Valcon UK Managing Director Ross Williamson on the top trends in consulting

Valcon is a north-western European consulting, technology and data company, which seeks to combine premium consulting with deep technology and data knowledge for its clients. Ross Williamson, managing partner of Valcon UK, speaks to Consultancy.uk six months into his tenure with the firm, to explain what drew him to the firm, and what he thinks will be the big trends in consulting in the coming year. 

How long have you worked in consulting?

I was working for TSB in the 1990s on some pivotal projects in consumer lending. I saw an unbranded job advert in the Sunday Times and was intrigued – it turned out it was for United Research Group and I ended up being employee number 50 in the UK. The firm grew quickly, becoming Gemini Consulting, later acquired by Capgemini. And I’ve been in consulting ever since.

Can you tell us about your career path – what did you study and did this set you up for a career in consulting?

I studied engineering at the University of Nottingham before taking a master’s degree in information systems management at Kingston. The engineering and maths route is a familiar one for consultants to follow.

It set me up for a career in consulting. My studies gave me the skills to analyse and solve problems pragmatically. When I started consulting, the variety was the appeal and it still is – you might be working with a financial services company on a customer service transformation, or a data project for a utility firm. No one day is the same.

What attracted you to Valcon?

Much of what attracts me to Valcon was what attracted me to the world of consulting back in the ‘90s. At Valcon, there is an open, supportive culture and ‘can do’ attitude that I love. The way our people work is collaborative, engaged and they all bring their enthusiasm and expertise, whether that’s a deep sector specialism, understanding of a business function, knowledge of how to get the best client experience from a platform or how to help a team manage change successfully.

Our consultants work closely with clients to cocreate solutions that deliver the desired outcomes. There is an inherent pragmatism based on experience in our approach that supports our focus on delivering clients’ desired outcomes.

What are your plans for Valcon UK?

We want to continue to accelerate growth by becoming more vertically focused, sharpening our expertise and further refining offerings in the sectors our clients operate in, such as retail, infrastructure, financial services, government and utilities.

One strength we continue to evolve is the ability to seamlessly combine our consulting, technology and data capabilities to solve client problems. Take a utilities company we work with – weather patterns significantly influence demand for their products, so Valcon devised a bespoke AI weather information service, which has helped them better meet demand, optimise pricing and boost margins.

Another example, for a retailer was to implement real-time dynamic pricing and suggest bundled purchases of products for their on-line channels. This required us to combine analytic and process consulting, data & AI as well as integrate onshore and near shore technology build and delivery teams.

We are working on lots of exciting projects that blend our capabilities to solve client problems in organisations that perhaps want to improve customer experience, reduce operating costs, increase revenue and margins or indeed do all of those. AI forms a big part of the solutions we build and is very much integrated into the way we develop solutions with clients.

What do you think will be the biggest trends in consulting in the next few years?

AI is the obvious one – it’s a game changer for productivity and speed and it’s already here! While there are many things it can’t do, AI is already helping to turbocharge what we do to help clients, through eliminating unnecessary work, finetuning processes and implementing the right technologies. AI is increasingly helping clients to improve business efficiency and helping organisations operate in a smarter way.

The digitisation transformation agenda is the other. Technology is evolving all the time, meaning organisations are now involved in a continuous cycle of transformation – this is now the ‘business as usual’ state. It’s down to the consultancy industry to guide organisations through that change, providing strategic direction, implementing solutions and delivering value.

It’s an exciting time in the consulting industry in the UK – and we want to ensure that Valcon is at the forefront.