Michael Curds joins digital consultancy 11:FS as Head of Talent
Former Apple and BCG Digital Ventures talent lead Michael Curds has joined digital consultancy 11:FS. Curds brings two decades of experience to the firm as its new Head of Talent and Recruitment.
11:FS, is a consultancy which was launched in an effort to combine an innovative start-up mentality with some of the best experts in the financial services field. Since its launch, it has subsequently delivered digital financial services projects for firms including NatWest’s Mettle business banking service, Standard Chartered, and other firms across Europe, Asia, Africa, and North America. It is also building its own modular banking infrastructure, 11:FS Foundry, to deliver secure, digitally native banking proposition to scale and at speed, in association with Norway’s largest bank, DNB.
Many of the firm’s clients are currently contending with heightened competition for talent, thanks to digitalised newcomers in their market. As a result, 11:FS has opted to improve its talent and recruitment offering with the hiring of Michael Curds, who takes responsibility for the planning and execution of the firm’s hiring strategy as it continues to build out its consulting, media, research and benchmarking, 11:FS Pulse and 11:FS Foundry teams.
Arriving at the firm as Head of Talent and Recruitment, he brings a wealth of experience in scaling digitally-native business, having most recently led the talent team at BCG Digital Ventures. Curds was the second employee at the firm, and helped it to establish itself a highly successful business, building and leading a function that attracted and hired the industry’s top talent. Prior to his time with Boston Consulting Group’s digital innovation arm, he held a number of talent leadership roles, including digital media company PERFORM, audio start-up MusicQubed and Apple, where he ran recruiting for its EMEA operations.
Commenting on his new role, Curds said, “The work and the approach to client delivery at 11:FS speaks for itself. What really attracted me was the culture that has been built, how it is lived and cultivated the leadership team, and embraced by the entire company. The opportunity to help scale the firm, while also being focused on maintaining and expanding that culture, is exciting.”
David M. Brear, Group CEO of 11:FS, said of his arrival, “When we founded 11:FS, it was with a belief that the talent we work with and the culture we create would set us apart from the current incumbents… For me this means finding, attracting and hiring the best talent on the planet that’s aligned to our cultural values, in what is a highly competitive market. I’m really excited that someone of Mike’s ability, character and passion for talent and workplace culture that makes us proudly different, will be taking our Talent team to the next level.
