CMC Partnership UK

Origins

The founding directors of CMC believed that they would be able to provide customers with a better service at a lower cost through a privately owned company than they had been able to deliver through a large PLC. Through their own company, they could respond to customer needs with greater agility and deliver improved services by leading teams made up of consultants who they have personally selected for the quality of their work and their work ethos. It is very important for CMC that their consultants not only have the skills and experience to do the job but that they reflect the values of the company: customer first, openness, trust and respect. CMC is wholly owned by its’ staff which reinforces ownership of our corporate values; accordingly there is a comprehensive commitment for the tight control of overheads which results in better value for money for customers. In terms of challenges at start-up, setting up a business from scratch is a considerable financial challenge. All three founding directors had held well-paid positions previously and had to give up a regular income as well as the majority of their personal savings in order to finance the construction and growth of the business. Working long hours on customer assignments to generate income, offering homes as security against finance and staying awake during long evenings writing proposals to win new work bids were all challenging. The biggest challenge has been to win contracts tendered through the EU procurement process as this is the only mechanism available to win public sector business over £120k in value. The alternative was for the business to forever be a sub-contractor, a situation which would restrict its ability to deliver to customers as it saw fit. Competing against larger, well-established businesses was not easy and the firm experienced considerable customer bias towards larger suppliers.

Success Factor

Since its inception, CMC has experienced progressive year-on-year rapid growth and in order to ensure that the quality of our service provision was not in any way diluted we have developed robust processes and procedures together with strong corporate governance. CMC always bids for work that it believes it can deliver excellently, and aims to work for customers with whom it has, or can develop, synergy based on shared values of openness, trust and respect. Customer need is a key business driver and whilst CMC offers preferred ways of working based on best practice guidance, it is always prepared to adapt. Growth has been tough due to the stringent conditions of the public sector procurement process it has had to compete against an open market for every piece of new business. The value it has delivered to customers has resulted in a growing number of requirements and testimonials that have made potential new customers take the firm seriously. CMC has also established a proven recruitment process managed by highly competent, specialist staff. The firm also subjects potential sub-contracting organisations to similar rigour, exploring their capability and business philosophy and taking customer references before we decide to do business with them. Finally, CMC is committed to investment in staff development, for all personnel, on a continuous basis. Its people learn and develop through every task they fulfil and CMC has developed a learning and development approach that supports staff so that they can stretch into new areas. This approach is based on a mix of formal and experiential learning supported by personal coaching and reading. The Directors and Senior Managers are respected practitioners with knowledge and experience that they make available to staff as well as customers and it is this, together with its values, that has enabled CMC to attract such an exceptional team.

The Future

CMC’s mission is ‘to have an excellent reputation within UK Central Government for the delivery of best value programme and change management solutions.’ Its vision is to be the first choice supplier of change, programme and project management consultancy services to the UK Intelligence, Defence and Central, Regional and Local Government sectors. Its target, in five year’s time is a turnover in the order of £26m and to continue to build balance sheet strength to give the financial credibility to continually compete for larger and more complex assignments.