Heidrick & Struggles Names Financial Services Practice Leader In Japan

September 19, 2016 – Heidrick & Struggles has added Steven Greenberg as a partner in charge of the firm’s financial services practice, based in Tokyo, where he will additionally lead the firm’s efforts in the insurance sector, covering Asia Pacific and the Middle East. He will also serve as a member of Heidrick’s CEO and board of directors practice.

Fluent in spoken and written Japanese, Mr. Greenberg has nearly 10 years of executive search experience in Japan and the Asia Pacific region. He has recruited for all levels of senior management across insurance companies, investment banks, securities firms, asset managers and other financial institutions. He has also advised clients on multiple senior management and board succession planning and selection engagements. He has a strong focus on senior strategic hires for complex, challenging leadership roles across the C-suite in Japan and Asia.

Prior to joining Heidrick, Mr. Greenberg was a consultant with Russell Reynolds Associates. Before that, he was a principal with Egon Zehnder. Earlier in his career, he was the representative director and president at The Gallup Organization Japan. He has also served as director of business development, Asia/Pacific at Thomson Financial and as a manager of the global financial services industry group at Deloitte Tohmatsu Consulting.

“Global financial institutions operating in Japan and Japanese financial institutions abroad require advice in all areas of senior executive talent management – from executive recruiting to leadership consulting and succession planning,” said Frazer Wilson, managing partner of Heidrick & Struggles’ financial services practice for APAC. “Steven is well known in Japan with his extensive knowledge in the insurance and financial industry, bringing tremendous value to clients on various challenging and stringent leadership issues.”

“I am thrilled to be on board at Heidrick and Struggles,” Mr. Greenberg said. “The evolving nature of the insurance industry in Japan and the Asia Pacific region requires leaders with a unique set of functional expertise combined with extensive leadership competencies. Heidrick & Struggles’ long history in Asia, strong global network, and perceptive insights into senior level talent enable us to partner closely with our clients in securing and selecting the right leaders at various stages in the growth and evolution of their businesses.”

Search Firms Clustering In Japan

Search firms generally have been eyeballing the Japanese market for growth and extension recently. Earlier this year, executive search firm RSR Partners expanded into Japan with the opening of an office in Tokyo. “Japan is a fertile market for recruiters targeting multinational companies that are looking for senior talent in Japan,” said Jim Whittle, head of RSR’s Japan office . “Companies like Mitsubishi, Mitsui, Toshiba and others also understand that their old boy network doesn’t cut it when looking for change agents to help them break outside of Japan.”

Japan is the third largest national economy in the world, after the U.S. and China. In addition to the three global conglomerates Mr. Whittle named, other large ‘Asian academy companies’ based in Japan include Toyota, Nintendo, NTT DoCoMo, Canon, Honda, Takeda Pharmaceutical, Sony, Panasonic, Sharp, Nippon Steel, Nippon Oil, and Seven & I Holdings Co. The country also provides a home base for some of the world’s largest banks, and the Tokyo Stock Exchange stands as the second largest in the world by market capitalization.

How One Firm Is Managing Growth

Heidrick has been on a recent expansion tear around the globe, making strategic acquisitions, naming a number of key practice leaders, and expanding out its culture shaping business segment. Here’s a look at some of them:

• Heidrick just acquired Philosophy IB, a leadership consultant based in Florham Park, NJ. Philosophy IB was established in 2000 by founding partners Christine Lotze and Kaveh Naficy and today serves Fortune 100 companies focused on assisting clients execute their strategies by changing how people work.

• In August, the firm acquired JCA Group, a well-known London-based executive search advisory boutique. JCA Group is led by founding partners Jan Hall and Emma Fallon, and has 40 employees, including eight partners. The firm has been a leader in addressing gender disparity among boards, as a policy advocate and in placing women on boards in both non-executive and executive roles. One in three of JCA Group’s recent appointments to FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 boards have been female.

• Just recently, Heidrick appointed Simon Pollock as head of its media and entertainment practice. He is based in the firm’s London office. Mr. Pollock has more than 30 years of experience in the media and entertainment sector. Prior to joining Heidrick, he was a partner at a boutique search firm The SevenArts, where he specialized in searches for media, communication and entertainment businesses.

• The firm also strengthened its healthcare and life sciences practices with the addition of healthcare leader Alan Milinazzo as a partner. He is based out of the firm’s Boston office. Mr. Milinazzo previously served as president and CEO of InspireMD, a global leader in embolic prevention systems (EPS), neurovascular devices and thrombus management technologies.

• Heidrick also expanded its industrial expertise by naming Patrick Gray as a partner and head of its aviation, aerospace, and defense sectors in the Americas. He joined the firm’s Washington, D.C. office. Mr. Gray provides talent and leadership consulting solutions to clients spanning aerospace, defense, industrials, & government services (technology, professional services, technical services, and cyber). He was previously with boutique firm Northwind Partners, where he helped establish its Washington, D.C. office.

• Heidrick appointed Sylvain Dhenin as head of Continental Europe for its global CEO and board practice. He is based in the firm’s Zurich office and reports to Bonnie Gwin and Jeff Sanders, CEO practice group co-managing partners. Mr. Dhenin will continue in his leadership role as managing partner of Western Europe. He joined Heidrick last year.

• Heidrick‘s culture shaping arm, Senn Delaney, added five new principals to expand its capability and meet increasing demand for its organizational culture transformation services. The newly appointed leaders will serve clients globally from home bases in Chicago, Huntington Beach, Boston, Los Angeles and Dallas.Senn Delaney’s new culture consultants bring backgrounds in strategy consulting, human capital management, business transformation strategy, leader engagement, talent optimization, organizational development, HR transformation, and leadership & talent management, beckoning from Deloitte, Capgemini Consulting, Ernst & Young and Gagen MacDonald.

In March, Heidrick appointed Jenni Hibbert in London to lead its financial services practice in the U.K. She has responsibility for managing the firm’s U.K. financial services business, overseeing a team of approximately 40 individuals with a focus on providing executive search and leadership counsel to top-tier financial institution. The same month, Heidrick appointed David Boehmer as global managing partner of its financial services practice. He works out of the firm’s London office and continues to lead the firm’s financial services enterprise in Europe and Africa.

Contributed by Dale M. Zupsansky, Managing Editor, Hunt Scanlon Media