Head of Sales Needed To Drive Value at Portco

PE firm urgently needs Head of Sales as portco grows

A private equity firm and portco CEO came to us with a critical need for a Head of Sales for their healthcare logistics company. Since the acquisition, the portfolio company had been growing rapidly and they needed to bring in a sales leader that could forge the way for the company to expand into new markets. With a lean sales team, they knew filling the vacant role was a top priority. They urgently needed a PE-grade sales leader who was a strategic thinker and strong seller while having a proven track record of building and leading sales organizations in high-growth, healthcare companies.

BluWave identifies top providers for firm’s needs

Leveraging our founder’s 20 years in private equity, we have extensive frameworks for assessing PE-grade sales executive needs. BluWave utilizes technology, data and human ingenuity to pre-map, assess, monitor, and maintain deep pools of the select executive sales recruitment firms that uniquely meet the private equity standard. We interviewed the PE firm to understand their specific key criteria, and then connected the client with the select pre-vetted groups from our invitation-only Intelligent Network that fit their exact needs.

Firm selects ideal recruiting firm to find candidates

Within 24 hours of the initial scoping call, the PE firm and portfolio company were introduced to two PE-grade executive recruiting firms that specialized in senior sales roles in the healthcare space. The client selected their ideal choice. The PE firm was able to confidently engage the recruiting firm who quickly provided them with the exact-fit sales leader they needed, allowing the fund and portco to drive an excellent outcome without wasting time or cost.

The 5 Key Ingredients To Building A Thriving Business

During my 20 years in private equity in New York, I learned quite a few lessons about what makes a thriving business and its people tick — for better or for worse. Some are driven by dollars and cents; some are motivated by a people-first philosophy that puts human beings at the center of decision-making. Many fall somewhere in between.

When I decided to spin out of the private equity world and start a company, I quickly realized how important it was to articulate my own philosophy. Otherwise, how could I lead others in any direction with a clear purpose?

Fortunately, my entrepreneurial craze turned out to be the right move, and four years later — with patience, grit, and an amazing team — we’ve exponentially grown and now serve more than 500 of the world’s top private equity firms. I believe this is in part due to a handful of “ingredients” — all of which reinforce one another and somehow ensure that we are getting back what we put in. Follow this recipe and your business will likely be the better for it:

Ingredient No. 1: Do good with good.

This is probably about as simple as it gets. I call it the “Karma School of Business”: Do good things with and for good people, and the world tends to take care of itself. It’s not necessarily the fastest path to Rome, but in my experience, this approach yields the highest percentage chance of long-term success.

The Karma School of Business principle is at the center of my company’s work, where we connect business leaders with service providers to help create a successful environment for both parties. We actively test the service providers we invite into our network for this mindset, and I consider it one of the key reasons why we have grown so quickly.

Ingredient No. 2: Work and learn hard.

Secretary Colin Powell said it well: “There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.” I built my career in an industry filled with many of the smartest people in the world. I most definitely was not the smartest person in most of the rooms I shared with peers. The thing that differentiated me was that I worked exceptionally hard, asked lots of questions, and sought answers from those who had already figured out the thing I needed to know.

The lesson here: Don’t recreate the wheel. Instead, ask a lot of questions, take time to learn how things operate, and then work tenaciously to make it happen.

Ingredient No. 3: Use the word ‘no.’

In our business, it’s our job to connect private equity firms with specialized third parties (e.g., boutique advisors, independent consultants, interim executives, etc.). If a resource isn’t the perfect fit, we tell them. “No” is always the best answer.

This is often hard to do, particularly if you think someone is otherwise smart, effective, and likable. But this doesn’t always mean they are the right person for the job. The trick is learning to say “No” in a self-aware and gracious way. I take a lot of time to explain how life is too short to put yourself in a bad position. To throw another quote in the mix, according to Warren Buffet, “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it.” Your customers will thank you for saying “No” when it’s not the right situation and will remember you when it is.

The caveat to this ingredient: Do not be anti-everything. “No” can be the easiest thing in the world to say. But if you’re not being thoughtful, you can become paralyzed in the face of otherwise confidently manageable risk. Good people know the difference between an errant “no” and one that is applied with introspection and purpose.

