Profile: Ricardo Backer, Founding Partner Backer Wurzel & Partners Argentina

AltoPartners, the international alliance of independent executive search and leadership consulting firms, is proud to shine a light on Ricardo Backer, a Founding Partner of Backer Wurzel & Partners in Argentina. Ricardo and his team joined the AltoPartners alliance in August 2016 to further enhance and strengthen our presence in Latin America.

Ricardo is one of the most senior Executive Search consultants in Argentina and has developed much of his career working in leading International Firms. Ricardo was the head of Heidrick & Struggles and Korn Ferry International in Argentina, considered to be two of the most important executive search firms in the world. In 2009 he founded Backer Advisory, later Backer Wurzel & Partners, which today is an independent leading firm in Executive Search and Executive Team Performance.

In addition, through Vistage (leadership training and business coaching), he provides personalized and coordinated advisory services to a group of 17 CEOs, and to a group of about 15 Human Resources Directors. This gives him a unique view of the market and adds to his reputation as a leading trusted advisor. At Backer Wurzel & Partners, he has developed methodologies to energize companies’ senior management and to install new cultures through effective processes in market-leading companies.

Backer Wurzel & Partners is continuously growing and its mission is to carry out projects in senior executive recruiting and senior management consulting. The firm’s philosophy is centred on “international quality adapted to the local market reality”. As such, the firm’s portfolio is composed of national and international companies for which the team work locally and regionally, improving the effectiveness of their management team.

Ricardo started his professional career in what is now Accenture, specializing in process reengineering, implementation of critical systems and provision of consulting services to senior management of industrial and consumer goods companies, working in the United States, Germany, Mexico and Venezuela in addition to Argentina. He was named Partner of the firm and later became Managing Partner of the Consulting Division for the Argentina and Chile offices, both of which he directed until his retirement in 1994.

Determined to engage in consulting in matters of talent, he joined AMROP International’s Argentine subsidiary. Later, he founded his own firm, Global Management, which was in turn acquired by Heidrick & Struggles for the launch of its subsidiary in Argentina and which he ran until he was recruited by Korn/Ferry in 2001 to re-launch its operations in the Southern Cone. For 8 years he worked on expanding the Argentina and Chile offices, making Korn/Ferry one of the leading companies in executive recruiting.

He is an advisor to the gA (Assa Group) CEO and was Advisory Board Chairman of Net Partners International, a Regional Technology Services company. Ricardo lectures at Universities on issues of Management and Boards and his articles are published in major media in the country.

Ricardo Bäcker is an Industrial Engineer (University of Buenos Aires).