Katrina L Helmkamp, president and CEO of Cartus Relocation, has announced she is retiring from the business at the end of the year.
In a letter to Cartus partners, she said that Eric Barnes, the company’s current chief financial officer and SVP of supply chain management, will become interim president and CEO from January 2023.
Barnes has been with the company for more than 20 years in financial and operational leadership roles and, according to Helmkamp, ‘has been central to our strategy that is succeeding in the marketplace’.
‘I have learned a great deal from Eric during my time with Cartus, and our entire senior team has tremendous confidence in his leadership,’ she said.
Helmkamp added that the Cartus team is ‘executing very well against our strategy and has gained market share over the past four years on the strength of our service excellence and agility, innovative technology for both clients and transferees, the highest levels of compliance, and thought leadership that helps our clients add value to their organisations.
‘The Cartus pipeline of additional growth opportunities from clients and prospects is incredibly strong, so we are well-positioned to further grow our Cartus community internally and externally, which will lead to increased value for all our stakeholders.’
She said the firm’s parent company, Anywhere, ‘has been, and continues to be, quite supportive of Cartus when it comes to investing in our technology and our people. It has been gratifying to see the client excellence scores for our technology increase by 25 points over the past four years, and it was particularly rewarding this past year to see over 200 internal promotions within Cartus as our volume grew.
‘I am very comfortable with the strategic vision and financial strength of Anywhere. Its purpose is to empower everyone’s next move, which both describes where Cartus fits into the Anywhere business and expresses support for everyone’s next career move – or, in my case, life transition.’
Helmkamp said she was planning to spend more time in ‘board service, volunteer work, and fun travel with my husband,’ and that, other than the handover to Barnes, there would be no changes in clients’ day-to-day accounts.
