Korn Ferry Q3 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
March 6, 2024

There are 8 speakers on the call.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, Welcome to the Korn Ferry Third Quarter Fiscal Year 20 24 Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. Following the prepared remarks, we will conduct a question and answer session. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded for replay purposes. We have also made available in the Investor Relations section of our website at kornferry.com a copy of the financial presentation that we will be reviewing with you today.

Operator

Before I turn the call over to your host, Mr. Gary Burnison, let me first read a cautionary statement to investors. Certain statements made in the call today, such as those relating to future performance, plans and goals constitute forward looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Although the company believes the expectations reflected in such forward looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such statements. Actual results in future periods may differ materially from those currently expected or desired because of a number of risks and uncertainties, which are beyond the company's control.

Operator

Additional information concerning such risks and uncertainties can be found in the release relating to this presentation and in the periodic and other reports filed by the company with the SEC, including the company's annual report for fiscal year 2023 and the company's soon to be filed quarterly report for the quarter ended January 31, 2024. Also, some of the comments today may reference non GAAP financial measures such as constant currency amounts, EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA. Additional information concerning these measures, including reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure, is contained in the financial presentation and earnings release relating to this call, both of which are posted in the Investor Relations section of the company's website at www.kornferry.com. With that, I'll turn the call over to Mr. Burnison.

Operator

Please go ahead, Mr. Burnison.

Speaker 1

Okay. Thank you, Greg, and good afternoon, everybody. Number 1, I'm enormously proud of our organization and how we continue to acclimate, innovate and align our business to the opportunity ahead. Clearly, the strategy is working. The results for the quarter, we did about $669,000,000 of fee revenue, which was down 2%.

Speaker 1

But in terms of the strategy working, our non search offerings provided a substantial buffer against the more cyclically sensitive recruiting offerings. Earnings and profitability were also good, 15.2 percent EBITDA margin. And the revenue from consulting and digital, when combined with our interim business, now represent 50 percent of our top line. And during the quarter, our consulting bill rate increased 12% and our digital subscription and license revenue increased 11% over the prior year. In today's world, as organizations toggle between perform and transform, it's clear that vertical is out and horizontal is in.

Speaker 1

And that's exactly the same for us and it's gratifying to see the results of this cross firm collaboration strategy. Today, we're approaching almost $3,000,000,000 in fee revenue with a balanced portfolio across solutions and geographies, that's now generating over a third of our fee revenue from our very successful marquee and regional account program, where just 4 short years ago, our top 5 and regional accounts averaged around $19,000,000 per account with the largest of $26,000,000 compared to today where our top 5 average almost $30,000,000 and our largest account has a run rate of almost $50,000,000 driven to a large extent by this horizontal approach by our cross line of business referrals, which today generate about a quarter of our fee revenue. And further to that point, when I look at our 3 $50,000,000 plus digital business, today 30% of our fee revenue is generated from consulting referrals. And we're looking to expand this horizontal focus even further through 4 primary digital growth drivers. Number 1, a firm wide push around digital sales, digital offerings.

Speaker 1

Secondly, increasing our commercial output and sales productivity third, enhancing our product offerings like our talent applications and talent platform and finally, increasing our digital revenue through partnerships, including offering joint solutions and opportunities with HR technology providers. It's clear given the results over the last few quarters that we're at the threshold of even greater opportunity. And regardless of the environment from one cycle to the next, our vision remains unchanged to become the premier organizational consulting firm. Our household brand, unparalleled IP and diversification strategy will continue to positively influence our performance and accelerate the trajectory of thousands of organizations. Indeed, Korn Ferry is uniquely positioned as a firm relentlessly focused on synchronizing strategy, operations and talent, a firm that offers increasing relevant solutions in a rapidly changing world.

Speaker 1

And I think we're only really scratching the surface of what we can become. With those short remarks, I'm joined by Tiffany, Greg and Bob. And Bob, I think I'll turn it over to you next.

Speaker 2

Great. Thanks, Gary, and good afternoon and good morning. Before I jump into the numbers, I just want to highlight a couple of points. First, I think the Q3 was a very good quarter and I'm extremely proud of my Korn Ferry colleagues and all that they've accomplished. 2nd, equally as important, I think our performance this quarter continues to demonstrate that our strategy is working.

