This is the Managing Director template — the firm's leadership seat, top of the consultant ladder. It is stored in the APB Codex and used to issue PDs to the current and any future Managing Director. Before issuing:
- Replace every [SQUARE BRACKET] placeholder with the MD's details — name, location, effective date, and the firm's quarterly numbers.
- Multiple role overlays may apply. The MD may concurrently wear Director, Operations, Accounts, and/or an interim Desk Lead hat. Section 05 contains four overlay cards — each is OPTIONAL, clearly marked, and may be kept or removed depending on which hats this MD actually wears. A founder MD typically keeps all four; a hired-in MD may carry only a subset as the firm grows and roles separate.
- Section 04 retains the canonical Three Pillars framing (Full P&L Ownership · Staffing & Team Building · Process Development & Execution). The MD owns all three regardless of how the operational overlays are split. Do not remove this section.
- No personal placement target. The MD is measured on firm-level KPIs only — all desks at/above target, coaching cadence, deal hygiene, and gross margin. Section 06 contains no Floor / Goal / Stretch tier for personal billings.
- No PM section. The MD does not PIP self. Accountability for firm-level performance sits with the board and/or shareholders, reviewed at quarterly off-sites and annually.
- Acknowledgement (Section 10) is to be read alongside (a) shareholder documentation OR the MD's employment contract — depending on whether the MD holds equity in the firm — and (b) the APB Codex. Adjust the acknowledgement paragraph to match.
- Compensation is not in this template. Director draw, profit share, dividends, salary, bonus — whichever combination applies — are documented separately in shareholder instruments and/or the employment contract, and reviewed annually with the board. Section 09 is a pointer, not a comp table.
The firm's leadership seat
[MD Name], this Position Description documents the role you hold at the top of APB Strategy. Managing Director is the firm's leadership seat — distinct from every other seat on the consultant ladder. Below you, Principal Consultants run desks and Senior / Executive Consultants carry personal placement targets. You do not. Your output is not a billing number; your output is the firm itself.
The work of the MD seat is to set strategy, own the P&L, coach the consultant floor, and hold the standard the firm operates to. You set every desk's budget and target. You sign for the commercial outcomes the team produces. You decide who joins, who progresses, who leaves. The firm becomes what you tolerate — and that is the contract of this seat. Read this PD alongside the firm's shareholder documentation and/or your employment contract (depending on how the seat is held), and the APB Codex.
Where you sit
The MD's coverage is the firm — not a single desk. Both tracks report up to this seat: the Consultant track (Desk Leads / Principal Consultants and their consultants) and the Talent Partner track (candidate delivery). Today all delivery staff are Talent Partners, so the MD leads delivery directly — the Senior Talent Partner and Team Leader are future rungs, stood up as the team grows. Ops and finance functions also sit under the MD until dedicated hires take them.
What "Managing Director" means at APB
A Managing Director at APB is the business-level operator of the firm. The MD does not run a personal placement target; the MD sets the targets the whole floor — both tracks — runs against. The MD is the source of the firm's commercial standards, the final authority on pricing decisions, and the coach behind the Principal Consultants who run desks and the Talent Partners who deliver.
- Business P&L. Total firm cash, gross margin, growth rate, and the headcount plan that supports them all sit with the MD.
- Sets every desk's budget and target. Each desk's quarterly cash-collection target and budget threshold are set by the MD and reviewed with the Desk Lead.
- Coaches everyone on the floor. At the firm's current size, the MD holds weekly 1:1 coaching with every consultant and Talent Partner across both tracks. Desk Leads mentor on the desk; the MD coaches the individual. As the firm grows and senior leaders emerge (a second Principal, a Talent Partner Team Leader), coaching delegates and the MD's direct scope narrows.
- Steps in for high-value deals. Available for senior client conversations, Briefing Decks where it matters, and any negotiation that materially shifts the firm's commercial position.
- Final commercial authority. Pricing outside the standard 18.5% / 25% structure, non-standard payment terms, replacement guarantees beyond 3-month / 6-month, and any deviation from Terms of Business escalate to the MD for approval.
- Final people authority. Hiring, termination, and promotion decisions across the firm sit with the MD. Desk Leads recommend; the MD decides.
- Standard-bearer for the firm. Culture, craft, commercial discipline. The firm becomes what the MD tolerates.
The MD sets the desk P&L. Desk Leads execute against it. The Principal Consultant running a desk is accountable for that desk's cash-collection target — but the target itself is the MD's to set, review, and adjust.
How the seat is built
The hats you wear
Keep the cards below that apply to this MD. Remove the cards that do not. A founder MD typically retains all four; a hired-in MD may retain only Director and Operations (or only Director) as Accounts and any Desk-Lead duties move to dedicated hires.
The ownership hat that contains all three pillars — distinct from the Managing Director title itself (the executive seat). As founder-owner the MD sets the firm's direction, holds full commercial accountability, and decides who joins the team and who is promoted. This seat is the source of the firm's culture and commercial standards — what the firm tolerates, expects, and rewards starts here.
- Full P&L ownership — total firm cash collected, gross margin, growth rate, and headcount cost.
- Staffing & team building — hiring, promotion gates, exit decisions, comp structure across the firm.
- Process development & execution — defines how the firm operates and ensures the operating system is followed.
