Paul Niesing is the Interim President Consumer Insights at NielsenIQ in Geneva, Switzerland. Having started his Finance career in Audit back in 1996, Paul recently made the move into general management. He was previously the CFO Global Retail Intelligence at NielsenIQ.

Your organisation is going through an exciting time. How highly do you rate the trait of adaptability in such circumstances?

Indeed, our organisation has gone through a significant amount of change. Most recently, in March 2021, we got spun off by Nielsen Media Group and were acquired by Advent, a private equity company.

When that happens, a lot of requests - especially in the Finance arena - come to you in advance of the process, but also afterwards. So, be adaptable to all the different circumstances, because - first and foremost - you need to maintain your business-as-usual and drive the teams, drive the results, but, at the same time, be able to manage the different views that are required and go, at times, into pretty big detail, which you would normally not go into in a business-as-usual situation. So, to be able to adapt towards this is very important when you go through a process like this.

Following on from that, what particularly surprised you that you had to adjust quickly to?

Specifically, with that acquisition, the change of the organisation and structure; we were run as a product organisation and we switched very quickly to a regional structure. With that, there were different ways of reporting, which also requires your adaptability. Things that you were used to doing changed almost overnight.

How important and how valuable is the adaptability skillset in the modern world?

For myself and for the coming generation, adaptability is key, because everything is changing continuously - jobs, roles, a lot of project work that requires you to adapt to it, but also requires you to get additional skillsets…

Everything changes at such a high pace, and you might think, “I didn’t learn this”, or “I don’t understand”, but actually, sometimes you just have to go with it and learn as you go, and learn from that. I think, for people who cannot do that, it’s very difficult to get by in Corporate Finance roles.

A recruitment question for you - how can leaders create diverse teams?

When I look at diverse teams, it is not only male/female; I look much more into the perspective that people can give on certain items. When I recruit for roles, or try to build a team, I look at the backgrounds, but more importantly, try to get their perspective on certain issues. It does not mean one perspective is right or the other is wrong, but the way certain people assess a situation or come up with solutions is very important when I try to create a diverse team.

With different perspectives, different ways of thinking, I tend to find you have more opportunity to get to a better place in the end; a more creative way to get somewhere, rather than everyone running behind each other in the same line and doing all the same things.

I think the process of getting there is much more fun with a diverse team and a diverse perspective of business.

It sounds like that only works if you listen to it - it doesn’t matter how diverse your team is, unless you actually take that on board and consider everything?

That’s true. I see myself as a leader that tries to listen a lot. In the end, as a leader, you are responsible for making the decisions, but in the process to get somewhere, listening to the team members that you have put together is very important. I don’t know everything, but getting those perspectives is generally the best way to a solution or direction.

What do you see as the biggest challenges for a) your business and b) your own role over the next 12 months?

What we have seen is there has been a degree of consolidation happening. We had some large mergers and, most recently, we acquired GFK. So, you get some big companies all together, which, in the process - just to survive and to expand and to grow and to deliver what the market requires - requires significant investment.

Next door to that, you have of course many boutique companies that always will remain in their niche market. But, I think, in the last one-and-a-half years, it’s very clear private equity came in and acquired IRI, Kantar, ourselves, we are all owned by private equity, so that’s a very interesting dynamic happening in this marketplace. I think it’s the right way to go forward, otherwise you cannot survive or make the investment needed for the business to flourish.

I recently moved into a general management role for Consumer Insights, so we are a global organisation that does consumer insights across the world. Clearly, we have a number of competitors, of which one is Kantar, but Ipsos is our main competitor. Succeeding in the marketplace requires investment and we try to do a lot through partnerships.

If it is a partnership from a platform perspective or if it’s a partnership in, for instance, the automotive industry, where there is certain detailed knowledge and access, we try to partner with this type of company in order to grow and not make all the investments ourselves, because either it takes too long or it’s too expensive.

In the specific business unit that I’m working in, it’s not so much acquiring other companies ourselves, but it’s more about working together with some other, bigger partners. We have a partnership with JD Power, we have a partnership with Qualtrics, who is a big platform provider.

What changes have you seen in the employment market in Switzerland over the years? How long have you been in Switzerland now?

Almost ten years, I’m located in Geneva. Especially in Geneva, I’ve seen a lot of international companies either shrinking or leaving.

