Actum LLC, a global consulting firm, will open its headquarters at The Row in downtown this year and expand its operations.

Founded in late 2021 by managing partners Kirill Goncharenko and Fabian Nuñez, the consulting firm is comprised of industry experts who offer professional advice, guidance and solutions to businesses or individuals.

After working together for more than a decade, the duo realized the value of a full-service firm with the capacity to help clients navigate different areas including communications, government relations, advocacy mobilization and political consulting. Actum’s advisors and partners, who have backgrounds in politics, media, business and technology, lead teams focused on different subjects in finding solutions for clients.

A little more than a year later, Actum is operating in Los Angeles, Sacramento, New York, Washington D.C. and London, with clients ranging from large Fortune 100 and British clients to companies both pre- and post-IPO. Nuñez and Goncharenko have brought over 100 clients to the firm including Bird, Charter Communications, and Lyft.

Actum has also expanded its ranks, hiring more than 90 partners including Barbara Boxer, a former senator, and former acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney.

Uniqueness in business

Kyle Murphy, a practitioner of strategy at Pepperdine Graziadio Business School, said Actum is a unique consulting firm because it brings “political heavyweights from both sides of the aisle.”

“It’s not the kind of traditional entrepreneur who is an expert in a space building a firm from the bottom up,” Murphy said. “This is bringing really good, noteworthy, well-known names to create a firm.”

Murphy explained that consulting firms usually face two types of challenges, one of them being procuring business. Because of the names involved with Actum, Murphy doesn’t believe the firm will have much of an issue with landing accounts.

“The other problem is you get the business and then you have to staff up and you have to find the talent,” Murphy explained. “Because people are hiring this company because of the names on the door, they’re kind of expecting they’re going to get them to do the work. And of course, that’s not true in a consulting firm. The partners oversee and manage, but ultimately, it’s analysts and researchers and also a whole team of others, and you have to recruit the quality of talent.”

Goncharenko said the company’s ability to grow so rapidly can be attributed to experience — both his and Nuñez’s — in the industry with clients and employees. Nuñez said as leaders of the company, the two are trying to create a welcoming workplace.

Vertical consultancy

He added that what sets Actum apart from other firms is that they are a “vertical consultancy,” meaning they not only advise on strategies, but also execute the work, and a lot of that is credited to the team they have built.

Before founding Actum, Nuñez and Goncharenko were partners at Mercury Public Affairs — Nuñez  for 13 years and Goncharenko for nearly 20. After successful stints at Mercury, the duo decided it was time to branch out and create something from scratch.

“To me, respect is really important. Both that I have it for people that I work with and the people that I work with have it for me,” Nuñez explained. “And the dignity that comes with that respect is more important than the other financial benefits of that relationship. I think what happened with us, (we) came to the same conclusion that it was time for us to move on. We’d outgrown the place that we were at, and we decided that it was time for us to … start our own thing.”

Goncharenko said a next step for them is to find more talent.

“We have an unlimited appetite for talent; great people who fit our culture are the primary challenge and the primary opportunity for our business,” Goncharenko continued. “When we get that right, the business flourishes, the clients, the outcomes, the economics and all these things come after the talent.”

The two are looking forward to making Los Angeles Actum’s headquarters.

“I’ve always had a special place in my heart for Los Angeles, but it isn’t just an emotional decision, it’s a business decision,” Nuñez added. “And the fact that a global consultancy decides to make Los Angeles its global headquarters, (that) says a lot about the city.”