Thistle Initiatives launches new change and transformation practice
London-based financial services compliance consultancy Thistle Initiatives has launched a new change and transformation practice, with the new arm to be led by freshly appointed partners Joe Marti and Sam Coe.
Part of Thistle Group, Thistle Initiatives provides compliance-related advisory services to financial services institutions, including banks, insurers, investment houses, payment providers, and regulators. The 70-person consulting firm has a strong focus on financial crime compliance, including anti-money laundering, anti-bribery, counterterrorism, and tax evasion.
The company’s new change and transformation practice specialises in delivering the people and cultural change needed that underpins robust compliance. The wing’s experts guide financial institutions through organisational change, regulatory implementations, digital transformation initiatives, and special mandates such as restructuring or mergers & acquisitions.
“Launching our dedicated change and transformation practice is a natural progression of our mission to provide holistic support to our clients. We recognise that effective change management is as crucial as robust compliance,” said Harry Cotton, Chief Commercial Officer at Thistle Initiatives.
Joe Marti and Sam Coe
Brought on board to setup and expand the arm are Sam Coe and Joe Marti.
Joe Marti has worked with and in many of the UK’s leading wealth and investment management firms. Starting out at Barclays, he moved into consultancy in 2016 to specialise in the buy-side sector and has worked predominantly with private client firms.
He arrives at Thistle Initiatives from Alpha FMC, where he was a partner and senior member of the Wealth Management and Private Banking practice, supporting a range of private client firms to identify and deliver complex change to their propositions, business and operations.
Sam Coe has 14 years of experience leading large scale change and transformation programmes in the financial services industry. He started his career at KPMG before moving to Capco in 2017, where he was part of the Leadership Team of the Banking and Payments practices. Before joining Thistle Initiatives, he was at Elixirr.
Coe has led numerous regulatory change programmes including remedial responses to S166, Consumer Duty and Operational Resilience. His experience also includes delivering transformation programmes related to M&A (such as target operating model design and post-merger integration), digital transformation and operational efficiency programmes generating millions in cost-savings.
Commenting on their appointments, Marti and Coe said: “The business has built up a phenomenal reputation in its Risk, Compliance and Financial Crime domains and has a group of amazing clients. The change and transformation offering looks to expand the services we provide to our clients and support them with a more end-to-end capability.”
