The transition roles: operating leaders, not consultants.

How to choose the right transition role for your situation

The starting point is never the vacant job title shown on the org chart, but the real nature of the problem to be solved on the ground. Tight cash flow and banking covenants to respect point toward a transition CFO. A deteriorating labour climate, poorly handled negotiated departures, or a works council in open conflict call for an industrial transition HR Director. A derailing ERP project or neglected OT cybersecurity call for a transition CIO. A production line missing its output targets calls for a production director, while an entire site underperforming overall — beyond a single line — requires a site director or a transition industrial director depending on scope. A supply chain with repeated disruptions points toward a transition supply chain director, a quality drift toward a transition QHSE director, a vacant general management position toward a transition general manager, and a site in deep turnaround toward a transition CRO — Chief Restructuring Officer. This classification by observable symptom rather than by simple job title often makes it possible to identify, within minutes, the role genuinely suited to your situation — well before a complete job description has even been drawn up.

What distinguishes a transition manager from a consultant

A consultant recommends from the outside; a transition manager decides and lives with the consequences of their decisions, day to day, on site. For each of the twelve roles presented here, the profile we mobilise takes the operational seat — signing the documents that need to be signed, arbitrating the decisions that need to be arbitrated, and answering to the teams and to the executive committee for the consequences of their choices, exactly like the permanent incumbent they are temporarily replacing. This difference is not cosmetic: a consulting report recommending a supply chain reorganisation has never, on its own, reorganised anything. A transition supply chain director who takes the role does. That is why every profile presented on these pages has held the position directly, inside the company, before becoming a transition manager — never as an external consultant coming in to make recommendations without implementing them personally.

Twelve roles, one shared requirement: operational experience

Whatever role is needed, we apply the same selection filter: fifteen to twenty-five years of experience in the function, a significant part of it in an industrial environment, and at least one transition assignment or crisis situation already successfully led. A transition CFO who has never negotiated a banking covenant under pressure, or a transition HR Director who has never run a redundancy plan, does not appear in our network for these specific situations — even with an otherwise solid track record. This requirement is why we offer 3 targeted profiles within 72 hours rather than a large volume of applications: the filter immediately eliminates profiles that would be discovering, alongside your team, the reflexes specific to a high-pressure situation. Across all twelve roles we cover, this tight selection applies identically.

Roles that often overlap on the ground

On a site in difficulty, functions don't stay siloed for long. A transition industrial director turning around a plant quickly finds themselves arbitrating HR issues — team reorganisation, absenteeism management — without waiting for a dedicated HR Director to arrive. A CRO leading a site turnaround relies constantly on the figures fed to them by a CFO, whether that CFO is themselves a transition hire or already in post. A transition CIO securing an ERP project works in near-permanent tandem with the production director, since the industrial information system touches the line directly. This overlap between roles means the right profile for your situation often combines primary expertise — that of the vacant post — with a real ability to engage with, and even decide on, adjacent topics. It's a criterion we systematically assess beyond the job title alone.

Torn between two roles? That's what the first conversation is for

Many executives who call us are torn between two closely related functions — site director or industrial director, CFO or CRO, quality director or production director, depending on the real root of the problem. This hesitation is entirely normal: at this stage, the exact job title actually matters less than the precise outcome expected in the first three to six months of the assignment. The first call exists precisely to clarify this with you, without asking you to decide alone between twelve role titles. We ask a few simple questions — what's actually happening, since when, what has already been tried — to identify the role, or sometimes the combination of two roles in parallel, best suited to your situation.

Why some roles mobilise faster than others

The three-targeted-profiles-in-72-hours commitment applies across all twelve roles, but actual availability varies with how rare the requested profile is. A transition production director or transition QHSE director — roles more common in our network — generally mobilise with no additional delay. A CRO or transition general manager — rarer profiles because they require full leadership experience and a proven ability to own a turnaround decision alone — may occasionally take a few extra days to identify the candidate best suited to your particular sector. This nuance doesn't change our selection method — it simply explains why, for certain roles, the speed we can offer depends more on the number of genuinely qualified profiles available at a given moment than on our willingness alone to move fast.

Finally, a word on what comes next: most of our assignments end with a prepared handover, not an abrupt exit. Whether the position is then filled permanently, given to an internal promotion coached by the outgoing transition manager, or occasionally extended if circumstances require it, this question is framed from the first weeks of the assignment onward — never in the rush of the final days.

Across the twelve roles presented below, each page details the profile we typically look for, the precise contexts that trigger this type of assignment, and a representative assignment example. If your situation doesn't exactly match one of these twelve titles, call us anyway: the right profile almost always exists in our network, even when it doesn't carry exactly the name you started out looking for.

Not sure which profile fits? An expert works it out with you.

Callback within 2 business hours · 3 targeted profiles within 72h · 100% industry