Speaker 2

The Q3 results were ahead of our expectations and really marked a strong start to the back half of our fiscal year. Both earnings and profitability improved year over year and sequentially despite seasonally lower fee revenue, a result of increasing productivity by leveraging our cost base, again an overall positive scorecard for our broader diversification strategy. We are excited about and confident in this strategy as it continues to play out just as we expected and have talked about, with resilience and growth in our consulting and digital business offsetting cyclical moderation in portions of our talent acquisition offerings. We continue to leverage existing client relationships, our colleagues across lines of business and our unique IEP, data and content to drive top line synergies with a particular focus on our marquee and regional accounts, as you heard Gary talk about that. A number of our key operating statistics improved in the quarter.

Speaker 2

We had higher hourly bill rates in both consulting and interim, which were up 12% 21% year over year and are really reflective of the exceptional value and impact our services deliver to our clients. Our subscription and license fee revenue in digital increased 11% year over year and was actually 38% of digital's total new business for the Q3, which illustrates the underlying strength and relevance of our data and solutions as well as contributing to increasing fee revenue stability going forward. Equally important, I'm pleased with the year over year and sequential growth of our earnings and profitability. The adjusted EBITDA margin was 15.2% in the 3rd quarter, with digital, consulting and RPO all improving their profitability, both year over year and sequentially and execsearch improving sequentially. Last, I'd like to highlight our balanced approach to deploying capital, specifically capital return to shareholders.

Speaker 2

In addition to our substantial dividend increase last quarter, this quarter we increased our share repurchases acquiring 300 and 83,000 shares, which brings our year to date share repurchase to 565,000 shares. Total of $67,000,000 has been returned to shareholders through a combination of dividends and share repurchases year to date. And our Board just approved another dividend of $0.33 a share that's payable on April 15. Now let me turn the call over to Greg, who will take you through some overall company financial highlights.

Speaker 3

Okay. Thanks, Bob. In the Q3, which is typically seasonally slower, global free revenue was $669,000,000 and was down only 2% year over year, measured at both actual rates and at constant currency. By line of business, consulting and digital grew 3% and 6%, respectively, year over year and combined generated 38% of total fee revenue in the 3rd quarter. Fee revenue moderation in the 3rd quarter for most of our Telen acquisition solutions continued to stabilize.

Speaker 3

Executive search and RPO were down 6% 22%, respectively, year over year, while professional search and interim were up 11% year over year, primarily driven by Salo, which was acquired in November of 2022. Consolidated new business in the Q3, excluding RPO, was flat year over year at both actual rates and at constant currency. By line of business, digital new business grew 2% year over year, consulting was up 9% year over year, driven in part by the acquisition of SALO. Executive search new business was down 6% year over year with recent monthly data points indicating that global demand is stabilizing. For RPO, new business in the 3rd quarter was strong at $122,000,000 and includes $83,000,000 of renewals and extensions and $39,000,000 of new logo Excluding RPO, consolidated new business was up 11% and approximately 5% organically year over year in January and in line with expectations in February.

Speaker 3

Earnings and profitability also continued to improve in the 3rd quarter. Adjusted EBITDA in the 3rd quarter grew 6% year over year to $102,000,000 with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 15.2% and was up 3% sequentially with a 120 basis point improvement in margin despite seasonally slower fee revenue. Strong cost controls and greater consultant and execution staff productivity continues to drive growth and profitability, which has now improved sequentially for 3 consecutive quarters. Finally, our adjusted diluted earnings per share in the 3rd quarter were $1.07 up 6% year over year and up 10% sequentially. Adjusted fully diluted earnings per share excludes $6,400,000

Speaker 1

or $0.12 per share

Speaker 3

of after tax restructuring and acquisition integration costs, which were positively offset by $9,700,000 or $0.18 per share of nonrecurring tax benefits. GAAP fully diluted earnings per share were $1.13 in the 3rd quarter. Our investable cash position at the end of the 3rd quarter remained strong at $496,000,000 and our capital allocation continues to be balanced. Through the end of the Q3, we deployed $122,000,000 of cash using $37,000,000 for capital expenditures, $18,000,000 for debt service and returned $67,000,000 to shareholders in combined dividends and share repurchases. With that, I'll turn the call over to Tiffany to review our operating segments in more detail.

