Interim management is particularly in demand for strategy concepts, reorganization & restructuring, process optimization, project management and bridging vacancies.

Interim managers take over positions in the first or second management level with authority to issue directives or project management independent of the hierarchy. Typical functions are:

General Management / Management
Sales / Marketing / Communication
Purchasing / Logistics / Materials Management
IT / Organization
Project Management
Finance / Controlling
Technology / Production
Human Resources Management

Interim managers are used by medium-sized and large companies up to corporate groups. Clients come from all sectors, but especially from industry and commerce, followed by IT and telecommunications companies, media houses, the chemical industry, and (financial) service and consulting companies. Public sector institutions are also increasingly hiring temporary executives.

For many years, the terms of just under half of the mandates have been between six months and one year. For another quarter, the deployment period is four to six months. The runtime depends strongly on the task.

While management consultancies prepare external analyses and concepts, but the decision-making responsibility and implementation remains exclusively with the client, interim managers assume entrepreneurial responsibility and actively implement strategic and operational tasks within the company. Based on their experience, they also contribute to their mandates in an advisory capacity.

Staff leasing companies provide workers primarily for substitutable activities in the executive area, but not for management. The workers are mostly employees of the leasing company and are provided to the client on a temporary basis. Interim managers, on the other hand, are independent entrepreneurs who take on management tasks at the first and second management levels. In very large companies, this can also take place at the third management level.

In professional interim management, the average daily rates are between 1,200 and 1,500 euros. The amount depends strongly on the experience and competencies of the interim manager and the importance of his tasks. Increasingly, performance-related fees or components are also being agreed.

Basically, however, the following applies: The costs of an interim manager (daily rate) are around 1% of the gross annual salary of a comparable permanent manager.

Most interim managers are between 40 and 60 years old. You have versatile and long-standing management experience as well as proven professional and social skills.

The interim manager’s capital is his experience and his competence to act, consisting of specialist knowledge, methodological competence and his personal and social skills. Persuasiveness, trustworthiness and above-average social skills are the most important qualities, followed by analytical thinking, assertiveness, creativity and communication skills.

Since interim managers work in different locations and permanently under time pressure, high resilience, adaptability and self-organization are prerequisites for this profession. Interim managers must be extremely flexible and constantly adapt to new companies with new tasks, structures and employees.

DDIM stands for Dachgesellschaft Deutsches Interim Management e.V. DDIM is the industry association for interim management in Germany, comparable to BVMW, the Federal Association of Medium-Sized Businesses.

The umbrella organization Deutsches Interim Management e.V. (DDIM) is the leading industry representative for professional interim management in Germany. The main tasks of the professional and business association are the protection of the economic interests of its members and the sustainable promotion of interim management in Germany.

DDIM defines professional standards, promotes quality assurance and supports the transfer of knowledge among its members. Membership in the umbrella organization is considered proof of high quality and competence in interim management. The umbrella organization is dedicated to the public recognition and consistent growth of the industry.

As its internationally networked voice, it provides business, politics and the public with relevant information and is the point of contact for all questions relating to interim management. It represents the legitimate interests of its members in an independent and non-partisan manner.

Companies that integrate external competencies flexibly and on demand are a decisive step ahead on the way to an efficient organization. Because interim managers offer:

1. short-term start of interim managers within a few days
2. temporary activity
3. no long training period due to precise qualifications
4. assumption of management and personnel responsibility (at customer’s request)
5. no integration into the customer’s organizational structure, therefore no dependencies on “political” framework conditions
6. concentration on problem solving, unhindered by the past and grown structures.
7. costs occur only for actual days worked – no costs for benefits, vacation, sick leave, contract termination, etc.
8. very fast cost reduction effects
9. substantially lower costs than if consulting firms were engaged
10. many years of experience as a manager

In order to prevent problems and misunderstandings, interim managers and clients should pay attention to a professional drafting of the contract which, in addition to the contractual contents regarding the type and scope of services, the term of the contract and the usual standard clauses, includes the following points (all information without guarantee and under exclusion of any liability):
– Reporting channels and authority to issue directives
– Cancellation and renewal options
– Service or work contract
– Part-time job
– Duty of confidentiality, secrecy
– Remuneration and allowance
– Non-competition
– Continuation and termination (ordinary and extraordinary termination as well as effects of changes in company law on the contractual relationship)
– Time off and vacation clauses
– Insurance clauses: Accident insurance, D&O (Directors and Officers Liability Insurance)
– Liability clauses

The contractual content regarding the type and scope of services in the mandate is such that no further instructions need to be issued. This serves to avoid bogus self-employment, see also the following question.

Not at all. It must be contractually ensured that the assignment is not classified as bogus self-employment or as covert and possibly even prohibited employee leasing, which would result in the possible applicability of labor and occupational health and safety laws and social security obligations.

Indications for dependent employment are an activity according to instructions and an integration into the work organization of the company as well as the determination of working hours by the client. If there are fixed working hours for the interim manager, e.g. in the form of unilaterally set duty rosters, so that the free allocation of time, which may be contractually guaranteed, is de facto cancelled, this also speaks in favor of an employment relationship and against self-employment.

Examples
Integration into the company’s work organization is demonstrated, for example, by the interim manager being included in the company’s organizational charts, having a company e-mail (note: this can be prevented by an e-mail address marked “external”), and participating in regular and, in particular, routine staff meetings or being designated as a contact person (both internally and externally) for day-to-day business issues.

A further indication of such scheduling in the work processes is when similar activities are also performed in the same company by employees of the assignment company.

Interim managers are generally self-employed entrepreneurs and work independently and at their own risk within the framework of their contractual agreements, not bound by instructions. As freelancers, they pay taxes and social security contributions themselves.

As independent contractors, interim managers are liable for damages incurred in the course of the performance of services, insofar as this is contractually agreed or not excluded or limited. Particularly in the case of mandates in which an executive position is assumed (management, board of directors, etc.), interim managers usually take out separate liability insurance policies (e.g. pecuniary loss insurance or so-called D&O= Directors and Officers Liability Insurance) to cover their liability risks.