Ingredient No. 4: Prioritize growth.

Whether you’re committed to personal growth or the growth of the business, this ingredient is vital to the health and longevity of any thriving business. The ability to learn, be agile, and always on your toes is often the difference between success and failure.

My dad had many wise sayings when I was a kid. One relevant one that comes to mind is, “The second you start to feel like you’ve figured the world out, you’re already falling behind.” Investing time and energy into constantly advancing knowledge and skills (for yourself, your employees, and your customers) will benefit you and your business in spades.

Word to the wise: Growth-oriented organizations are far more likely to retain their best employees. Your best people will eventually leave if they feel bored or stagnant.

Ingredient No. 5: Adopt a winning mindset.

When push comes to shove, at the end of the day, ingredients one through four are foundational for success. However, you still need to have a winning mindset to create a thriving business that matters. It’s imperative that you work to win for your customers, win for your stakeholders and win for your company and yourself.

To be clear, I’m not talking about a “winner takes all” mentality, where someone else is always losing. Healthy relationships are not transactional. They should be built around core commitments that are important and lead to the success of both parties.

A winning mindset means that you’re always looking for ways to ensure that both you and your peers end up ahead.

 

The 5 Key Ingredients To Building A Thriving Business originally appeared on Forbes.com.

How We Did It: Healthcare Turnaround and Performance Improvement Case Study

A multi-site healthcare provider portco was in need of turnaround expertise to help improve their growth-stalled performance. Moving quickly, we worked to thoroughly understand the client’s specific turnaround needs. Tapping into our Intelligent Network, we were able to match the client with a resource who fit their exact requirements (including geographic location) and was able to efficiently start moving on the strategy. In the short-term, the PE fund was able to quickly gain confidence in the interim executive. In the long-term, the PE fund hired the candidate full-time to lead and execute the turnaround plan. 

 

For the full story, read the case study here.

How We Did It: Targeted Survey Case Study

With COVID-19 drastically altering the healthcare landscape, our PE fund client needed to quickly understand the effects these changes were having on a healthcare provider of interest — and they needed to know across geographic areas spanning six states in two weeks. Based on our proprietary approach, from our selection of vetted candidates the PE fund hired a group of resources with the exact market experience they needed, as well as key relationships with manufacturers. The information gleaned armed the PE fund with the insights they needed to make an informed decision.

For the full story, read the case study here.

Interim CFO Needed to Quickly Integrate New PE Platform Portco

An interim chief financial officer with relevant niche experience was needed

A private equity firm purchased multiple IT managed services companies with the intention of integrating them into one streamlined platform. The firm needed an interim chief financial officer immediately, but they did not have time or patience to sift through scores of unvetted, mixed-quality candidates. Rather, they wanted a candidate from a targeted subset of pre-vetted, PE-grade interim CFOs that fit their specific needs by company size, budget, industry, culture and geography. Crucially, the firm also needed an interim CFO who both understood the IT MSP environment and had a proven track record of successful financial integrations.

BluWave learned the need and matched the requirements to our pre-vetted resources

Leveraging our founder’s 20 years in private equity, we have extensive frameworks for assessing PE-grade interim CFOs. We utilize these frameworks to map, assess, monitor, and maintain deep pools of the select interim professionals that meet the private equity standard. In this instance, we interviewed the PE firm to understand their specific key criteria, and then matched these criteria to the right pre-vetted candidates from our invitation-only network.

The PE firm was quickly introduced to a targeted selection of interim CFOs that fit their exact needs

After interviewing a discrete number of custom-fit candidates, the PE firm chose their preferred candidate. This person started working within two weeks of the firm’s initial outreach to us. This interim chief financial officer quickly gained the trust of the portfolio companies’ leadership, successfully consolidated financial reporting across the two separate companies, and ultimately paved the way for the new permanent CFO. The PE firm was able to drive an excellent outcome without wasting time and opportunity costs.

We pride ourselves on our ability to know the market of the niche expert resources our clients need before they need them.

