Case Studies

First Time General Manager Accelerates Results Through Integration

CHALLENGE

A multi-national consumer products organization owned two businesses providing similar lines of products. Both businesses were underperforming … market share was declining, innovation had stalled, costs were high, and neither company was effectively leveraging the shared resources of the parent corporation.

To salvage the businesses, the two underperforming units were merged into a single, unified division. A new GM was promoted from within and ineffectual leaders let go. The new leader was tasked with creating and rejuvenating a new leadership team, defining a growth plan, reducing costs, optimizing all available resources, and returning the organization to its previous growth pattern.

Despite significant talent and business acumen, the new leader had never held a full-fledged General Manager role. PrimeGenesis was poised to help this GM quickly tap his talent, establish his leadership and set a new direction and momentum for the team.

ACTIONS

  • Helped the new leader get on his front foot by preparing a well-rounded 100-Day Action Plan outlining goals, priorities, stakeholder planning, leadership messaging and key milestones
  • Accelerated team alignment behind the leader by facilitating an assimilation session that level-set expectations, removed the mystery behind the changes, engaged the team in a conversation about the future and addressed the team members’ key concern, “What does this change mean for me?”
  • Engaged broader organization behind a well-crafted “growth through integration” message
  • Kick started the integration process with a framework including criteria and checkpoints for decision-making, communication and execution
  • Enabled early “people” decisions to provide immediate clarity for the new leadership team
  • Regular behind-the-scenes coaching to help GM focus on priorities and where he could drive results
  • Facilitated two-day Team Imperative Workshop, a galvanizing event to unify the two teams around common mission, vision, values, goals, actions plans, operating cadence and communications.

RESULTS

  • Unified, integrated, efficient team operating effectively against a co-created plan
  • Exceeded financial goals in first 2 quarters in the role, first time the unit(s) had achieved plan in 3 years
  • Focused negotiation resulted in new $20 million commitment from previously under-performing customer
  • Exceeded aggressive cost-saving/integration goals by 2%
  • Retained key employees during integration exercise
  • Redefined sales organization utilizing best practices of both companies and corporate resources
  • Optimized corporate resources to accelerate plan, progress and results
  • New leader has full confidence of self, team, boss and board

Private Equity CEO Accelerates Exit

CHALLENGE

While gearing up for exit, a private equity-owned manufacturer faced a leadership challenge … the long-time CEO’s announcement of his retirement. Keenly aware that the announcement could possibly derail the exit, the PE owners needed to demonstrate strong, stable leadership to attract a viable buyer.

Their decision? Promote the CFO to president. Entirely competent and capable, the former CFO still faced transition challenges … both personally and professionally.

Personally, as the self-proclaimed “numbers guy,” the new president needed to change his mindset from “profitability” to “growth” while sharpening his communication skills to engage the team. In addition, he was now tasked with being the “face” of the company throughout the sales process – an entirely new role for him.

Professionally, a new hierarchy had to be established between the new president, his former peers and a newly transitioned CFO. The leadership team also needed to change its long-standing focus on profit, to a focus on growth opportunities leveraging new technologies, new channels and new markets. This was a complex, high-stakes transition. Timelines were tight and failure was not an option.

ACTIONS

  • Established leader confidence and credibility by developing and implementing an internal and external communications plan with one-on-one coaching checkpoints
  • Secured the president in his new role by facilitating a “new leader assimilation” workshop that seeded messaging and clarified roles and expectations – leaving no questions unanswered
  • Aligned team around critical growth initiatives and empowered them to make trade-offs to rank priorities
  • Accelerated team confidence and momentum by introducing an “early wins” process, driving tangible results on internal issues that had languished in the past, such as new product development strategy, service improvements and key customer plans
  • Re-energized the leadership team by facilitating a role sort process to redefine, develop and assign roles

RESULTS

The new president’s transition was highly successful… gaining acceptance by the executive leadership team, board members and, ultimately, the prospective buyer. A cohesive leadership team was re-energized and effectively produced the following results:

  • Business sold within six months of the new president’s appointment
  • Sale transpired one year sooner than expected
  • Valuation $700 million greater than original investment – equaling a 4x ROI for the investors
  • President promoted to CEO (upon previous CEO’s retirement) nine months into new ownership
  • Business results remain strong with new product innovation driving growth

 

New CEO Leads Successful Private Equity Exit

CHALLENGE

A privately owned personal care company brought in a new CEO to prepare the business for its Initial Public Offering. Meanwhile, the company was losing market share, had no coherent strategy for growth and had broken operating processes.

