(P) Christian Gurny, BearingPoint: We are the end-to-end experts
Christian Gurny, Regional Leader Romania and Czech Republic, BearingPoint, talks in this interview about his Romanian business journey from a small villa in Bucharest to a team of 700 in five cities serving clients all around the world.
Christian Gurny, Regional Leader Romania and Czech Republic, BearingPoint, talks in this interview about his Romanian business journey from a small villa in Bucharest to a team of 700 in five cities serving clients all around the world.
Berliner Christian Gurny has been working as a management and technology consultant for 25 years, first at KPMG Consulting then at BearingPoint, being on the plane almost every week. Following his interest in international activities and his strong entrepreneurial drive, he jumped at the opportunity to set up a new BearingPoint entity in Romania in 2007.
Despite a bumpy start of his journey, marked by the 2008 financial crisis, he managed to steer the business in the right direction and grow it to more than 650 people in four offices in Romania (Bucharest, Sibiu, Timisoara, Iasi) and one office in Prague. His team now consults large and medium international corporations in Germany, France, Switzerland, UK, and other countries on navigating a rapidly changing digital environment. They advise clients what technologies are most suited and implement them.
The pandemic came with plenty of challenges, one of which was changing the way BearingPoint consultants work. From weekly flights to and from clients, people suddenly found themselves working from home. And the results were surprisingly good: the business has increased, and 200 new employees have joined the team last year, Christian says.
He is now optimistic about the growth opportunities ahead as businesses have to adapt to the new digital world. But what he is most proud of is that he has created a team of like-minded people who will continue the journey that he started in Romania almost 15 years ago.
How did you start in the consulting business and how did you get to Romania?
I joined the company - named then KPMG Consulting - 25 years ago as an SAP consultant, working in production, and made my way up. In 2002, I became a partner.
As a partner, I was responsible for almost everything: winning deals, implementing, managing big projects across the globe.
At one point, we didn’t have enough people to help us get the work done. So, in 2005-2006, we started thinking about opening a new entity to help us add more talents to our teams. I had a look at Eastern Europe, Turkey, Spain, Portugal, and other countries. In the end, we chose Romania.
Why did you choose Romania?
Romania was and still is the second biggest Eastern European country after Poland, accessing the EU at the beginning of 2007. I was convinced that the Latin heritage made it a good fit for the west.