Executive Recruiter Critically Needed for New Portco

Firm needed executive recruiter to place CEO with industry expertise

Having recently invested in a sector for the first time, a PE firm came to us with an urgent need for an executive recruiter. Knowing that they needed to place an industry expert as CEO in their new power solutions portfolio company, the firm was in need of a specialized executive recruiter that had experience and deep network connections in the nuanced sector. Ultimately, the PE firm was seeking an executive recruiter that could quickly place an experienced CEO with a background in the power solutions market in their new portfolio company.

BluWave identified PE-grade executive recruiter from pre-vetted network

Leveraging our founder’s 20 years in private equity, we have extensive frameworks for assessing PE-grade executive recruiter needs. BluWave utilizes technology, data, and human ingenuity to pre-map, assess, monitor, and maintain deep pools of specialized executive recruiters across various industries that uniquely meet the private equity standard. We interviewed the PE firm to understand their specific key criteria, and then quickly connected the client with two select pre-vetted executive recruiters from our invitation-only Intelligent Network that fit their exacting needs.

Firm engaged provider and successfully recruited CEO

The PE firm selected their ideal recruiter who started sourcing candidates immediately. With their deep network connections and intimate understanding of the industry, the recruiter was able to identify exact-fit candidates faster than generalist recruiters the PE firm had previously used. The executive search firm successfully recruited a CEO for the portfolio company who had decades of experience in the power solutions industry, prior business experience as an executive within a PE-backed company, and demonstrated financial acumen in similarly-sized companies.

PE Firm in Need of Short-Term Resource

PE firm needed short-term resources after unexpected loss

A private equity firm in our network unexpectedly lost two mid-level investment team members within a few weeks of each other. In order to avoid missing out on active deal opportunities, the PE firm needed to quickly find a short-term resource who could meet its team standards and bridge the gap while it searched for a full-time hire.

Bluwave connected firm with top-tier candidates

With our extensive private equity knowledge, rooted in our founder’s 20 years of PE industry experience, we use time-tested frameworks to assess PE-grade investment professionals for interim work opportunities with our clients. We quickly identified several candidates whose experience matched the exacting needs of the PE firm based on specific criteria outlined during the initial assessment.

Client engaged candidates and found stability during the transition

Within two weeks, a top-tier MBA with four years of relevant PE experience joined the team. The independent consultant was integrated into the core team quickly to ensure that projects stayed on course. He stayed for three months, giving the PE firm client stability and a much-needed resource while it searched for a full-time candidate.

How We Did it: Private Equity Associate Case Study

With our extensive private equity knowledge, we use time-tested frameworks to assess PE-grade investment professionals for interim work opportunities with our clients. This means when clients have a need, we can move swiftly to connect them with viable, third-party resources. When a private equity fund in our network unexpectedly lost two mid-level investment team members within a few weeks of each other, they needed to quickly find a short-term resource who could meet its team standards and bridge the gap while it searched for a full-time hire. 

For the full story, read the case study here. 

How We Did It: Cost Reduction Case Study 

PE funds across a broad spectrum of industries often approach us with specific, episodic needs. Our first step for matching them with best-in-class, third party resources is to understand the nuances and unique challenges they face. When a private equity firm acquired a leading plastics company that designed and manufactured innovative plastic-injection-molded products, the firm believed there was room for improvement and cost reductions in the company’s supply contracts. We quickly matched these criteria to the pre-vetted candidates from our invitation-only network, rooted in our founder’s 20 years of PE industry experience.

For the full story, read the case study here.

How We Did It: Executive Search Case Study

Finding specialized executive search firms is an area PE funds often seek our assistance, because instead of spending countless hours trying to find the right fit we can quickly match the funds with a series of vetted candidates. So, when our PE fund client acquired a founder-owned business that provides services to the niche power solutions market, they needed deep network connections beyond its immediate purview to source a highly capable CEO with industry experience. 

For the full story, read the case study here.

How Companies Can Leverage Interim Leadership for a World in Flux

A rapid transformation of the global workforce has been taking place, fueled by digital transformation, specialization, and an increasingly on-demand labor pool. This transformation will only accelerate in light of the Coronavirus pandemic. Your company can’t afford to be paralyzed. In fact, when the world starts rotating again, now more than ever you and global workers need to proactively embrace these changes and be ready to act.