In addition, we needed to support the CEO to be prepared to run a public company within 100-days.

ACTIONS

After evaluating the business and organizational context, we convinced the CEO and the board to delay the IPO. Next, we leveraged our core processes and worked with the leadership team to put in place a new strategic plan and strengthen their operational and organizational processes.

RESULTS

The team aligned around a new strategic imperative that enhanced its competitive positioning and was well-communicated internally and externally. Operational performance improved, increasing confidence in the ability to execute. Market share trends were turned around, creating positive momentum. Then, “a funny thing happened on the way to the IPO”. The company was bought out by another private equity firm for $2.3B, $700MM more than the original IPO target valuation, three months later than planned.

The CEO told us “I could have put the strategy and operational improvements in place myself. But I never could have done it as fast as you helped us do it.”

New CEO Accelerates Team and Share Performance

CHALLENGE

A large diversified manufacturer spun off one of its divisions as a separate, stand-alone public company with the previous division president promoted to the role of CEO. The division’s recent past performance had suffered due to competitive and market issues, impacting the legacy company’s financial and share price performance. The new company needed a completely new leadership team, external positioning, and its own set of strategic, operating and organizational processes, to build momentum.

ACTIONS

We helped the CEO create his own action plan and then worked with his direct reports, their direct reports and the entire organization in a series of workshops with ever-expanding reach to launch the new company and its core processes.

 - sharpened priorities and execution plans
 - developed messaging for internal and external initiatives
 - readied leadership team to cascade core processes throughout the business

RESULTS

Got leadership team and then entire organization aligned around a new strategic imperative and new messaging. The new company got off to a strong start and increased its stock price more than 66% over its first five months after several years of “at market” share performance.

The CEO told us we were “orders of magnitude more valuable than we ever expected. Way above and beyond the call of duty and greatly appreciated by all…Your process and you personally have made a huge difference for me and the entire team.  All of that is nice but the shareholder value that has been created says it all.  Thank you so much! ”

Private Equity CEO Accelerates Merger of Five Businesses

CHALLENGE

A middle market private equity firm owned five separate operating companies in the medical technology industry. The vision was to combine the businesses to expand revenue by matching up to 100% of the industry’s key procurement targets and reduce costs through operating synergies in Product Development, Operations and Sales. Market trends were driving demand for integrated solutions, providing an outstanding opportunity for any business able to deliver a wide range of solutions at scale.

However, each of the individual portfolio companies operated within its own niche, with its unique strengths, weaknesses and cultures.

The new CEO was tasked with the challenge of creating a unified strategy, leadership team and set of operational processes to capture the market opportunity.

ACTIONS

  • Conducted assimilation workshops for new CEO in multiple locations to kick start relationships,  align messaging, and answer the question – “what does this change mean for me”
  • Performed preliminary role sort to provide immediate clarity to the organization
  • Facilitated workshops to align the team around goals, strategies, and action plans
  • Regular behind-the-scenes coaching to help accelerate decisions and enhance communication

RESULTS

  • Increased sense of ownership by connecting the team’s co-created “bottoms up” plan to the PE firm’s “top down” vision
  • Quickly re-formed the leadership team, adding new and re-sorting existing members
  • Designed assignment for exiting leader to ensure smooth and positive transition
  • Attracted industry Sales leader to join and drive agreed cross-selling program
  • Executed early wins to accelerate unity, shared accountability and results
  • Delivered operational costs savings in staffing, location and procurement

Combined business grew at a rate above market averages and delivered a successful exit in the planned time frame.

New Medical Center CEO Drives Culture Change and Results Through Effective Team Integration and Total Onboarding

CHALLENGE

A regional medical facility was in transition, from a standalone medical center to one partnering with other centers to deliver improved and expanded care, as a means to thrive in a more profitable manner. A new CEO was coming on board to drive the change which would require evolutions in strategy, team, operations and culture.