- Strategic commercial direction — desk count, vertical expansion, fee structure, partnership decisions.
- Equity & shareholder management — capital structure, distributions, and any commercial conversations with shareholders or external investors.
- Board reporting — quarterly performance review against plan; annual strategic review; material commercial decisions surfaced for board input where applicable.
- Final authority on pricing outside the standard fee structure, on Terms of Business deviations, and on any decision that materially shifts the firm.
Internal operations, tech stack, compliance, reporting. As Ops Manager the MD owns the firm's operating system: the Codex (the firm's playbooks), the CRM, automation (e.g. n8n), AI workflows, the reporting cadence, and the compliance posture. This is where Pillar 03 lives in its purest form.
- Owns the APB Codex — every module, every framework (RAPID, 6Rs, Making the Ask / CTM), every locked naming convention.
- Owns the tech stack — CRM, sourcing tools, comms, automation, AI integrations.
- Owns reporting cadence — fortnightly desk reviews, monthly Townhall, quarterly business review.
- Owns vendor relationships — software, contractors, professional services.
- Owns compliance — privacy, contracts, employment, IP, data handling.
- Drives process improvement — what's broken on the floor and what to fix next.
Financial management at the cash level. As Accounts the MD owns invoicing, AR/AP, the Finance Hub workflows, Xero, and the firm's tax obligations. This is where Pillar 01 (P&L ownership) translates into actual money in and money out.
- Issues invoices and chases collections — owns the Invoicing AR pipeline.
- Approves payables — owns the AP pipeline.
- Runs Xero — reconciliation, classification, reporting.
- Manages ATO obligations — BAS, PAYG, super, GST, income tax.
- Owns the Finance Hub — banking, financial position, cash forecasting, payables, tax obligations.
- Defines and enforces "cash collected" as cleared funds in the APB bank account — the basis for every consultant's commission calculation.
- Final authority on commission calculation and payout against the cash-collected threshold.
Tactical lead on the named desk — held by the MD in an interim capacity until a Principal Consultant reaches Desk Lead readiness. This is a deliberately temporary hat. The aim is to hand it off cleanly inside the named consultant's development plan. While held, the MD operates under the same Authority Matrix the firm uses for any Principal Consultant + Desk Lead overlay.
- Weekly BD coaching with the desk's lead consultant on their hottest prospects.
- Signs Terms of Business on deals from this desk.
- Approves Search Briefs before they go live.
- Sets the desk's quarterly budget and cash-collection goal — currently [Desk cash goal] against a [Desk budget threshold] budget.
- Hands the seat to the named consultant on promotion to Desk Lead readiness — typically Senior Consultant or Principal Consultant level depending on the development plan.
The numbers you carry
The firm's quarterly cash-collection goal is the sum of every desk's goal the MD sets. The MD is accountable for the total — and for whether each desk's goal is realistic, ambitious, and resourced to be achieved.
The MD role is not measured on personal billings. The MD's time is on the firm — coaching PCs, setting strategy, owning the operating system, and signing for the commercial outcomes the team produces.
The MD does not PIP self. Accountability is to the board and/or shareholders (where applicable) — or, for a founder MD, to the firm's commercial reality itself. Firm-level performance is reviewed at quarterly off-sites and annually with the board. Where firm-level KPIs are missed, the response is strategic review, not personal performance management.
The seat scales with the firm
The current shape of the seat — the overlays kept in Section 05, the firm's desk count, the team in place. The work now is to execute against the firm's current plan and systematically hand off the overlays that should be handed off as dedicated hires come in.
The first axis of MD growth is the firm itself: developing a second Principal Consultant on an existing desk, opening a third desk when capacity supports it, and ultimately bringing in a second senior leader — partner, COO, second MD — when the desk count requires it. Each move expands the seat's strategic capacity by reducing its operational load.
Beyond steady-state growth, the MD seat carries the firm's strategic options: a sale or exit, scaling to a multi-office / multi-region footprint, acquiring an adjacent firm, raising external capital, or moving to an IPO. The choice and timing belong to the MD (with shareholders where applicable). This PD is revisited whenever any of those moves is on the table.
Every desk consistently at or above target. A bench of PCs (and an emerging second senior leader) that no longer requires the MD for hands-on coaching of every consultant. A clean operating system — Codex, tech stack, finance hub — that runs without the MD in the room. Strategic options open and on the table because the firm's commercial position earned them.
How we show up
Compensation
Compensation for the MD seat is treated separately from this Position Description. The structure varies depending on whether the MD holds equity in the firm — for a founder / shareholder MD, compensation is typically a combination of director draw, profit share, and dividend distribution documented in shareholder instruments. For a hired-in MD, compensation is a combination of base salary, performance bonus, and any equity component documented in an employment contract. In either case, the financial arrangement is recorded in those instruments and in the firm's accounts (Xero), reviewed annually with the board as part of the firm's financial planning cycle, and is not duplicated here.
Sign-off
This Position Description is to be read alongside (a) the firm's shareholder documentation OR the MD's employment contract — depending on whether the MD holds equity in the firm; the relevant instrument records the financial arrangements and (where applicable) notice, termination, and post-exit obligations — and (b) the APB Codex, the firm's operating system covering frameworks, naming standards, and module-level playbooks. Material changes to the role or its scope will be issued as a revised PD with a new effective date.