About Us

What we do

Established in 2008 by a number of seasoned industry practitioners, RPC Consulting is a niche consultancy providing bespoke solutions to the public and private sectors specialising in customer services, change management and business transformation. We are focused on helping our clients to achieve their short and long term service and business objectives.

At RPC we specialise in providing expertise to our clients in four key areas, underpinned by our core skills in developing strategy, designing operations, managing programmes and delivering solutions.

Our services include:

• Customer centric service design and delivery
• Customer driven business change and transformation
• Market analyst proposition development and bid support
• Financial and commercial modelling
• Recruitment and interim management

We can provide a full end-to-end service or simply augment specific areas of projects or programmes. We are experienced in integrating with existing teams and working seamlessly with other specialists such as legal, accountancy, management consultants and technology specialists.

Our Markets/Clients

Local Government

We have a wealth of experience in working with the public sector from both client and supplier sides and have participated in a number of landmark local government deals and transformational initiatives. We understand well the unique challenges councils, Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCG''s), schools and the emergency services face, particularly in the face of the unprecedented current economic conditions. We can bring genuine insight into the opportunities for efficiency, whether this is delivered via internal change, outsourcing or both and we have a proven methodology to help you deliver and manage these activities successfully.

We are strong advocates of the Total Place initiative and we have built many of the features and facets of this approach into our overall delivery methodology for the public sector. Our aim is to provide very practical support in the implementation of Total Place solutions. With this in mind we have developed the Total Place Toolkit which is a tailored instance of our generic Change Management and Outsource Lifecycle Solution. The Total Place Toolkit encapsulates and incorporates approaches to and solutions for the key challenges, risks and opportunities of a Total Place initiative. For more information on our unique Total Place Toolkit click here.

Health

The NHS is arguably facing its most challenging period since it was created. While much of the focus has been on the government''s reforms there are a host of other factors that make the decisions made today crucial for its viability in the future. Demands from all sides are rising, as is the cost of delivering services, against a backdrop of reduced budgets. To meet theses needs we have been directly involved in helping the newly formed CCG''s and Commissioning Support Units (CSU''s) develop Target Operating Models and managing major change programmes on their behalf.

Utilities

Through close working relationships with many utility companies we have developed a deep understanding of the issues and challenges faced by the energy and water industry. Political and shareholder pressure continues to place efficiency high on the agenda, but this has to be balanced against the ever increasing demands of customers and regulatory bodies, with many aspects of customer service still lagging behind other sectors.

We can offer insight and best practice solutions from across the industry targeted at improving the management of large scale front and back office operations and increasing customer satisfaction.

Private Sector

UK businesses have, on the face of it, managed to steer through the challenging economic waters of the last few years. However, below the surface the outlook for companies is still one of uncertainty, with the cost and difficulty of borrowing, rising overheads and competition all adding to generally difficult trading conditions. The need to be able to change and enhance the way businesses operate has never been more important to their survival. This is why we have been working with private sector clients on major change programmes to help them adapt and rationalise their operations to be more efficient and customer focused.

The Leadership Team

Our team have a huge amount of experience and expertise in assessing, procuring,mplementing and managing complex change and complex outsourcing solutions. The Senior Management team are:

Ron Pierce - Executive Chairman

Ron has 15 years experience operating in the public/private sector marketplace. He has designed, won and delivered complex local government bids over the course of the last ten years. He is an operator with a creative mind to design solutions which will be well received by the market. Over the last three years he has built up a business advising clients and outsourcers in placing requests for proposals and completing and assuring winning bids.

Paul Johnston - Finance Director

Paul has over 22 years of financial experience working in a senior position. He has considerable experience and expertise in the financial aspects of outsourcing across a range of sectors and service lines. He has a particular specialism in bid modelling and contract management. Paul has been responsible for annual budgets in excess of 100m and developed complex bid models to assess contract viability and subsequent delivery. Paul has worked on both client and supply side of organisations.

Clare Hickson - Consulting Director

Clare has over 17 years experience in business strategy, change & transformation, and implementing lean thinking, management processes & business performance systems. She holds a BA Honours Degree in Business Studies frmo Sheffield Hallam University and is a Chartered Member of the Institute of Personnel and Development. Her experience has primarily focused on UK utility industries where working with Board Members and Directors, she has initiated, designed and delivered transformational change within a FTSE100 company where tangible sustainable savings realised were in excess of £50m pa.

In the commercial arena, her experience includes acquisitions where she has developed and managed the initial transition of acquired businesses, identifying areas of opportunity, additional leverage, and successfully integrating new businesses into larger corporate organisations.

More recently, she has concentrated on extending her knowledge across a variety of different business sectors - she has developed a strong client portfolio over the past 12 months in the NHS as part of the strategic health reforms.

Clare''s strengths lie in her ability to utilise her strategic capabilities and apply them to high levels of complexity and ambiguity, from which she creates the business focus, structure and direction for making significant performance improvements. Thinking holistically, she challenges and encourages ''out of the box'' thinking from senior leaders. She has good commercial acumen and a strong customer focus.

She is a charismatic individual, making a strong impact with her facilitation and interpersonal skills leaving a lasting impression on an organisation and those she works with. Her experience at working with CEO and Board Members in organisations has meant she is able to communicate effectively up, down and across organisational levels and boundaries, influencing and engaging key stakeholders - and most importantly, delivering results.

Paul Holden - Operations Consulting Lead

Paul has a degree in Engineering from Salford University and an MBA from Lancaster University. He has over 20 years experience undertaking operations management, strategy and change management roles in the Logistics, Telecommunications, Utilities and Public Sectors. This has included five years managing mechanical engineering service & installation contracts into the Private & Social Housing sector. He has designed, and delivered complex operational solutions to meet the needs of clients in the utilities and local government sectors over the course of the last ten years. He is a strategic level operator with a creative mind capable of designing solutions which are relevant to the target market.

Peter Hornby - HR Consulting Lead

After gaining a BSc in General Sciences Peter''s early career was spent training and qualifying as an Accountant before he moved into recruitment and HR Consulting with Deloitte & Touche. Working with clients from a wide range of private and public sectors organisations including: - Leicester City Council, Shetland Islands Council, Vertex, Norwich Union, Morphy Richards - Peter has developed extensive experience and expertise on strategic resourcing, executive recruitment, management development, culture development and business planning. Peter is also a trustee of Yorkshire Cancer Research.