Working for Arup, Raghu Ramkumar wants to drive positive change and deliver impactful outcomes. His firm is dedicated to sustainable development, offering a range of services from design and engineering to advisory across the full project life cycle. Chartership has meant being valued for his experience, expertise, and skills, providing confidence to clients in his capabilities to offer services in this field. He said:
“Arup is a diverse organisation. We have engineers, architects, designers, business strategists, change managers, investment specialists, and digital experts – a full breadth of capabilities end to end. That creates the opportunity for several different types of charterships. When I started as a consultant 12 years ago there was no chartership for management consultants. Now that has changed, and I am very grateful for that.”
Raghu was one of the key members of Arup’s team as the firm went through the accreditation process. Once that was achieved, he decided to put himself forward through the experienced route and became Arup’s first chartered management consultant. He said:
“Having the experience is one thing but having the industry recognition for that experience gives confidence to our clients about our capabilities, develops trust, and boosts our credibility to offer value through our advisory services. Clients are increasingly acknowledging the chartership. Internally you become mentors and role models for people who want to take that route, and this gives me more pride in the work I do.”
This contribution has also been recognised by the MCA Awards this year where Raghu has been shortlisted in the Chartered Management Consultant of the Year category. One of the key projects he highlighted was his work supporting the diversification of the UK telecoms supply chain. His work with the University of Bristol and a wider consortium of partners has directly influenced policy, shaping the Government’s approach to address gaps in the telecommunications supply chain in the UK. His ability to think strategically and have practical insights on funding and delivery has led to the programme’s success with the consortium winning the tender to set-up UK Telecoms Innovation Network.
The shortlisting in the MCA Awards is not just a personal achievement for Raghu but something in which he believes his colleagues can share in. He said:
“I was really pleased that someone from Arup was nominated in this category because we are such a broad and diverse firm, and many people are not aware that we offer management consultancy and advisory services. It also inspires practitioners and consultants working in smaller firms, SME organisations, and boutique consultancies that they can still be excellent management consultants and thrive and grow being where they are.”
For more information on the Associate award, go to www.mca.org.uk/chartered-management-consultant-award