The new CEO faced the dual challenges of quickly strengthening the internal capability and culture of the institution while leading the decisions of whether and how to merge or partner with other institutions. In order to get the job done, it was clear that the CEO needed to invest in building a cohesive, high performing leadership team.

A second focus area to drive success was a robust leadership onboarding program. This included how the medical center hired, oriented, developed and prepared potential new executives … how to get leaders integrated, up-to-speed and delivering … quickly. Historically, while some common processes were in place, there was too much dependence on individual executives’ willingness to commit time and energy to supporting their new leaders.

ACTIONS

To help the medical center achieve its business and organizational goals, PrimeGenesis undertook 2 projects:

  • We engaged with the institution to onboard the new CEO, working closely with him and his leadership team during his first 100 days, to help him quickly assess the situation, co-create a shared imperative with his team, and embed operational and organizational processes that drove action and results. 
  • At the same time, we partnered with the organization to build a Total Onboarding Program, a new and more effective way to bring new leaders of all levels into the organization quickly and effectively, so that they could assimilate into the culture, align their teams, and deliver better results faster.  

 

RESULTS

Executive Onboarding of the CEO

  • Built a cohesive leadership team through a process of co-creating the mission, vision, values, goals, strategies and action plans – led to faster decisions and results
  • Established partnerships with other medical centers to improve growth and profits
  • Reversed financial performance – moved from unprofitable to profitable
  • Achieved record donations in the CEO’s first 2 years, reflecting new, focused plan led by new Chief Development Officer (whose onboarding was also supported by PrimeGenesis)
  • Assessed leadership team and effected upgrades where needed
  • Aligned with the board on roles, priorities, actions, timelines and expected results
  • Infused a culture of urgency regarding the market changes throughout the leadership team, causing the team to lean in and solve the challenges they faced

Total Onboarding

  • In the first two years, 44 leaders participated in this program, with 41 successfully delivering at or above expectations in the organization, consistent with the PrimeGenesis 95% success rate
  • Change mandates for new leaders are more forcefully communicated and results have improved
  • The process especially helps new medical leaders get the support they need to integrate into a sophisticated, complex, high performing clinical organization. This is done through an embedded physician specializing in driving the onboarding process
  • Consistent, skillfully managed, well-understood and integrated Total Onboarding Program is in place. “This is how we do it”
  • Onboarding is a recruiting competitive advantage. Organization Development specialists work closely with hiring leaders and recruiters to build an onboarding plan for each new leader before they start.  “You will be supported as soon as you accept your position”
  • Hiring leaders have the commitment, skills and tools to support their new leaders’ success
  • New leaders have described the process as a key to successful starts and integration into the culture at the institution 

SVP-Global Operations Drives Change and Results, Gets Promoted

 
 

CHALLENGE

A high-potential site General Manager was promoted to run Global Operations for an aggressive, fast-growing, complex, 30-site manufacturing organization.  Cross-functional relationships and effectiveness had deteriorated due to silo mentality, quality concerns were mounting, productivity had flatlined, and the team lacked the depth and sophistication to drive needed changes. Meanwhile, there were questions about the new leader’s ability to build relationships and upgrade the team.

ACTIONS

In-person prep session far in advance of Day One clarified priorities, tightened message, and laid out specific plans for building and re-building relationships.  Behind-the-scenes coaching provided the needed tough love to accept personal leadership changes required by the leader to become more collaborative, confident, and flexible in thinking around people and process. Imperative workshop narrowed the team’s focus and solidified leadership norms. Intentional role sort raised awareness and turned up the heat on team upgrades. A cross-functional workshop drew out concerns and opportunities, clarified shared objectives, and established the client as a leader amongst equals.

RESULTS

Function’s productivity and quality improved dramatically. Processes established and significant team upgrades implemented in fast yet thoughtful manner with close attention paid to success of new leaders. Overall operation scaled effectively in line with the organization’s organic and inorganic growth. Client led cross-functional teams and picked up additional responsibility every year until being promoted to Chief Operating Officer three years into the role. Functions being led by strong players and overall organization continues to scale organically and via M&A.

Case Studies

First Time General Manager Accelerates Results Through Integration

First Time General Manager Accelerates Results Through Integration

CHALLENGE

A multi-national consumer products organization owned two businesses providing similar lines of products. Both businesses were underperforming … market share was declining, innovation had stalled, costs were high, and neither company was effectively leveraging the shared resources of the parent corporation.

