Succession Planning Consultant

The role: The Succession Consultancy Team sits within Performance Consultancy and forms a national specialist capability. The team will initially comprise five consultants, with scope to grow. Role holders work closely with other consultancy teams, Services, Ecosystem, Legacy Services, Partner Finance, and Business Partnering across all Business Units. The role operates with a high degree of autonomy and specialist authority within its portfolio of Partner businesses. The Succession Consultant is a specialist role responsible for delivering the Partnership’s national succession strategy through expert commercial assessment, financial modelling, and execution of complex ownership transitions. The role provides deep expertise in exit planning, lending policy, commercial structuring of BSP (Business Sale Purchase) transactions, succession readiness, and buyer–seller matching. The role holds accountability for succession outcomes across a defined portfolio of Partner businesses, ensuring commercial viability, continuity of client service, and the long‑term sustainability of the Partnership’s succession pipeline. This includes leading complex MBI and MBO transactions, preparing businesses for sale, assessing their readiness to absorb new clients or acquisitions, and ensuring post‑deal execution supports successful transition. The role is accountable for the performance, health and sustainability of the succession pipeline within their defined portfolio, including pace of transition, deal quality, and post-deal stability. The role requires expert judgement, commercial acumen, and the ability to influence senior stakeholders to deliver high‑quality, commercially robust succession solutions. The role is also responsible for maintaining portfolio-level visibility of succession risk, proactively intervening to protect continuity and long-term Partner viability. The consultant acts as a commercial gatekeeper, ensuring only viable deals progress to Partner Finance and providing go/no‑go decisions where commercial, operational, or infrastructure risks are identified. What you'll be doing: Develop commercially robust business and exit plans for Partner businesses preparing for sale, applying specialist knowledge of lending policy, valuation drivers, financial modelling, and commercial forecasting. Own and manage the succession pipeline across an assigned portfolio, ensuring appropriate prioritisation, progression, and delivery against defined succession objectives. Assess the commercial viability of proposed BSP transactions, including the operational capacity, infrastructure, and client‑handling capability of both buyers and sellers, ensuring deals are sustainable and aligned with long‑term Partnership objectives. Act as a commercial gatekeeper for Partner Finance by filtering out non‑viable deals, ensuring lending requirements are met, and providing go/no‑go recommendations where financials may be viable but commercial or operational risks make a deal unsuitable. Lead and manage succession activity across an assigned portfolio from initial assessment through to sale readiness, matching, deal structuring, and post‑deal execution, ensuring continuity of client service and successful ownership transition. Identify, qualify, and develop buyer and seller opportunities using data, insight, and market intelligence to build a strong and sustainable succession pipeline. Facilitate effective matching of buyers and sellers, applying expert judgement to ensure commercial, cultural, and operational fit, and ensuring Partners make full use of digital marketplace tools to improve matching outcomes. Monitor and report on succession performance indicators across the portfolio, identifying trends, gaps and intervention requirements to improve transition outcomes. Build strong working relationships with Partner management teams, FMT (Field Management Teams), Partner Finance, and internal SMEs to support succession planning, commercial assessment, and deal execution. Navigate sensitive, high‑stakes or emotionally charged negotiations with professionalism, guiding Partners through complex transitions and helping them understand commercial implications and readiness requirements. Identify, manage, and mitigate commercial, operational, and succession‑related risks across all assigned cases, exercising delegated authority to make risk‑based decisions and escalating only where necessary. Oversee post‑deal execution to ensure seamless client transition, monitoring persistency, withdrawals, and ongoing advice fee retention, and intervening directly with Business Owners where performance flags concerns. Investigate post‑deal issues within acquired businesses or books, identifying root causes and working with Business Owners to implement corrective actions that protect client outcomes and commercial performance. Deliver education and capability‑building activity for new buyers, including running workshops, peer groups, and learning sessions to build understanding of commercial expectations, lending requirements, and operational responsibilities. Provide insight, data, and commercial analysis to support senior leadership decision‑making and contribute to the ongoing development of national succession strategy, tools, and processes. Who we're looking for: We are looking for a commercially astute consultant with strong financial and succession planning expertise, who is comfortable working in complex, sensitive Partner scenarios. The ideal candidate will combine analytical rigour with empathy and influence, enabling them to guide Partners through high-stakes transitions while delivering positive outcomes for clients and the wider Partnership. Essential Criteria Strong commercial and financial expertise, including business planning, financial modelling, valuation drivers and forecasting. Proven ability to manage complex succession or business transition engagements end-to-end. Strong understanding of the Partnership, including Partner motivations, business structures and culture. Ability to influence, consult and challenge Partners and internal stakeholders without formal authority. Excellent organisational skills, with the ability to manage multiple concurrent BSP (Business Sale and Purchase) engagements. Desirable Criteria Experience of business sale processes, buyer–seller matching or succession planning within advisory or consultancy environments. Strong understanding of SJP Head Office functions, corporate strategy and stakeholder priorities. Experience of managing sensitive negotiations or emotionally charged commercial situations. CMI Level 5 Professional Consultancy qualification (or equivalent). Special Requirements: CMI Level 5 Professional Consultancy (or equivalent).