“Our job is to handle the heavy lifting so that when someone arrives on site, they’re ready to add value from day one.”
Mike Barrett, Director of Sales and Delivery at Catalyx,
This is Part 2 of our three part Ask the Expert series with Mike, Director of Sales and Delivery at Catalyx, where we explore what makes their non conventional outsourcing models so effective in the pharmaceutical industry.
In this instalment, Mike explains how Catalyx helps clients scale operations up or down without disruption, overcome workforce and compliance challenges, and respond quickly to evolving industry demands. He also shares real world examples that highlight how Catalyx delivers scalability, flexibility, and long term impact.
How do you ensure clients can scale resources up or down without disruption?
Scaling resources always brings challenges, but we have built structures that make the process as seamless as possible for our clients.
When scaling up, we rely on our global Talent Acquisition team, based across Europe and the Americas. Their local knowledge and expertise enable us to identify and attract the right talent quickly. We do not simply fill roles. We ensure quality through psychometric testing, structured interviews, and by giving clients the opportunity to meet candidates before onboarding. This approach ensures every new team member is the right fit from day one.
When scaling down, transparency is essential. We work closely with our teams so they understand what is happening and what options are available to them. Wherever possible, we redeploy talent by moving people from organisations that are reducing their footprint to those that are growing. This allows employees to continue developing their careers while clients retain access to experienced and trained resources.
Our operations team plays a critical role throughout this process, working closely with Talent Acquisition, HR, and Finance to keep everything running smoothly. Ultimately, if we have invested in developing a resource, we want to retain that expertise within Catalyx so our clients always benefit from a supported and resilient workforce.
Can you give an example of how flexible project management or Functional Service Provision has solved a client challenge?
One client we worked with was struggling with a highly fragmented workforce spread across multiple vendors. This led to inconsistent service levels, high turnover, and ongoing disruption to production. The client was spending a significant amount of time managing vendors instead of focusing on their core mission.
Through our Functional Service Provision model, we consolidated these services into one fully managed program. Rather than filling individual roles, we delivered an integrated team with clear leadership, consistent processes, and a strong retention strategy. Over time, the program has grown to nearly 200 people on site, providing stability, scalability, and continuity.
For the client, this resulted in fewer disruptions, stronger compliance, and the freedom to focus on core activities while trusting us to manage the supporting functions. The outcome has been a more resilient workforce, reduced turnover, and a production environment that operates far more smoothly.
What makes the Catalyx outsourcing model more adaptable than conventional resourcing approaches?
What sets our model apart is that we are not simply placing someone on site and assigning them a task. We take responsibility for the full process, including sourcing, interviewing, vetting, and onboarding, so that when someone arrives at a client site, they are ready to add value immediately.
Our involvement does not stop there. We stay engaged throughout the entire lifecycle, from onboarding through to eventual transition. Our operations team is highly visible and present on client sites, checking in regularly with our people to ensure they are supported and with clients to ensure expectations are being met or exceeded.
In short, we are not just providing resources. We are delivering a fully managed, adaptable service with genuine on site support, something you simply do not get with conventional resourcing models.
Your engineers are described as platform agnostic. Why is that an advantage in regulated industries?
Our aim is always to be platform agnostic. While reaching one hundred percent is not realistic, it remains the goal. We do not want to place someone on site who can only support a single application. Instead, we develop engineers who can work across multiple systems.
This happens frequently in practice. An automation engineer might initially support a specific PLC, but before long they are also working with MES or SCADA systems connected to it. We ensure our engineers have the breadth of knowledge to operate across these platforms. They may not be experts in every system, but they have enough understanding to provide effective support.
That flexibility is the real advantage. Rather than limiting expertise to a single system, clients gain access to engineers who can adapt across platforms, which is exactly what regulated industries require.
As Mike explains, true scalability in pharma is not just about increasing or reducing headcount. It is about having the right structure, support, and expertise in place to adapt without disruption. Catalyx’s managed services model delivers a flexible, people first approach that keeps operations stable, compliant, and ready for change. By combining deep technical expertise with hands on partnership, Catalyx helps clients scale smarter and turn real world challenges into sustainable success.