To salvage the businesses, the two underperforming units were merged into a single, unified division. A new GM was promoted from within and ineffectual leaders let go. The new leader was tasked with creating and rejuvenating a new leadership team, defining a growth plan, reducing costs, optimizing all available resources, and returning the organization to its previous growth pattern.

Despite significant talent and business acumen, the new leader had never held a full-fledged General Manager role. PrimeGenesis was poised to help this GM quickly tap his talent, establish his leadership and set a new direction and momentum for the team.

ACTIONS

  • Helped the new leader get on his front foot by preparing a well-rounded 100-Day Action Plan outlining goals, priorities, stakeholder planning, leadership messaging and key milestones
  • Accelerated team alignment behind the leader by facilitating an assimilation session that level-set expectations, removed the mystery behind the changes, engaged the team in a conversation about the future and addressed the team members’ key concern, “What does this change mean for me?”
  • Engaged broader organization behind a well-crafted “growth through integration” message
  • Kick started the integration process with a framework including criteria and checkpoints for decision-making, communication and execution
  • Enabled early “people” decisions to provide immediate clarity for the new leadership team
  • Regular behind-the-scenes coaching to help GM focus on priorities and where he could drive results
  • Facilitated two-day Team Imperative Workshop, a galvanizing event to unify the two teams around common mission, vision, values, goals, actions plans, operating cadence and communications.

RESULTS

  • Unified, integrated, efficient team operating effectively against a co-created plan
  • Exceeded financial goals in first 2 quarters in the role, first time the unit(s) had achieved plan in 3 years
  • Focused negotiation resulted in new $20 million commitment from previously under-performing customer
  • Exceeded aggressive cost-saving/integration goals by 2%
  • Retained key employees during integration exercise
  • Redefined sales organization utilizing best practices of both companies and corporate resources
  • Optimized corporate resources to accelerate plan, progress and results
  • New leader has full confidence of self, team, boss and board

Private Equity CEO Accelerates Exit

Private Equity CEO Accelerates Exit

CHALLENGE

While gearing up for exit, a private equity-owned manufacturer faced a leadership challenge … the long-time CEO’s announcement of his retirement. Keenly aware that the announcement could possibly derail the exit, the PE owners needed to demonstrate strong, stable leadership to attract a viable buyer.

Their decision? Promote the CFO to president. Entirely competent and capable, the former CFO still faced transition challenges … both personally and professionally.

Personally, as the self-proclaimed “numbers guy,” the new president needed to change his mindset from “profitability” to “growth” while sharpening his communication skills to engage the team. In addition, he was now tasked with being the “face” of the company throughout the sales process – an entirely new role for him.

Professionally, a new hierarchy had to be established between the new president, his former peers and a newly transitioned CFO. The leadership team also needed to change its long-standing focus on profit, to a focus on growth opportunities leveraging new technologies, new channels and new markets. This was a complex, high-stakes transition. Timelines were tight and failure was not an option.

ACTIONS

  • Established leader confidence and credibility by developing and implementing an internal and external communications plan with one-on-one coaching checkpoints
  • Secured the president in his new role by facilitating a “new leader assimilation” workshop that seeded messaging and clarified roles and expectations – leaving no questions unanswered
  • Aligned team around critical growth initiatives and empowered them to make trade-offs to rank priorities
  • Accelerated team confidence and momentum by introducing an “early wins” process, driving tangible results on internal issues that had languished in the past, such as new product development strategy, service improvements and key customer plans
  • Re-energized the leadership team by facilitating a role sort process to redefine, develop and assign roles

RESULTS

The new president’s transition was highly successful… gaining acceptance by the executive leadership team, board members and, ultimately, the prospective buyer. A cohesive leadership team was re-energized and effectively produced the following results:

  • Business sold within six months of the new president’s appointment
  • Sale transpired one year sooner than expected
  • Valuation $700 million greater than original investment – equaling a 4x ROI for the investors
  • President promoted to CEO (upon previous CEO’s retirement) nine months into new ownership
  • Business results remain strong with new product innovation driving growth

 

New CEO Successful Private Equity Exit

New CEO Leads Successful Private Equity Exit

CHALLENGE

A privately owned personal care company brought in a new CEO to prepare the business for its Initial Public Offering. Meanwhile, the company was losing market share, had no coherent strategy for growth and had broken operating processes.