Speaker 4

Thanks, Greg. Starting with KF Digital, global fee revenue in the Q3 was $90,000,000 which was up 6% year over year at actual rates and at constant currency. Digital subscription and license fee revenue in the Q3 was $33,000,000 which was approximately 37% of fee revenue for the quarter and up 11% year over year. Global new business for KF Digital was $111,000,000 with $42,000,000 or 38% of the total tied to subscription and license sales, up from 36% last quarter. The overall pipeline for digital remains strong as we head into the 4th quarter and into the next fiscal year.

Speaker 4

For consulting, fee revenue in the Q3 was $167,000,000 which was up approximately 3% year over year at actual rates and at constant currency. Fee revenue growth was strongest in organizational strategy, which increased 9% year over year. Today, we are selling larger and more complex transformational engagements, which use our rich proprietary data to drive unique and differentiated insights. Consulting's average bill rate continues to climb, now at $4.38 an hour, which is up over $46 an hour or 12% from just 1 year ago. Adjusted EBITDA margins also improved increasing 40 bps sequentially and by 2 30 bps year over year.

Speaker 4

Additionally, global new business consulting in the 3rd quarter was flat year over year with double digit growth in EMEA and in North America. Total fee revenue in professional search and interim in the 3rd quarter was $131,000,000 up $13,000,000 or 11% year over year. Breaking down the quarter, year over year fee revenue growth was mostly driven by the interim portion of the business, which offset moderation in the permanent placement portion of the segment. Interim fee revenue grew to $78,000,000 from $53,000,000 year over year, driven by the recent acquisition of Salo. Interim's average hourly bill rate has increased to $129 per hour, which is up $22 an hour or over 20% from 1 year ago and reflective of the added value of being part of the broader Korn Ferry ecosystem.

Speaker 4

Professional search and permanent placement fee revenue declined by $23,000,000 or 19% year over year to 56,000,000 dollars Professional Search and Interim new business increased 9% year over year in the Q3 aided by the recent acquisition of SALO. Moving on to recruitment process outsourcing. New business for the Q3 was $122,000,000 comprised of $39,000,000 of new logos and $83,000,000 of renewals, which included several marquee accounts. Total revenue under contract at the end of the quarter was approximately $696,000,000 Fee revenue in the 3rd quarter totaled $81,000,000 which was down $23,000,000 or 22 percent year over year at actual rates and constant currency. Fee revenue was by a moderation in hiring volume within the existing base of contracts as well as labor hoarding conditions, which have continued in the market.

Speaker 4

Historically, fee revenue averaged 106 percent of the original contract value, which is why we view the current slowdown in demand as transitory and believe RPO is well positioned to benefit in client hiring returns to more normalized levels. The pipeline remains strong as RPO continues to renew existing clients and win new business with a differentiated service offering in the marketplace. Finally, global fee revenue for executive search in the 3rd quarter was $199,000,000 down 6% at actual and 7% constant currency. Overall, global demand in the 3rd quarter would indicate that demand is stabilizing. Additionally, consultant productivity has improved driving a year over year 2 22 basis point improvement in adjusted EBITDA margin.

Speaker 4

I will now turn the call back over to Bob to discuss our outlook for the Q4 of fiscal 'twenty four.

Speaker 2

Great. Thanks, Tiffany. Monthly new business trends exiting our Q3 and entering the Q4 have begun to stabilize. January new business was up 11%, 5% organically year over year. February new business was in line with our expectations, and we are well positioned to deliver our March new business, which historically is one of our best new business months of the year.

Speaker 2

Now assuming normal monthly seasonal new business patterns and assuming no further changes in worldwide geopolitical conditions, economic conditions, financial markets and foreign exchange rates, we expect fee revenue in the Q4 of fiscal 'twenty four will range from $675,000,000 to $695,000,000 our adjusted EBITDA margin to improve to approximately 15.3% to 15.4% or I'm sorry, 15.5% and our consolidated adjusted diluted earnings per share to range from $1.09 to 1 $0.17 Finally, we expect our GAAP diluted earnings per share in the 4th quarter to range from $1.06 to 1 $0.14 dollars Now in closing, we've made substantial progress as demonstrated by our continuing performance in delivering our strategic plan to lead the market in organizational consulting. Our top line diversification continues to serve us well as the non permanent placement talent acquisition portions of the business, which represent almost 50% of fee revenue, as Gary mentioned, remain on track to deliver consistent growth. Our IP, data and science backed services and solutions continue to differentiate us in this war for the best talent. Further, our strong cost base management really positions us to deliver continuing improvements in earnings and profitability and positions us to successfully continue our balanced approach to capital deployment.

