A.T. Kearney appoints Simon Kent head of Financial Services
Global management consulting firm A.T. Kearney has a new boss at the helm of its Financial Services practice: Simon Kent.
“Increasing disruption, open banking, rising customer expectations, new challenger firms and new regulation are all continuing to reshape the financial services sector, driving demand for expert advice. A.T. Kearney’s global financial services team works with brands around the world to transform their operations for competitive advantage and create long–term success, and I’m looking forward to the challenge of delivering growth for the firm in these areas.”
Simon Kent has been with A.T Kearney since 2013, when he joined the consulting firm as a Partner in its London headquarters. He previously served US-headquartered consultancy Navigant in the UK, where he served as Head of Financial Services. Kent spent six years at Navigant, having joined the firm in 2007 after it bought Troika, a consulting boutique focused on UK’s financial services industry. Kent started his career with PA Consulting Group.
A.T Kearney’s Financial Services practice works for clients across the landscape, including banks, insurance companies, pension funds, wealth managers, regulators, FinTech’s and new entrants to the landscape. The focus of the firm’s work is on supporting the CEO agenda – engagements involve strategic, operational and digital transformation.
Kent, who has a degree in economics and politics, brings over 25 years’ experience of advising financial services clients to the role. He has gained extensive experience with cost transformation, operations design, and distribution strategy assignments across the UK, Africa, and Asia. Among the projects he has delivered include helping a retail bank develop a cost model to understand value drivers and service improvements, leading the programme portfolio office for the integration of two major UK banks, designing and rolling out a new operating model across four geographies for a major Asian bank, and leading the operational split of a UK bank into a ‘good’ and ‘bad’ bank in the aftermath of the financial crisis.
According to a recent study by A.T. Kearney’s Financial Services practice, European banks are struggling to meet the productivity and profitability levels demonstrated by US banks. Meanwhile, the sector is seeing bits of their margins eroded by the rise of challenger banks and innovative FinTechs.