Alumni Profile: James R. Holland, Jr. of Unity Hunt, Inc.

Today: President and CEO of Unity Hunt, Inc. since 1991. A diverse, family-owned holding company, Unity Hunt has been in business for almost 50 years. Upon assuming the role of CEO, Mr. Holland's first challenge was creating an infrastructure and organization plan for the approximately 100 entities owned by Unity Hunt. Under his leadership, its holdings were completely reorganized into four operating vehicles: the Hunt Operating Group, Hunt Sports Group, Hunt Financial Group, and Hunt Capital Group. In addition to his leadership position at Unity Hunt, Mr. Holland is a director of two public companies as well as several private companies. He has served on over 80 Boards of Directors in his career.

James Holland

At Booz Allen & Before: Mr. Holland began his career with Booz Allen, where he was a principal in the firm's mergers and acquisitions (M&A) practice. Before joining Unity Hunt, Mr. Holland was chairman and CEO of Nedinco, and prior to Nedinco, Mr. Holland served as President and Director of KSA Industries, Inc. He holds an M.B.A, with honors, from the Graduate School of Industrial Administration of Carnegie Mellon University and a B.S. degree, with honors, in chemical engineering from Oklahoma State University.

Do you feel that Booz Allen gave you a strong foundation for your current position? Booz Allen taught me how to manage multiple projects simultaneously, on time, and on budget. I developed effective time management and discipline along with useful writing skills and reporting processes that have proven to be very useful over the years. In addition, Booz Allen taught me interviewing techniques, which have been helpful. But most important, obviously, was the firm's focus on hard work and performing effectively. There was a real breadth in terms of industries, client size, and the products that clients manufactured or sold — it was a very broadening experience. The range of clients and projects I worked on at Booz Allen is helpful in my situation at Unity Hunt, where I have a large number of diverse companies that I am reviewing, analyzing, and overseeing.

What skills and strengths did you acquire at Booz Allen? Beyond the time management and writing skills I mentioned, I would say that I benefited most from the firm's mentoring skills. Particularly when I started out as a cub consultant, I had some great mentors. Booz Allen understands very clearly that its product is people and the firm puts enormous effort into teaching, training, and refining the people it hires in all ways — building their analytical skill sets and strengthening their interpersonal skills. I was very fortunate to have outstanding mentors all through my experience with the firm. Working with companies' top management was very much a part of this learning process for me.

Would you recommend working at Booz Allen? The answer is yes. Obviously it was a great learning experience for me. But what was also exciting to me was the sheer intellectual challenge, not just in terms of the work content, but in being associated with very bright people at both Booz Allen and the client companies which I enjoyed immensely. It was a great learning experience from the perspectives of the industrial, commercial knowledge I gained, the companies I interfaced with, and the skills I developed. In retrospect, my work at Booz Allen helped my career a great deal.

How would you describe the Booz Allen style of consulting in terms of what it brings to clients? That's very hard to describe. Booz Allen is a very large firm with many different skill sets and that's the way that I use consultants: I hire them by their area of expertise. The view of Booz Allen as a firm that delivers long-term results — I think that's accurate. I had the opportunity to be part of this in my projects. There was a very practical orientation to the particular jobs that I worked on. I was dealing with strategic issues, but my projects all had practical results.

Is there any favorite Booz Allen experience you'd like to share? Well, there are a lot of memorable things I can't repeat! I had the opportunity to work with brilliant financial folks helping them buy and restructure companies, as well as sell off pieces of some of their businesses. I had a great team and all the resources I wanted. It was a unique experience and the work turned out with great success.

Do you have any advice for new Booz Allen staff members? My advice would be to take advantage of the great learning experience that Booz Allen offers — you'll have the opportunity to work with really high-caliber people and learn a great deal from them.

profile posted February 21, 2005