In addition, we needed to support the CEO to be prepared to run a public company within 100-days.

ACTIONS

After evaluating the business and organizational context, we convinced the CEO and the board to delay the IPO. Next, we leveraged our core processes and worked with the leadership team to put in place a new strategic plan and strengthen their operational and organizational processes.

RESULTS

The team aligned around a new strategic imperative that enhanced its competitive positioning and was well-communicated internally and externally. Operational performance improved, increasing confidence in the ability to execute. Market share trends were turned around, creating positive momentum. Then, “a funny thing happened on the way to the IPO”. The company was bought out by another private equity firm for $2.3B, $700MM more than the original IPO target valuation, three months later than planned.

The CEO told us “I could have put the strategy and operational improvements in place myself. But I never could have done it as fast as you helped us do it.”

New CEO Accelerates Team and Share Performance

New CEO Accelerates Team and Share Performance

CHALLENGE

A large diversified manufacturer spun off one of its divisions as a separate, stand-alone public company with the previous division president promoted to the role of CEO. The division’s recent past performance had suffered due to competitive and market issues, impacting the legacy company’s financial and share price performance. The new company needed a completely new leadership team, external positioning, and its own set of strategic, operating and organizational processes, to build momentum.

ACTIONS

We helped the CEO create his own action plan and then worked with his direct reports, their direct reports and the entire organization in a series of workshops with ever-expanding reach to launch the new company and its core processes.

 - sharpened priorities and execution plans
 - developed messaging for internal and external initiatives
 - readied leadership team to cascade core processes throughout the business

RESULTS

Got leadership team and then entire organization aligned around a new strategic imperative and new messaging. The new company got off to a strong start and increased its stock price more than 66% over its first five months after several years of “at market” share performance.

The CEO told us we were “orders of magnitude more valuable than we ever expected. Way above and beyond the call of duty and greatly appreciated by all…Your process and you personally have made a huge difference for me and the entire team.  All of that is nice but the shareholder value that has been created says it all.  Thank you so much! ”

Private Equity CEO Accelerates Merger of Five Businesses

Private Equity CEO Accelerates Merger of Five Businesses

CHALLENGE

A middle market private equity firm owned five separate operating companies in the medical technology industry. The vision was to combine the businesses to expand revenue by matching up to 100% of the industry’s key procurement targets and reduce costs through operating synergies in Product Development, Operations and Sales. Market trends were driving demand for integrated solutions, providing an outstanding opportunity for any business able to deliver a wide range of solutions at scale.

However, each of the individual portfolio companies operated within its own niche, with its unique strengths, weaknesses and cultures.

The new CEO was tasked with the challenge of creating a unified strategy, leadership team and set of operational processes to capture the market opportunity.

ACTIONS

  • Conducted assimilation workshops for new CEO in multiple locations to kick start relationships,  align messaging, and answer the question – “what does this change mean for me”
  • Performed preliminary role sort to provide immediate clarity to the organization
  • Facilitated workshops to align the team around goals, strategies, and action plans
  • Regular behind-the-scenes coaching to help accelerate decisions and enhance communication

RESULTS

  • Increased sense of ownership by connecting the team’s co-created “bottoms up” plan to the PE firm’s “top down” vision
  • Quickly re-formed the leadership team, adding new and re-sorting existing members
  • Designed assignment for exiting leader to ensure smooth and positive transition
  • Attracted industry Sales leader to join and drive agreed cross-selling program
  • Executed early wins to accelerate unity, shared accountability and results
  • Delivered operational costs savings in staffing, location and procurement

Combined business grew at a rate above market averages and delivered a successful exit in the planned time frame.

New Medical Center CEO Drives Culture Change and Results Through Effective Team Integration and Total Onboarding

New Medical Center CEO Drives Culture Change and Results Through Effective Team Integration and Total Onboarding

CHALLENGE

A regional medical facility was in transition, from a standalone medical center to one partnering with other centers to deliver improved and expanded care, as a means to thrive in a more profitable manner. A new CEO was coming on board to drive the change which would require evolutions in strategy, team, operations and culture.