Speaker 2

As I always say, we're at the beginning of what's going to be a very long ballgame, and I truly believe our best is yet to come. With that, we'd like to answer any questions that you may have.

Operator

Your first question comes from the line of Trevor Romeo from William Blair. Please go ahead.

Speaker 5

Hi, thanks so much for taking the questions here. First one is just kind of on the overall macro and demand backdrop. I think if you look at some of the CEO confidence surveys, we've seen those increase a little bit so far in the last couple of months. I think the capital markets backdrop feels a bit more stable. It seems like maybe fewer people are talking about a severe recession now.

Speaker 5

So I guess how much change have you started to see in overall demand sentiment? And what do you think from this point could be a catalyst to start seeing a more significant demand recovery?

Speaker 1

Well, the latter part is a tough question. Clearly, we've seen those same trends for sure. As I talked about on the last earnings call that my expectation was you'd start to see deflationary pressures. I think you're starting to see that for sure. Obviously, everybody is on pins and needles with respect to the Fed.

Speaker 1

But I still what I've said for some time, I think we're in the middle of a multi quarter reset and back to a period of time where rates would be at more normalized levels from a period of 2 to 3 decades of very cheap money. And I think companies are adjusting to that reality. And what that is creating is a focus on organizations to have a more horizontal approach, less vertical, more horizontal and perform at the same time they transform, which creates opportunities for our consulting business and digital offerings, which is exactly what you're seeing. And CEOs are looking not just at their strategy and how to be more horizontal, but looking at their leadership and their talent. And I think that's reflective of the engagements that we're winning today.

Speaker 1

I would say that there as I was listening to Tiffany and Greg and Bob, the word that kept coming up was stabilizing. And I think that is absolutely true for sure. And I do think there's some green shoots and it's hard to again, I'm not going to say that 2 or 3 months make a trend. But certainly, when you look at the most cyclical parts of at least our business, You take, for example, ProSearch, number 1. We have seen an uplift in volume.

Speaker 1

And we think that uplift is 15% to 20% over the last few months and that's what we're expecting in the Q4. That's what February delivered. So I think that's a positive, a very positive sign. And interim has also stabilized as well. So I think those are for us, I think those are 2 good green shoots and I think they do portray a positive sign for the labor market.

Speaker 5

Okay. Thanks. Thanks, Gary. That's helpful. Maybe a follow-up on margins.

Speaker 5

Nice improvement to 15% EBITDA in the quarter. Looks like a little bit of further improvement in the guidance. As we think about kind of modeling margins maybe beyond the next quarter, can you talk about some of the puts and takes and maybe base case for fiscal 'twenty five and how quickly you could get back to that 16% to 18% target range you're looking for?

Speaker 1

Well, the we that is the longer term target at 16% to 18%. If I just dial it back before the pandemic on an apples to apples basis, So adjusting for the mix shift as we entered this new business called interim, which today is about $350,000,000 it was 0 in 4.5 years ago. That impacts the margin compares by 200 basis points to 2.50 basis points. So if you when you adjust for that, pre pandemic, we were running 12%, 12.5% pro form a adjusted for the mix margin. Today, we're at 15%.

Speaker 1

So profitability is substantially ahead of where it was pre pandemic. The business is up, call it, 3rd top line is up kind of 30% from the pre pandemic levels. Both of those data points, I'm extremely proud on. We have to deliver profitable revenue growth. And we do think there's some upside in the EBITDA margin.

Speaker 1

And when that can crank up to 16% to 18%, I think part of that depends on the Fed and what a more normalized rate environment is going to look like. The search business today is, call it, dollars 800,000,000 I mean it got to as high as $930,000,000 which probably isn't a good compare. But clearly, there's a lot of room there. There's room on ProSearch. There's room on Interim.

Speaker 1

I think the consulting business, we're scratching the surface.

Speaker 5

So at the end of

Speaker 1

the day, in this kind of business, it's really about the top line. And that's why we've got a strategy really focused on 1 Korn Ferry, a horizontal approach to going to market. And I think that's reflective in the data around our marquee and regional accounts as well as the cross referrals. But we do think there's upside on the EBITDA margin.

Speaker 5

Okay. Thank you. That was helpful. I'll turn it over.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of George Tong from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Speaker 6

Hi, thanks. Good morning. Your consulting and digital businesses are seeing good growth and you're making inroads with your interim search business. Can you provide some additional stats on cross referrals and cross selling involving these lines of businesses across the broader organization?

