His departure follows a profit warning two weeks ago which saw the consultant’s shares slump 40%.

WYG blamed economic uncertainty leading to delays and deferrals across the public and private sectors in the UK.

The hold-ups meant WYG would breach its banking covenants and prompted the firm to open discussions with its lending bank with a view to securing a deferral or waiver of the relevant covenant tests.

Clarkson joined WYG as chief financial officer in June 2016. Prior to that he was at AMEC Foster Wheeler for four years.

In a brief statement, this morning the firm said: “The board, acting through the nominations committee, will now take steps to identify a new CFO, pending which senior managers within the group finance team will report to the board through the CEO, Douglas McCormick.”