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Executive Summary
Harvard Business Review’s report on interim CEOs focuses on a narrow category: interim appointments at large public companies. Professional interim CEOs serving private companies, private-equity-backed businesses, family-owned companies, and nonprofits operate differently. They are brought in to solve urgent business problems, lead transformations, and deliver measurable results.
To illustrate the difference, we share six real-world interim CEO success stories from the InterimExecs RED Team, including turnarounds that increased revenue, EBITDA, and cash flow; leadership transformations; successful company sales; and a hospital turnaround completed in just four months.
When Harvard Business Review ran an article looking at research on CEO vacancies at 400 large public companies between 2002 and 2024, it offered some pretty damning statements:
- Interim appointments are among the most disruptive succession choices.
- Interim CEOs shift their focus to short-term performance in the hope of being hired permanently.
- Overall, the companies saw their return on assets decline by 2 to 3% during the interim CEO’s tenure.
While we don’t doubt the veracity of this research as it applies to the small percentage of American companies in the S&P 1500, we take significant umbrage at the sweeping statements that are now being returned in Google results. Here is Google’s AI summary of the article: According to Harvard Business Review, appointing an interim CEO can be disruptive and often hurts financial performance if handled poorly.
While handling something poorly is never a recipe for success, we firmly disagree with this characterization of interim executives.
Not All Interim CEOs Are the Same
| Placeholder CEO | Professional Interim CEO | |
|---|---|---|
| Primary purpose | Keep the CEO seat filled | Solve a specific business challenge |
| Mindset | Maintain the status quo | Create measurable change |
| Typical mandate | Hold the organization together during a search | Lead, fix, transform or stabilize the business |
| Time horizon | Until a permanent CEO is selected | Until the defined assignment is successfully completed and a new CEO is hired |
| Approach | Avoid major disruption | Make the decisions the situation requires |
| Focus | Continuity | Performance and progress |
| Success looks like | A smooth handoff to the next CEO | A stronger company ready for its next leader |
| After the assignment | Hands off the seat | Hands off a better-performing organization—and moves to the next challenge |
A placeholder occupies a role. A professional interim CEO is brought in to create change and deliver results.
To showcase the difference, we asked our 12,000 vetted, professional InterimExecs RED Team members to tell us about their own experience.
Here are just six of their stories.
Interim CEO Generates $75 Million in Cash Flow and Increases Revenue 50%
Who: Interim CEO with experience across 11 assignments
The Challenge: Global chemical company facing shutdown thanks to $68 million in undisclosed safety liabilities.
The Results: The professional interim CEO generated $75 million in cash flow from operations alone and increased EBITDA from $15 million to $20 million (15 percent of revenue). Achieved 100 percent safety compliance with the in-house team and a three-year payback. Increased revenue by 50 percent to $200 million and improved market position to No. 2 globally.
Interim CEO Stabilizes a Disrupted Manufacturer
Who: A professional interim executive with experience across 10 assignments
The Challenge: The French parent of a US company had terminated a third-generation general manager, disrupting long-term relationships and destabilizing the organization.
The Results: The InterimExecs RED Team CEO kept the organization aligned while determining what else needed to be fixed. That list was long, including inconsistencies in financial reporting, capital expenditures that had not been approved, and organizational issues. The CFO and manufacturing managers were fired. To set up the company for future success, the interim CEO worked with the human resources manager to develop a job description for the new general manager, then helped hire and onboard the new GM before moving on to the next assignment.
Interim CEO Leads Manufacturing Turnaround Before Successful Sale
Who: Professional interim CEO with experience across 10 assignments
The Challenge: Turn around a struggling manufacturer.
The Results: Completed two acquisitions, doubled the size of the company headquarters, integrated systems using AI for robotics to automate manufacturing, and grew revenue from $30 million to $50 million before the company was sold in 2025.