Speaker 1

Digital is a huge opportunity for us. When we look at the cross referrals into the digital offerings, it's been underweighted compared to the rest of the portfolio. And so the cross referrals, George, for this quarter, it was about 25%, year to date, I think it's about 25%, something like that. The cross referral percentages into pro surge interim substantially higher, like way higher. RPO is the same thing historically, maybe not as much recently.

Speaker 1

Digital is an undersized penetration that we have to get at. And that's opportunity for us. And I think right off the top of my head, George, I want to say that that cross referral percentage in the interim is probably and Bob can correct me on all this, but it's probably like 15% or so. Consulting, which is a good sign, that cross referral percentage into digital is like 30%. But for a firm overall, it's underweighted, which creates nothing but opportunity for us.

Speaker 2

Yes. George, it's Bob. Just maybe a little bit more color on the interim. So if you go back to the point in time when we acquired Lucas Group and you roll the clock forward to today, as a result of being part of those businesses being part of cornflare ecosystem, we've had somewhere around 1500 to 1600 incremental opportunities that were identified between lines of business in interim. And they've won in the neighborhood of like 850 to 900 of those, creating kind of $50,000,000 to $60,000,000 of incremental fee revenue that those businesses never would have gotten had they not been part of our ecosystem.

Speaker 6

Got it. That's helpful. In recent periods, you've undertaken some cost rationalization actions, most of which are complete at this point. Do you envision needing to take additional cost or headcount actions? Or do you think at this point the organization is right sized for where we are in the cycle?

Speaker 1

We are always looking at our talent in terms of promotion and development opportunities, that's something we're constantly at work at. No, I don't see any kind of workforce actions other than our normal talent management processes.

Speaker 2

Yes, George, I would say on the from a cost perspective too, we're managing our BD and travel down to a number that I think is sustainable at this point as the business goes forward. And as I said in the past, on the real estate side, we have some opportunities, but the big opportunities are behind us at this point. To me, it's really all about what Gary said earlier, it's productivity and that we're going to get leverage out of the top line growth once the clouds lift.

Speaker 6

Great. Very helpful. Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Josh Chan from UBS. Please go ahead.

Speaker 7

Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. On the digital business, so you've run the business at about 30% margin for the last two quarters now. About a year ago, it was 25% to 26% margin. So is the difference mainly the people that have come out of the business?

Speaker 7

And if that's the case, what does that mean in terms of the long term growth potential in the digital business going forward?

Speaker 1

Well, I think we're scratching the surface of what the digital business can be. I mean, we have to make sure that we're driving the entire firm across this IP that we have and creating knowledge transfer to clients. And could this be 3 or 4 times the size of what it is today? Absolutely could be. But we have to invest in the platform, which we're continuing to do.

Speaker 1

The profitability is clearly up, not just because of the cost reductions, but also because of the collaboration between consulting and digital. I've never seen it to be higher. Clearly, it should be the most profitable part of our business. It creates, I think, enormous opportunity for shareholders. If we were to do nothing but double or triple that business, you can imagine what that could do for shareholder value.

Speaker 1

So it's clearly a focus of ours. But we've taken a very systematic approach to it in trying to build partnerships and an ecosystem and also investing in the platform, in the technology platform that we have.

Speaker 7

Okay. Yes. Thanks for the color there, Gary. Yes, that's helpful. And on the consulting side, I guess growth has been sustained by Europe's strength over the last couple of quarters.

Speaker 7

So does Europe continue to look strong on consulting business or at some point does that become a tougher compare as we kind of look ahead here?

Speaker 1

Well, clearly, it could be a tougher compare. But I think overall in terms of where the consulting business is, again, it's the beginning, not the end. We just continue to see we have a fabulous team, a great leader in Mark Arian. And his strategy was to move the business towards bigger, more impactful transformational assignments. And the business many years ago started out in with assessments and smaller ticket engagements.

Speaker 1

And over time, through incredible team and the IP that we have and a firm wide push, we have systematically moved that towards bigger organizational strategy assignments. And you see it in the numbers, you see it in the bill rate. I mean that bill rate, and I don't know the exact time, but it's like 3 or 4 years ago. I think that bill rate was sub $300 an hour. Now it's $438 That's a combination of everything and the strategy working.