The new CEO faced the dual challenges of quickly strengthening the internal capability and culture of the institution while leading the decisions of whether and how to merge or partner with other institutions. In order to get the job done, it was clear that the CEO needed to invest in building a cohesive, high performing leadership team.

A second focus area to drive success was a robust leadership onboarding program. This included how the medical center hired, oriented, developed and prepared potential new executives … how to get leaders integrated, up-to-speed and delivering … quickly. Historically, while some common processes were in place, there was too much dependence on individual executives’ willingness to commit time and energy to supporting their new leaders.

ACTIONS

To help the medical center achieve its business and organizational goals, PrimeGenesis undertook 2 projects:

  • We engaged with the institution to onboard the new CEO, working closely with him and his leadership team during his first 100 days, to help him quickly assess the situation, co-create a shared imperative with his team, and embed operational and organizational processes that drove action and results. 
  • At the same time, we partnered with the organization to build a Total Onboarding Program, a new and more effective way to bring new leaders of all levels into the organization quickly and effectively, so that they could assimilate into the culture, align their teams, and deliver better results faster.  

 

RESULTS

Executive Onboarding of the CEO

  • Built a cohesive leadership team through a process of co-creating the mission, vision, values, goals, strategies and action plans – led to faster decisions and results
  • Established partnerships with other medical centers to improve growth and profits
  • Reversed financial performance – moved from unprofitable to profitable
  • Achieved record donations in the CEO’s first 2 years, reflecting new, focused plan led by new Chief Development Officer (whose onboarding was also supported by PrimeGenesis)
  • Assessed leadership team and effected upgrades where needed
  • Aligned with the board on roles, priorities, actions, timelines and expected results
  • Infused a culture of urgency regarding the market changes throughout the leadership team, causing the team to lean in and solve the challenges they faced

Total Onboarding

  • In the first two years, 44 leaders participated in this program, with 41 successfully delivering at or above expectations in the organization, consistent with the PrimeGenesis 95% success rate
  • Change mandates for new leaders are more forcefully communicated and results have improved
  • The process especially helps new medical leaders get the support they need to integrate into a sophisticated, complex, high performing clinical organization. This is done through an embedded physician specializing in driving the onboarding process
  • Consistent, skillfully managed, well-understood and integrated Total Onboarding Program is in place. “This is how we do it”
  • Onboarding is a recruiting competitive advantage. Organization Development specialists work closely with hiring leaders and recruiters to build an onboarding plan for each new leader before they start.  “You will be supported as soon as you accept your position”
  • Hiring leaders have the commitment, skills and tools to support their new leaders’ success
  • New leaders have described the process as a key to successful starts and integration into the culture at the institution 
SVP-Global Operations Drives Change and Results, Gets Promoted

SVP-Global Operations Drives Change and Results, Gets Promoted

 
 

CHALLENGE

A high-potential site General Manager was promoted to run Global Operations for an aggressive, fast-growing, complex, 30-site manufacturing organization.  Cross-functional relationships and effectiveness had deteriorated due to silo mentality, quality concerns were mounting, productivity had flatlined, and the team lacked the depth and sophistication to drive needed changes. Meanwhile, there were questions about the new leader’s ability to build relationships and upgrade the team.

ACTIONS

In-person prep session far in advance of Day One clarified priorities, tightened message, and laid out specific plans for building and re-building relationships.  Behind-the-scenes coaching provided the needed tough love to accept personal leadership changes required by the leader to become more collaborative, confident, and flexible in thinking around people and process. Imperative workshop narrowed the team’s focus and solidified leadership norms. Intentional role sort raised awareness and turned up the heat on team upgrades. A cross-functional workshop drew out concerns and opportunities, clarified shared objectives, and established the client as a leader amongst equals.

RESULTS

Function’s productivity and quality improved dramatically. Processes established and significant team upgrades implemented in fast yet thoughtful manner with close attention paid to success of new leaders. Overall operation scaled effectively in line with the organization’s organic and inorganic growth. Client led cross-functional teams and picked up additional responsibility every year until being promoted to Chief Operating Officer three years into the role. Functions being led by strong players and overall organization continues to scale organically and via M&A.