We’ve been increasingly impressed with RocSearch’s growth since it hit the radar in 2005. So it’s going to be interesting to hear from COO Ashish Sinha about David O’Brien’s appointment as Executive Chairman. O’Brien comes in just as Neeraj Bhardwaj, the firm’s London-based CEO, is moving on (The Indian-headquartered firm has decided it needs a CEO based out its headquarters).

David is a 31-year veteran of the IT and services industries with a very different skill-set, and it will be interesting to see what happens. His backround in executive coaching makes him well suited to support strategic management initiatives.

His career has spanned sales, marketing and general management roles at Candle Corporation, Siemens Business Services and the outsourcing arm of Unisys. Then he became CEO of the US$ 1 Billion joint venture BPO company ipsl.

Until 2006 David was a senior partner at Accenture focusing upon large scale change programs. He was a founder of a new Centre of Excellence based in the US, based predominantly upon the work of the Harvard negotiation project.

Because of this outsourcing experience, David is a strong advocate for offshore services – and his ability to nurture and mentor could lead to a major development in the firm’s culture.

P.S.  A colleague at RocSearch has usefully suggested that a exchange of comments on this page between him and others familiar with the firmshould be removed, and instead we should develop a follow-up article. We will do that in September. The article is now closed to comments.