Hollis’s new leadership team on resetting the consultant for growth

For decades, founder John Woodman has been synonymous with Hollis, but after shifting to an employee-owned business in 2021, unveiling ambitious growth plans and putting a new leadership structure in place, the firm is ready for a new chapter. Just how do you replace a leader that has been synonymous with a business since its foundation? It is a conundrum, but the new leadership team at Hollis believes the answer is in the culture of the company itself. Last September, former UK chair of Cushman & Wakefield Digby Flower (pictured above, right) was appointed as interim chief executive of Hollis, with founder and chairman John Woodman and managing director Alex Brown both stepping back from the day-to-day management of the business. Flower’s appointment was part of ambitious growth plans for the consultancy, following its switch to an employee-owned business in October 2021. His task was to oversee succession planning for the firm and set it up for a new phase of growth. For Woodman, he knew that the business he loved had to change if it was to seize on the opportunities the market was lining up. “To achieve the ambitious plans we have for future growth, we need to change the way the business is managed and structured, but without losing the culture we have worked hard to embed,” Woodman said, as he handed over the reins to Flower. Now, with a new permanent chief executive appointed in Andy Hay, and Flower having somewhat given up on the retirement plans he announced in late 2022, the business is readying itself for that next phase of growth. Going full orange Hay (pictured above, left) was something of a no-brainer when it came to the chief executive role at Hollis. Although he was not without competition. The hunt for a new chief executive was wide. The business went beyond real estate, looking to the world of marketing and other professional services firms. Seven candidates were shortlisted, and three made it through to the final round before the business unanimously decided on Hay. “Andy was the standout because of the mix of him coming from an accountancy background – having that professional understanding – and also understanding our industry,” says Flower. While Hay may be an accountant by background, he has a wide array of corporate experience, working for big businesses such as Adidas and Diageo. He entered the property world in 2012, joining CBRE, where he met Flower. He spent 13 years there running its property management business in the UK, before taking on Europe. Hay then joined Colliers in 2019 performing a similar role, and later adding ESG to his brief. But after decades in the big corporates, Hay’s eye was caught by the bright flash of the Hollis orange and the potential that the business might have. “Having done the large corporate thing, the attraction of something like Hollis was very strong,” says Hay. “It has gone through some changes in organisational structure but has a very strong brand. This is a business that clearly stands for something. For me, there was a real sense that there is a greater opportunity at Hollis than perhaps even Hollis knows.” And it is that opportunity that has Hay kicking off the corporate clobber – although he is still suited and booted when we meet – and Flower forgetting a life of purely fly fishing for now, to go full orange and embrace the Hollis way. Streamlining and service delivery Both believe that with the real estate market now finally starting to show signs of a turnaround in fortunes, the Hollis business is perfectly placed to seize on the opportunities a changing sector like property throws up. And while both will wax lyrical about the Hollis culture, the unique Hollis way and how the business is defined by being just a little bit different – not accountant-like at all, says Hay – both also know that the way the business operates outside of that culture does need to change a bit if it is to achieve its growth ambitions. Flower’s remit when Woodman handed him the interim reins to the business was to restructure. To find a fresh organisational structure that set the business up to deliver. Having 27 different service lines reporting into the board was not going to enable that growth. It needed to be simpler. It needed some of the “hygiene” that Flower says he learnt while working in private equity-backed businesses. The clean-up resulted in a streamlined business with six regional managing directors, each with ownership over their regions, and four consultancies operating across the business – development and project management; lease and occupy; buy and sell; and sustainability and innovation. With the new structure in place, a new chief executive at the helm and the consistency of Flower in the chair role, all sights are now set on doubling the turnover of the business to more than £100m in the next five years, doubling down on its service offer, having a deeper footprint in Europe and building its talent pipeline. “If you look at where Hollis’s core is, it is right now at the sweet spot,” says Hay. “We’re not an agent so we don’t have the potential conflict when we are trying to offer services. If you look at what we do, from a really strong, robust technical offering – which is at the heart of what we do – and you think about where we are going to have to get to on the sustainability offer, and you think about how many assets there are out there that are going to have to be refurbished, as the market picks up, all of that stuff puts us absolutely at the sweet spot.” Whether it is dilapidations, technical due diligence, ESG consulting, health and safety, or one of the other 23 services Hollis currently offers, Hay believes that the business has the opportunity to win. His focus as he settles into the role is making sure that each of those service lines is either delivering an opportunity for a client or finding a solution to a pain point they might have. That analysis of client needs, he says, will tell him how vital those service lines are for growth. Some, he admits, may fall by the wayside, but there will also be new lines added. The only vital is that all deliver exactly what they say they will and that service becomes the Hollis hallmark. “There is a huge opportunity for us to own the space in delivering service,” says Hay. “We want to own the space around technical advice and delivering that.” Plans for expansion Expansion in mainland Europe will also be key in delivering on the growth of the business. Hollis already has a footprint in Germany, the Netherlands and Spain, but it wants to make this deeper. Hay admits that Hollis’s employee-owned status makes splashing cash on big acquisitions a little bit harder, but the business has a pretty successful history of growing organically – from three people when Woodman founded it 30 years ago to 500 today. Flower says the focus for growth will be on building critical mass and a full-service offering in the locations it already has – adding teams, building services and making sure that Hollis hallmark is stamped right across Europe. And while Hay is adamant that Hollis is in no way accountant-like in its personality – “it’s curious – someone you’d want to spend time with,” he says – the plans for growth are measured. “Sustainable, profitable growth. That is the future of the business,” says Hay. “That is what will allow us to employ 1,000 people rather than the 500 we have today.” Sustainable, profitable growth, say both Flower and Hay, will come through that culture that has already been embedded so deeply by the former management of Hollis. Both proudly share stats that one-fifth of the people in the business today have come through its early careers programme. Both want that to grow at a faster pace than the scale of the business. “I want to see more people in the business who have come through our early careers programme. If we can grow that from one-fifth to 25% on a bigger headcount, that’s us living the S part of our ESG strategy,” says Hay. However they do it, Flower and Hay do have an ambitious task ahead of them. And while the personality of Hollis may be curious and altogether different, you have to admit that setting out a target, having a plan to hit it, making sure you have a simple structure to make it happen and wanting to deliver a clear Hollis hallmark in how you do it does sound just a little bit accountant-like. Photos © Hollis