Korn Ferry (NYSE:KFY) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Gary Burnison: Well, the genie’s out of the bottle. And so I think that all of us enjoy the flexibility that, unfortunately, the pandemic brought about. And so when this whole thing started, I said — 3 years ago, I said this thing, travel, all this stuff, it’s going to be — how you’re entertained, how you consume, how you produce, it’s going to be about 50% of what it was. Now it’s not 50% of what it was. And so clearly, yes, we are seeing a desire for sure. There’s no substitute for being in-person with another human being — but it’s not even at the 50% level of what it was. And I think that’s a generational change. I mean, that could take 5 to 10 years to truly play out. So it’s clearly increased over the last several months but nothing at all like it was.

And then we’ll see with “China” setting aside the geopolitical aspect, we’ll see what happens with China. It’s only been 2, 3, 4 weeks since “it’s opened up.” China has had an enormous drag on not only multinational companies and in the Asia Pacific region but also in our business. It’s been, as you would expect, it’s been drag on the top line. It could be as much as $40 million to $50 million a year for us.

Operator: And Mr. Burnison, it appears there are no further questions.

Gary Burnison: Okay. Well, we appreciate everybody taking the time to listen. And first and foremost, I want to thank our colleagues all around the world for just an incredible performance. And thanks to Bob and Gregg and Tiffany and we’ll talk to you next time. See you. Bye-bye.

Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, this conference will be available for replay for 1 week starting today at 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time running through the day March 15, 2023, ending at midnight. You may access the AT&T executive playback service by dialing 866-207-1041 and entering the access code 703-7839. International participants may dial 402-970-0847. Additionally, the replay will be available for playback at the company’s website. That does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation and for using AT&T teleconference. You may now disconnect.