Just look at what’s happening at the government level: a task force appointed by the President in order to tackle COVID-19. These experts have backgrounds in healthcare, infectious disease, economics, and infrastructure. Within a few months, they will have done their duties and will likely be off to fight the next battle. Perhaps a few will stay on longer-term to help rebuild critical healthcare infrastructure that was so clearly lacking.

In other words, having a leadership team that’s dynamic and flexible—given the rapidly changing needs of businesses—is going to be more important than ever within the next three to six months and beyond. The emerging alternative work arrangements are a win-win for both businesses in need and interim leaders with specialized skills. Highly trained professionals will embrace the opportunity to stay relevant, add value, and keep their options open while the economy comes back to life, and companies will be able to stay agile and bring in exacting expertise. Both will be able to see if a longer-term, full-time role is mutually attractive without the expectation and challenge of making a commitment in a highly fluid environment.

These interim leaders can focus on having the maximum positive impact on the company for however long they’re in their role. And the good news for organizations: as everyone is becoming more equipped to work virtually, you don’t have to wait for these people in person. Here are a few things to keep in mind as you leverage interim leaders in the coming months.

Have a specific idea of what you want interim leaders to accomplish
Companies shouldn’t measure the performance of interim leaders in the same way as full-time employees. This isn’t to say you shouldn’t have high expectations (you absolutely should), but it’s essential to recognize how their roles are unique. The first principle with interim leaders should be: do no harm. No matter what, you want the ship to keep moving forward and not disrupt momentum, which means having a tight focus on what you want done within a specific timeframe. For example, what are your top three goals within the first three to six months? By emphasizing well-defined tactical targets instead of overarching strategic goals, you’ll be deploying interim leaders as efficiently as possible.

Transparency and accountability are two of the most important traits for interim leaders, which is why interim leaders and their managers should have an open discussion about what goals they’re trying to accomplish right at the outset. When interim leaders help their colleagues develop a set of concrete outcomes to pursue and metrics for measuring success, this won’t just increase performance – it will also improve morale by giving team members a clear idea of what they’re working toward.

According to Gallup, “mission-driven workgroups suffer 30 percent to 50 percent fewer accidents and have 15 percent to 30 percent less turnover.” However, only 40 percent of employees “strongly agree that the mission or purpose of their company makes them feel their job is important.” This is why it’s vital to outline what the mission is and what steps the company is taking to accomplish it. If anything, interim leaders are under even more pressure to outline exactly what outcomes their teams are trying to achieve – they’re hired with specific targets in mind and they typically have to rigorously adhere to set timeframes.

Without establishing well-defined goals, it’s impossible to hold interim leaders accountable. The alternative workforce is built around accountability, for both independent workers and the companies that hire them. Just as companies want to know if potential leaders have a proven record of finishing projects on time and under budget, good leaders want the ability to prove what they’re capable of by pointing to what they’ve accomplished.

Treat interim leaders like full-time teammates
Interim leaders are recruited because they offer a specialized set of skills that a company’s current workforce can’t provide. To be as effective as possible, however, these leaders should work within the existing protocols and expectations – as well as the current structure and culture of the company – to be as productive as possible without becoming disruptive. They should be treated like full-time resources.

Many organizations hire interim leaders with the expectation that these professionals have specialized expertise and thus should know what to do or will require little management. This approach doesn’t work with full-time executives and will also not work with interim leaders. You still need to manage them with care to enable them to support your organization’s success and achieve desired objectives.

According to Deloitte, despite the fact that American employers are increasingly reliant upon alternative workers, only 28 percent say they’re “ready or very ready” to manage these types of workforces. While just 8 percent of companies report that they have “established processes to manage and develop alternative workforce sources,” almost a quarter have “little to no processes.” The rest are somewhere in between.

This means interim leaders will also have to step up to address this lack of capabilities and processes by proactively engaging with permanent team members right away (asking what they need and what major obstacles they face, for example), starting conversations about reasonable goals and how to achieve them, and familiarizing themselves with the company’s culture and operations as quickly as possible. Companies will be on a steep learning curve with the alternative workforce for years to come, so alternative workers themselves need to equally take responsibility in the meantime.

