Robert Atkinson is National Leader, Professional Services at Watermark and a Client Services Partner within the firm's Financial Services & Industry Practice.
With more than 30 years' experience in executive search and leadership advisory across Australia and the United Kingdom, Robert specialises in advising professional services firms on the appointment of C-suite executives, equity partners, and high-performing teams.
Robert is a trusted adviser to Boards, Managing Partners, and executive leadership teams across the professional services sector, helping organisations navigate growth, succession, and transformation through leadership.
He works with law firms, accounting firms, consultancies, and other knowledge-based businesses on some of their most important talent decisions, ranging from C-suite appointments including CEOs, COOs, CFOs and Chief People Officers, through to partner succession, strategic lateral hiring, practice acquisitions, and team lifts.
Robert is particularly experienced in advising firms seeking to build or reshape capability, whether through the appointment of individual leaders, the recruitment of high-performing equity partners or the acquisition of specialist teams. His work is typically undertaken where talent is intrinsically linked to growth strategy, market positioning, client expansion, and long-term value creation.
Through a career spanning three decades, Robert has built an extensive network of C-suite executives, board directors, managing partners and senior industry leaders across Professional Services, Financial Services, and Industry. He is valued for his ability to navigate sensitive, high-stakes appointments and for bringing deep market insight to workforce and talent strategy discussions.
Outside work, Robert is a passionate Manly Sea Eagles supporter, water sports enthusiast (surfing, windsurfing, swimming), and he enjoys spending family time with his wife and two teenage children.