Interim CEO Tames a Toxic Workplace, Rebuilds Culture and Accountability
Who: Interim CEO with experience across five assignments
The Challenge: Organization burdened by several toxic employees who controlled important information and were so intimidating that the board and staff were afraid to confront them.
The Results: The interim CEO was able to replace the toxic employees without incident, set up their replacements for success, and build a culture of trust and accountability for the incoming CEO. This prevented valuable employees from leaving and from further harm to staff morale.
Interim CEO Increases Sales 22% and EBITDA 35%
Who: Interim CEO with experience across five organizations
The Challenge: Company that lacked leadership, accountability, goals, or metrics.
The Results: The interim CEO narrowed the product focus, implemented daily performance metrics, added critical warehousing space, and improved sales by 22% and EBITDA by 35%.
Interim CEO Rebuilds Hospital Leadership in Just Four Months
Who: Interim CEO with experience across five assignments
The Challenge: Inpatient psychiatric hospital with years of operational, regulatory and leadership instability.
The Results: The interim CEO took just four months to rebuild the hospital’s leadership and operating infrastructure; recruit a new CMO, CNO, and three new onsite physicians; strengthen staffing across departments, improve admissions throughput; and expand business development. Patient census increased by nearly 30 percent, with occupancy reaching more than 90 percent of available capacity. Brought the organization through its LPS monitoring agreement, significantly strengthened overall regulatory compliance, and completed a successful Joint Commission survey despite years of preexisting compliance and leadership challenges. (LPS refers to the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act, a California law that governs involuntary civil commitments and psychiatric holds.)
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The Complete Guide to Interim Management
Everything owners, investors, and boards need to know about deploying interim executives — when to use them, how to vet them, what to pay, and how to get results fast.
Why Professional Interim CEOs Are Not Placeholders
A professional interim CEO is an experienced operating executive who is brought into a company for a defined period to solve a specific business challenge, lead a transformation, or navigate a critical transition.
They are neither placeholders nor caretakers
Professional interim CEOs are brought in to lead. They are accountable for solving problems, executing strategy, improving performance, and navigating transformational events. They live for the challenge of coming into an organization, righting the ship, moving it forward, and handing it off to the newly hired permanent executive before moving on to their next challenge.
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Frequently Asked Questions
It can be that in a large public company, which must comply with Sarbanes-Oxley rules that say a CEO must sign off on all financials. But true, professional interim CEOs are the opposite of a placeholder. They are experienced executives with a proven track record of operational success who choose interim as a career path. They are geared for action, driven to produce results, and then ready to move on to the next challenge.
A permanent CEO is hired and generally given a long-term contract to run the organization. An interim CEO is hired on a short-term basis, usually with a defined mandate to fix a problem. Professional interim CEO is a career path for experienced executives who crave the challenge of fixing a problem, moving on to the next assignment once the mission is complete.
No. We deploy InterimExecs RED Team interim CEOs for many reasons: to turn around failing organizations, to prepare companies for IPO or sale, to lead change through market disruption, to amp up growth, and more, including as part of a succession plan to bridge the gap between permanent CEOs. This can happen when a CEO leaves unexpectedly due to illness, death, malfeasance, or underperformance. In this case, a key deliverable for the interim CEO can be helping identify, hire, and onboard the new permanent CEO, sometimes staying on to mentor the new permanent hire for a defined period of time.
A professional interim CEO creates value by quickly diagnosing a company’s most pressing challenges and taking action to improve performance. They may increase revenue or EBITDA, improve cash flow, strengthen the leadership team, execute a turnaround, prepare a company for a sale or lead a major transformation. Unlike a placeholder CEO, a professional interim CEO is brought in to create measurable progress and leave the company stronger when the assignment ends.
A company should hire an interim CEO any time there is a vacancy in the job. Identifying and hiring a new full-time CEO can take six months or longer. A fully vetted InterimExecs RED Team interim CEO can be identified in as little as 48 hours and on the job in a few days, ready to keep the company moving forward during the search for a new full-time CEO.
