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Ready, not second best. Trusted interim talent, waiting for their moment. The Bench is 325 Consulting's interim practice, placing hand-picked consulting talent into strategy and transformation roles across consulting firms, industry and private capital.
Tim Carroll has built this network over more than twenty years through genuine relationships. When we make an introduction, we make it with conviction.
For clients, we understand the problem to be solved before we talk about people. We will tell you what will work and what will not. We do not flood inboxes with CVs. We introduce a short, hand-picked shortlist we are confident can solve the problem.
For consultants, we go well beyond your CV to understand your experience and your professional and personal drivers, and we keep you informed at every step.
We don’t just know our clients and consultants, we take the time to genuinely connect. We go beyond the CV to understand drivers, experience and fit, and we keep relationships alive between placements. Honest, practical guidance for both sides, because we care about getting it right for everyone.
Fast, but never transactional. Because we keep our trusted network active, we never start a search from scratch. That closeness, plus years of accumulated knowledge, means we hand-pick the best available fit and stay transparent from brief to placement. Roles filled in as little as 12 hours, typically two to three days.
Every hand-picked consultant and every recommendation is built on more than twenty years and hundreds of interim placements. We have the market depth and lived experience to know what good looks like, and a thorough, proven process to find it.
Ours take days. Our network is pre-qualified, live, and ready to engage. Tim Carroll has spent more than twenty years building it, one relationship at a time.
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Day rates are indicative and exclude GST. Client names withheld. Full rate benchmarking by level available on request.
Built for speed without compromise, drawing on a pre-vetted network of available, qualified and trusted contractors. No theatre, no CV flood, and no silence in between.
A focused briefing to understand the gap you need to fill: the scope, the seniority, the timeline and what good looks like. We start with the problem, not the person, and we have seen most scenarios, so we get up to speed fast.
We hand-pick from a network we actively maintain, assessing for drivers, experience and culture fit, not keyword matches. You receive a considered shortlist, usually one or two candidates, with high confidence they can deliver. No CV flood.
We manage interviews, negotiate day rates and advise on the right corporate structure. We stay engaged through the placement and beyond, handling extensions and handovers, and keeping the relationship alive for the next opportunity.
You get a candidate who has been comprehensively assessed and matched, not keyword-filtered. We understand your environment and team so the fit is right from day one, and we only present someone when we are confident they are the right person. A team that has done this hundreds of times, at roughly one third of the daily cost of a Tier 1 firm, with full transparency.
HIRE HAND-PICKED TALENTYou are joining a trusted network, not a database. We take the time to understand what you are looking for, professionally and personally, and only put you forward for work that genuinely suits you. We are honest, we have your best interests at heart, and we keep you informed at every step. The greatest compliment is helping you on your interim journey.
JOIN THE NETWORKI know I’m going to get real consultants. Not someone brushed up to look like a consultant who doesn’t actually have the experience.
A detailed understanding of our staffing needs, along with extensive relationships with ex-top-tier consultants, means 325 provides superior and timely interim consulting staff.
A genuine desire to understand our business needs, and to ensure proposed consultants meet not only the technical requirements but the cultural fit.
They invest the time to understand not just what’s on your CV, but how you think, where your strengths lie and the kinds of environments where you’ll do your best work.
You don’t just sell consultants, you represent them. I’ve always felt you advocate for both sides.
Tim immediately understood the type of role I was looking for, something many other recruiters I’d spoken to didn’t.
Post-transaction, a newly PE-backed business needed to stand up a transformation office to run a portfolio of initiatives. The CCO was weighing an MBB or Big 4 engagement, a path carrying significant cost.
We pitched a direct senior resource instead of a firm engagement: an ex-McKinsey, ex-Chief Transformation Officer who could run the PMO with more day-to-day control, at a fraction of the cost. A second consultant followed. For a third role briefed toward MBB pedigree, we put forward a candidate from a different strategy background, on the reasoning that the work was delivery, not classical case strategy.
A transformation office stood up for a fraction of the cost of a Big Three engagement. Three placements across one programme. The third became, in the client’s words, one of the best hires he almost didn’t make.
An urgent three-month strategy role at a PE-backed business. Senior enough to start almost immediately, with specific PE exit-deal experience. We broadcast across a network of 10,000+, locally and offshore.
Rather than restricting the search to local candidates for speed, we backed an offshore candidate’s experience directly with the client, cross-referencing mutual connections at a firm where he had worked. First contact Monday, interview Wednesday, offer Thursday. Remuneration was handled transparently, including holding firm at the top of his range.
Offer extended within four days of first contact, on a plane from Mexico and starting the following Monday. Hired for a twelve-week exit, retained for eighteen months post-acquisition.
There wasn’t one. An ex-BCG consultant on the bench needed his next engagement. Separately, a newly-appointed COO, for whom 325 had built out a strategy team years earlier, had moved into a healthcare business with no confirmed open roles.
Rather than waiting for a formal mandate, we used the relationship to get ahead of it. A catch-up was arranged, partly to see how he was tracking, partly on the instinct that a newly-appointed leader has needs before he has scoped them. Two CVs went along on spec.
He interviewed both, and hired both. Two placements from a single relationship-led conversation with no brief in place. Both delivered above expectations and were extended beyond the original contract.
Whether you are looking for hand-picked interim talent or want to join our network, get in touch.
GET IN TOUCHConnecting current and former management consultants with permanent and interim opportunities.
