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Our people support network

How we support people at CDS — and who's in your corner.

The short version

At CDS, every Consultant sits at the heart of a small network of people whose job is to support them. There's no single line manager. Support is spread deliberately across a few different roles, each doing one thing well.

The aim is that nothing important falls through the gap — and that no one person has to carry it all.

The CDS people support network

Closest to you

Your Client Lead is closest to your work. Your project, your client, your day-to-day. They catch up with you weekly — a short, regular chance to talk through what's on your mind, what you're stuck on, and what's coming up.

Your Advocate is closest to your career. The bigger picture, the longer horizon, the you-shaped questions about where you're heading and what you want to be better at. They meet you monthly. They stay with you when you move between accounts, so your career conversations have continuity.

Crucially, they're never the same person. Two perspectives, two doors.

The wider network

The closest support sits inside a wider network that comes in when you need it:

  • Practices — your discipline's home. Your Practice Lead and the wider practice community are where you go for technical depth, bids, and thought leadership in your area.
  • Client Leadership Team — the group accountable for the commercial and client relationship side of CDS, including your Account Owner. The route when something needs to be resolved above your Client Lead. See Account leadership for how this team works.
  • Ops — the safety net. Pay, contracts, formal policy, wellbeing — anything that needs to sit outside the operational structure.

Why it works this way

A single line manager has to be everything to everyone — career coach, workload manager, sounding board, escalation route. That's a lot for one relationship to carry, and it leaves you with nowhere to go if it isn't working.

Spreading the load means each person can do one thing well. Client Leads focus on the work. Advocates focus on the longer-term you. You get multiple doors to walk through, depending on what's on your mind.

In this section

Interested in joining us? We'd love to hear from you — recruitment@cds.co.uk.