It has an impact on the labour market from two ways - it looks like, on one side, there are fewer jobs available, but, at the same time, some of their senior leaders that they brought into Switzerland - because most of us are brought in from outside of Switzerland - tend to remain or want to remain, because their families are there, they have been living there. With that, you have bigger amounts of supply in senior leadership positions and those do not really match demand.

I think the Swiss market, especially from a senior perspective, has been a more challenging market in the last ten years.

What, in your opinion, have been the drivers for these changes?

I think there are some micro-economic items - tax is a big thing, the streamlining of the tax rates - all that is happening. In the end, in many companies, the financial business case doesn’t make sense anymore. So, we have a lot of people in Switzerland, however, there are other options and maybe cheaper opportunities, as companies always look to lower their costs. I think that’s a big driver behind that, as well.

What have you learnt as a leader over the past 12 months?

When you go through a process that we have gone through, with the acquisition, it then results almost in a transformation of everything that you look at or that you were used to. I think it’s being adaptive and open for it, but also with a broader group, with your teams and the employees, to be able to share and to be clear about it. This could be through meetings, but then we also have - within Consumer Insights - a group called Consumer Insights Ambassadors (the top 100 people across the organisation that function as ambassadors). They get quicker insights of what’s happening, and their task is to communicate that to the broader group.

So, I think that is important, because you can imagine, if you’re located somewhere in Vietnam, it seems very far from what’s happening in the US or in the corporate world, so it’s important that you get regular updates on what is happening, what’s changing, what you see, even if you can’t control it.

That communication piece has been very important in this whole process, because it tries to make you part of the whole process and not just be executing a little piece in the total machine.

That’s interesting, because I imagine your organisation has always had an internal comms piece, but it sounds like you’re really seeing the value of that at this particular point in time?

I do think so. It’s a time of transformation; a lot of things are changing and the way we look at the business is changing, so to communicate and to share why we do certain things is very important, so that people get an understanding and feel part of it. We all drive to get to a better place.

How has your Finance background helped you transition into general management?

Most of my career, I’ve been in Finance roles. Most recently, I was a CFO for the retail intelligence business. As a Finance person, you are always very close with the business in a way, otherwise you cannot succeed or add value.

Now, as I move to general management, a lot of that work and that experience is very valuable, because I think any general manager needs to be able to read financials. For me, that comes very naturally. But then also, as a Finance person, we have a very rational mind, but I have learned to be open for commercial opportunities.

Sometimes, things just don’t make sense from a Finance perspective, however, looking more into it and seeing the market dynamics, and looking a little bit further than just a very short-term view - which we tend to do from a Finance perspective - going a step back is actually very interesting and refreshing. Seeing the value that you as a business can bring and sometimes making a bet; with the Finance perspective, it’s a controllable bet, so I really enjoy that step over into general business.

If you could go back and give your younger self some career advice, what would it be?

I started in Accountancy, which I do not regret, because I think it was a very dynamic start - I saw a lot of different companies while doing my studies. I do not regret that, but maybe at that time, I should have focused a little bit more on leadership programmes.

At NielsenIQ, we have a two-year leadership programme, and I’ve seen it in companies like Unilever or General Electric. Those are very interesting; you learn a lot about that company, but you also move around. If you’re lucky, you can be abroad quickly, outside of your country.

From that perspective, if I could do it all over again, I would focus on that more; just getting out there quicker and following a leadership programme.

You mean, as an alternative to your Accounting education, going directly into one of those financial management programmes, straight from graduation?

I think it’s important to make switches early in your career - don’t go straight from university and stay ten or 15 years with one company. I think it’s healthier if you switch every four years - there is so much to see, so many different companies, so it widens your perspective on what the world has to offer. I would recommend everyone do that, not to stay with one employer in the early years of your career.

What is the best compliment you have ever received?

I’m Dutch, so with compliments, we normally go, “Oh, okay.”  It’s a difficult question. I think the best compliment is when, from a Finance perspective, there are no surprises, no misses… things go smooth and you take the problems away from your general manager. You solve things before they start to boil up. I had many times when there was appreciation, from that perspective.

Thank you to Paul for speaking to John Bower, Director in our Finance & Accountancy recruitment team in Switzerland.

Views and opinions contained within our Executive Interviews are those of the interviewee and not views shared by EMEA Recruitment.