Speaker 1

So, yes, do the compares get a little bit tougher? For sure, they do. No question about it. But in terms of the long term potential of this business, we're at the beginning.

Speaker 2

Hey, Josh, this is Bob. One thing I would add is that, as we move through the quarter, we did see, to talk about greenshoot, some positive activities happening in North America as well.

Speaker 7

Okay. Yes, that's really helpful. Thanks. Thank you both for your time and congrats on the

Speaker 1

good quarter.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Josh. We'll see you talk to you on Tuesday.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Andre Childress from Baird. Please go ahead.

Speaker 5

This is Andre on for Mark Marcon. Thank you for taking our questions. My first question is just a follow-up to some of the prior commentary you just had. Could you provide a little bit more of a breakdown in terms of what you're seeing by major geography between North America, Europe and Asia Pacific?

Speaker 1

I'll talk about revenue first. And overall as a firm, we reported down 2%. EMEA was flat, kind of the same for North America. Asia was down like 5% and a large part of that was driven by the continuing challenges that every company is facing in China. On the new business front for the quarter, overall, we were flat compared to the prior year.

Speaker 1

EMEA was up 6%. Asia was continued to be challenged. Consulting was flat, digital was up 2%. And in North America, we've seen stabilization over the past few months and quarters.

Speaker 5

Okay, great. Thank you for that. And then as a follow-up, digital saw a nice improvement pretty much across the board. And in your prepared remarks, you had a big point of emphasis in terms of trying to drive more cross sells into that going forward. Could you provide a little bit more color on some of those strategies?

Speaker 5

And if you could, in particular, touch on some of the commentary really

Speaker 1

by ourselves. And when you look at World really by ourselves. And when you look at world class consulting firms, they typically enjoyed an ecosystem of partners that creates deal flow. And we, up to this point, really haven't been able to we haven't monetized that. And that's been an effort.

Speaker 1

We have a new leader in the digital business, Matthias Herzog, and who brings a fresh perspective. We think we've got a great team. And so that is an opportunity for us. And so there are 3 to 5 largely technology players that we are working steadily with to create an ecosystem where we can deliver more value through our IP with their technology solutions to their clients and vice versa. And so I think it is a greenfield for us, for sure.

Speaker 1

I think also the collaboration between digital and consulting, as I said earlier, has never been higher. I think that is something that's positive for us. And overall as a firm, when you think about the kinds of data that we have and being able to provide insight to clients, it's extraordinary. I was on a call last week with a CEO, huge healthcare company. We've done thousands of assessments where we're able to tell that CEO exactly kind of a DNA and MRI of their organization and juxtapose that with that organization strategy and show where the gaps are, which leads to assessment, leads to development.

Speaker 1

And so I do think as a firm that one huge focus for us, we're calling it KF Rise, but a focus of that is to make sure that we are delivering scaled analytics through our data. We've done 103,000,000 assessments over time. Every year, we develop over 1,000,000 professionals. Here is to make sure that we're able to create more insight based on that data with clients and we have to get the whole firm behind that effort. And that's an activity that's it's a big activity that's underway for us right now.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Tobey Sommer from Truist. Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thank you. I was wondering if you could give us some more color on that trend you quoted recently of professional search being up, maybe talk about how broad based it is and any industry verticals that stand out as either leaders or laggards in that regard? The industry verticals, I think it's going to be hard for me to comment on. I would say that it's been somewhat broad based for sure. But when you do look, it is up into the right.

Speaker 1

And I'm not going to sit here and say 3 months, 4 months, make a trend line. But I do think it is kind of reflective of where companies are in terms of their adaptation in this multi quarter reset. And so it is true that over the last few months, we have seen in Pro Search, new kind of monthly new business trends up 15%, 20%, largely in North America, but also in EMEA. And that's I think generally been one of the most cyclically sensitive parts of the labor market, at least of recruiting companies, staffing companies. So I do think that is a green shoot.

Speaker 1

The other thing that I would point out is on the RPO business, when you look back after this great resignation and we've talked about labor hoarding and you've seen other RPO providers and what's happened to their top line. We are expecting a shift largely over the last 2 to 3 quarters, you'll see that it's been substantial part of the business has been renewals, which is important. I mean, there's no question about it, shows the quality of the work. And as Tiffany said, the revenue that we actually recognize from what we report as new business has been about 106 percent of notional value. But we are we do think there's going to be a shift away from that trend line more towards new wins.