Why flexibility should be a top priority across the company
The most common mistake people make when they think about the alternative workforce is to reduce it to the gig economy. A surging number of highly trained specialists like the flexibility that alternative work arrangements provide. CFOs, CTOs, and other members of the C-suite want to be more selective with the types of work they do and are open to moving from project to project while waiting to find the right long-term opportunity. This allows them to expand their skill sets, network, and secure long-term positions that will ultimately be better for them and the companies they work for.

And this demand for flexibility extends to other workers as well. According to a 2019 survey conducted by FlexJobs, 80 percent of employees said they would be more loyal to their companies if they had flexible work options, 65 percent said they would be more productive if they could work from home, and almost one-third reported that they had actually left a job due to a lack of flexibility.

None of this will come as a surprise to interim leaders – after all, they likely decided to join the alternative workforce for similar reasons. This is why they should be especially sensitive to the changing demands of American workers and do their best to provide flexibility wherever possible. This could mean any number of things – from providing remote work opportunities to instituting intelligent flexibility that allows for less rigid scheduling while not sacrificing productivity.

Specialized leaders from the alternative workforce are uniquely positioned to address the new normal that will require on-demand expertise in rapidly changing environments. If they combine their needed capabilities with an outcome-oriented mindset and the ability to merge their talents with a company’s existing culture and operations, they’ll be a powerful productive force for the future of work while simultaneously helping to rebuild the global economy.

Bain’s Global PE Report 2020: High Prices and Higher Stakes

Oh, what a difference a month makes.

Prior to the coronavirus sending the world into a health pandemic and a global economic downturn, Bain & Company released its annual “Global Private Equity Report” to provide context and insights for the current year. While these reports often top 100 pages (which makes them somewhat cumbersome to digest), they are filled to the brim with useful information.

I took a dive into this year’s report and pulled out some highlights. While it’s interesting to look at these insights now through the COVID-19 lens, the key takeaway is the same: higher stakes for value creation.

In a time like no other in modern history, companies will need to create value quickly, efficiently, and with little margin for error. In our experience, this is where expertise comes in. This isn’t the time to be “learning on the job.” Rather, it’s the right time to create your own “value creation task force” powered by individuals or groups who know exactly what to do.

Here are the top 10 things to know, along with page references:

  1. PE buyout deal value remains robust at $551B in 2020 (page 5).
  2. Deal multiples reached an all-time high (average of 11.5x EBITDA) fueled by robust debt markets (pages 6, 7).
  3. Uncalled capital (aka “dry powder”) has been rising since 2012, hitting $2.5 trillion in December 2019 (page 11).
  4. The largest exit channel for PE is strategic buyers (pages 14,15). Judging by our experience at BluWave, strategics typically get aggressive for cleaned-up companies and they’re much less willing to buy fixers.
  5. Private equity is still outperforming public equity over the long term, but the spread is decreasing as absolute returns in PE decline due to industry maturation and related supply/demand dynamics (pages 24, 25).
  6. Fundraising had been robust, but we’re moving toward a world of haves and have nots with fewer funds raising larger sums. Meanwhile, fundraising is taking longer (page 20).
  7. Winning firms tended to be buyout firms with strong track records (top 1 or 2 quartiles), a clear strategy, a high degree of specialization, and strong value creation capabilities (page 22).
  8. Funds are distinguishing themselves by focusing and recognizing patterns for value creation (page 89).
  9. PE funds must aggressively deploy new levers for value creation to continue making things economically interesting and attracting investment as the LP world bifurcates.
  10. Bain believes PE is still best positioned for long-term success, but like always, business gets harder, participants must evolve, and the proactive players will continue to thrive while others will increasingly struggle.

Here’s how the developments we’re seeing at BluWave align with this report: We are seeing a massive shift towards value creation in private equity.  As noted in our BluWave Index, PE Fund clients are using us to support value creation more than 60% of the time (ask us for a copy).  Value creation is also increasingly being pulled into due diligence streams.  PE funds are using BluWave to drive value creation insights during due diligence so they can acquire the company based upon what it could or should be versus what it is or is portrayed to be in the offering memorandum.

Click here to reference Bain’s 2020 report.