.
      • Ran a commercial procurement exercise for prospective digital providers to pitch against the desired brief.
      • Helped manage the implementation for the successful digital provider, holding them to account against the clients target state.
      Result:

      • Our team consisted of experts for each module including, HR, Finance and People change
      • A successful implementation with stakeholders and the team fully engaged in the process and the outcome.

    Large-scale ERP implementation

    • Issue: Our client was in urgent need of standing up a considerably large change team at pace for an ERP implementation, requiring in excess of 30 team members over the life cycle of the implementation.

      Solution:

      • We were able to quickly mobilse/stand up staged teams ramping up at agreed milestone events
      • Initial PMO set up and change management
      • Delivery and business analysts for module specialisms
      • Communications team
      • Training team
      • Post implementation support
      Result: As well as the expertise of the teams we deployed, the ability to scale up and down at pace was seen as a key enabler for the success of the project.

    Finance & Accounting 

    • Audit challenges and year end consolidation

      Challenge: As a result of high staff turnover and underlying data capture issues our client had several audit recommendations and were in danger of a receiving a modified audit opinion.

      Solution We deployed a team of 5 to support the FC/FD and identified all process gaps and provided a shadow finance team to prepare all audit schedules and reconciliations as well as a roadmap for implementing sustainable improvement.

      Result: The group accounts were submitted and audit without issue. We scaled our team down to 2 after the audit and implemented to the process improvements we had identified with the client left sufficient after we completed our work.

      Acquisitive debt management group facing compliance backlog with statutory accounts

      Challenge: Following 4 successful midcap acquisitions our client found they were behind with statutory reporting deadlines for the newly acquired entities and the group consolidation.

      Solution: We introduced a team of 2 to act as a conduit between the group finance team and the individual entities and took over full responsibility for the statutory accounts and auditor liaison relieving pressure on group and finance teams.

      Result: All local and statutory accounts were prepared and completed on time.

      Large Government department with multiple projects and challenges following Brexit

      Challenge: The department had a variety of critical and complex challenges to navigate following the UKs exit from the EU. Timing of required support was difficult to determine and the challenges while overseen by finance required multi-disciplined teams across a range of divisions including finance and transformation.

      Solution: We deployed a team ranging between 5 and 20 consultants to oversee the various finance projects overseen by the CFO during this acute pressure period. Multi-disciplinary teams were deployed at pace and overseen by MSC with regular reporting, issue escalation and cost management reported to the CFO on a weekly basis. The teams were scaled up and down in line with specific project needs and expertise required including technical accountants/auditors, project specialists and financial modellers.

      Result: All projects were co-ordinated and delivered on time. Where appropriate we assisted management with permanent solutions at project completion to ensure a steady state post completion.

  • Technology

    • Technical Delivery and User Centred Design roll out

      Issue: As part of the Government’s Digital by Default policy our client had embarked on an ambitious journey to transform the way front line services are delivered to clients, embracing technology and in particular online access and deliver of key policy initiatives. Specifically, the application and assessment process for two key voucher based schemes were to be provided via fully online delivery. This meant our client found themselves facing significant timescale pressures in order to deliver policy promises that had been made by ministers and were lacking in capability and capacity to deliver the required services.

      Solution:

      • We acted as a Delivery Partner covering both Technical Build and User Centred Design and stood up a flexible resourcing team at pace, with the ability to ramp up and down adding additional capability and capacity at pressure points during the projects.
      • Our flexible resourcing and deployment model covered multiple disciplines and responded rapidly to changing business needs, working closely with policy makers with limited time and experience of digital delivery to help them make informed decisions.
      Result

      • The outcome of the engagement, and indeed the underlying programme, was one of resounding success. By deploying a flexible and scalable team over a significant time period, we were able to respond to changing client needs, proactively identifying skills requirements and particular pinch points requiring additional capacity.
      • We responded to and delivered all the project requirements outlined above, and by doing so were acknowledged as a critical part of the client embracing Digital delivery and successfully rolling out two key policy initiatives.

      Managing multiple suppliers in a digital environment

      Issue: Our client was using multiple agencies and suppliers for various digital projects in their portfolio, but struggling to find consistency in pricing, delivery, expertise and accountability.

      Solution: We engaged in a managed service with the client to bring all services onto one standardised agreement with one point of contact, a standardised rate card and importantly accountability and assurance for the delivery of the various workstreams.

      Result:

      • We prepared detailed cash forecasts for the projects which provided greater transparency for budgets and facilitated planned scaling up and down of the team proactively.
      • By providing governance and assurance for each project we are able to highlight issues and risks to delivery as they arose to ensure no surprises and all items were addressed in appropriate time.

    Governance Risk and Compliance

    • Newly purchased entity was required to comply with Sarbanes Oxley controls for the first time

      Issue: Our client didn’t have in house expertise or capacity to ensure compliance with J-Sox.

      Solution: We deployed a team of 2 and helped management document, design and test effectiveness of their control environment as well providing support during the audit process and a liaison to the group team in Japan. We also provided training to the local finance team to ensure they were self-sufficient going forward.

      Result: All processes were documented and tested in line with the regulations with no issues arising during the audit.

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About MSC

MSC is a boutique professional services firm challenging the traditional model of how projects and professional services are delivered. 

Stakeholder value is at the core of their approach and they utilise a flexible, associate based workforce to deliver high-quality professional services across a range of disciplines with a greater agility and commercial viability than the traditional consulting model.  


Visit the MSC website

MSC's core values

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Authenticity

Providing an environment for our teams to be the truest version of themselves and a promise to our clients of honesty and sincerity in every interaction. Our teams will have freedom to use their skills and experience to provide the best advice and be invested in the outcome.

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Excellence

The quality standard we hold ourselves to account to on every project. Our brand and reputation will only ever be as good as the quality of our last project. There is no better feeling than a client telling us we have exceeded their expectations. We will aspire to this standard on every engagement.

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Gratitude

Using our platform to give back what we have been fortunate to receive. Our teams will actively use their skills to give back to the wider community and we will partner with charities and social enterprises that are doing tremendous work in this space.

Founders Story

Between them, the partners at MSC bring over forty years of Professional Services experience including over a decade each at PwC and Deloitte. They saw a need for alternative solutions to clients’ requirements and have been working together to successfully provide them as challengers to the traditional models for over 10 years.

Sat and Chris share a passion for working alongside customers on their change and transformation journeys, providing hands on support with experienced teams of subject matter experts, genuinely investing in and taking responsibility for the outcome. 

Meet the team


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Sat Sembi

Sat has been providing professional services for over 20 years, with a passion for delivering value for money and an experience clients and teams remember long after the life of an engagement. 


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Chris Malakouna

Chris has over 20 years experience advising many clients in a wide range of industries. Before founding MSC Chris worked as the Chief Consulting Director at Veracity Consulting specialising in delivering value on complex change scenarios.

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