Speaker 1

So I would expect that in this next quarter here, we'll probably do $100,000,000 maybe a little bit north in new business. And I think that trend of 70% or so renewals is going to flip a little bit. And I think you're going to see more new logos, less renewals. I appreciate that. From a modeling perspective, is the effect of recent cost cutting fully captured in this quarter?

Speaker 1

Or is there sort of an incremental tailwind in the quarter you're guiding for or beyond? Yes, Bob, Ollie, you can answer that.

Speaker 2

Yes. No, Sabi, I think most of the benefits of the actions we took are already embedded in our run rate numbers that we posted today. For us, as we said earlier, I mean, where we're going to continue to see margin improvement is top line growth. And then also, we're going to look to drive more continue to drive productivity so that we're not adding back headcount as quickly as we maybe perhaps have in the past as that top line recovers.

Speaker 1

Understood. And then from a cross sell referral, I think you quoted being in sort of the mid-20s now. Do you have any thoughts on the sort of the evolution of your approach to driving that? Is it still marquee account and marquee sales force focused? Or do you have different sort of tools and approaches to trying to drive that higher?

Speaker 1

No, it is. It clearly starts with a top down go to market strategy, but we also have to make sure that we are doing it bottom up. And the reality is we haven't had as much firm wide push around that as we would like to have or what there's opportunity to do. And so that is an initiative that we call KFRI's that's 1st and foremost investing in data and being able to do scaled analytics, because I think wherever this thing goes on AI, which we are absolutely trying to incorporate into our business, it starts with proprietary data and insight. Then it's how do we get that data and insight into our consultants' hands to differentiate Korn Ferry with our clients.

Speaker 1

And so that is an active part of the strategy. That scaled analytics, that data around sectors, industries, geographies, we have to do a better job of getting that into our consultants' hands across the entire platform to be able to differentiate Korn Ferry and offer more insight into customers. So that is definitely something that is been accelerated for us. I'm not going to say it's new, but we've certainly put a fresh emphasis on that.

Speaker 2

And Tobey, this is Bob. I would the only thing I would add to that is, historically, I would say that the we were more opportunistic than intentional. And I think as part of what the program Gary is talking about, we're going to become much more intentional. Give you an example, in the past, if somebody was an account leader on account and we wanted it was a $10,000,000 count, we wanted 20% growth, we'd say, okay, go get $2,000,000 Now the KPIs are being built where we're actually saying we want $2,000,000 but $1,000,000 of it needs to come from consulting, dollars 1,000,000 of it needs to come from digital, so that we're focusing efforts where we really see the opportunities and going after it with intent versus, again, just being more opportunistic and letting taking kind of what was given to us.

Speaker 1

My last question has to do with the bill rate growth in consulting. I know you had some success with some government work in EMEA. And I'm just curious if that's the main driver of the bill rate growth or it's broad based, how would you characterize it, larger projects, etcetera? Thanks. Yes, it is broad.

Speaker 1

But clearly, that's had an impact, what you're referencing around governmental work. No question about it. But I also think it's reflective of the strategy from going from smaller engagements to bigger, more impactful transformational assignments. That's how you get leverage. We still have to continue to push towards that the organizational strategy, organizational design, transformation.

Speaker 1

We still have to push the firm that direction, but clearly that's had a big, big impact on the bill rates as well.

Operator

And at this time, there are no further questions. I'd now like to turn the call back to Gary Burnison for any closing remarks.

Speaker 1

Okay, Greg. It looks and thank you to everybody for listening. We're very, very excited obviously about the future of Korn Ferry. I think this is the beginning. We've proven that there's customer receptivity in the marketplace.

Speaker 1

The IP and the data that we have is enormous. And we're excited about the future. Thank you for taking an interest and we'll talk to you next time. Thank you, Greg.

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this conference will be available for replay for 1 week starting today at 3 pm Eastern Time running through the day March 13, 2024 ending at midnight. You may access the AT and T Executive Playback Service by dialing 1-eight sixty six-two zero seven-ten forty one and entering the access code 7,321,980. International participants may dial 402-970-0847. Additionally, the replay will be available for playback at the company's website, www.kornferry.com in the Investor Relations section.

Operator

That does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation and for using AT and T Teleconference. You may now

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Earnings Conference Call
Korn Ferry Q3 2024
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