April 22, 2020

The COVID Battle on the Manufacturing Floor & The Future of Our Global Supply Chain

The COVID Battle on the Manufacturing Floor & The Future of Our Global Supply Chain

The reach of coronavirus in the manufacturing sector has been vast. A survey by the National Association of Manufacturers revealed that 78% of manufacturers anticipate a financial impact, 53% foresee a change in operations, and 36% are experiencing disruptions in their supply chains. The Federal Reserve reported that in March production fell 6.3% in the manufacturing sector – the largest drop since 1946. This has everyone asking what the short and long-term impacts look like as major economies around the world seemingly come to a halt to curb the spread of the virus.

Manufacturers everywhere are running into cancellation of exports, delayed payments, and disruptions in logistics. Economist Larry Hu told Bloomberg “The worst is yet to come for exports and supply chain. For the whole year, China’s exports could easily fall 10% or probably more.” Meanwhile the world is grappling with how to deal with supply chain break downs and inventory shortages of critical medical equipment. The US government reportedly has almost depleted it’s emergency stockpile of masks, respirators, gloves, and gowns.

Still — essential companies such as ones producing food, medical supplies, or supporting necessary infrastructure and distribution of supplies are up and running. Leaders of these companies face a whole new realm of challenges as the health of workers and creating and maintaining a safe environment become top concerns.

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August 7, 2019

What Bad Loans and Management Shortfalls Mean for Investors

What Bad Loans and Management Shortfalls Mean for Investors

U.S. Banks are growing concerned — if not alarmed — and are reevaluating just how lax they are when it comes to handing out commercial loans. With sour loans on the rise, that’s not a pretty picture for companies that rely too much on credit lines or commercial loans. This is, in essence, a self-imposed business risk, as they are more dependent and susceptible to any fluctuations that occur.

A recent Financial Times article reported that non-performing loans increased by 20% at ten large commercial lenders. How much of an impact is that on the bank industry exactly? According to the Financial Times analyst, that’s a hefty $1.6B in the first quarter alone, a significant shift from credit quality since 2016, an era where the dust had settled from crashes and subsequent defaults on loans. The future started looking bright. Lending portfolios and credit quality began to improve. 

With merely three years of positive momentum, fast forward to present day and all that has changed and not for the better.  “Since most businesses utilize a credit line or other commercial loans, any slowdown will impact all types of commercial lenders – banks, asset-based lenders and factors,” said Yoav Cohen, an interim executive who has spearheaded eight turnarounds and liquidations, each one successful in paying off secured lenders in full. Cohen has seen it all, serving in roles as varied as interim CFO, COO, and a Chief Restructuring Officer.

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July 23, 2018
Olivia Wagner

Signs Your Struggling Business Needs Help

Olivia Wagner | President, InterimExecs
Signs Your Struggling Business Needs Help

We were having a conversation with an executive recently who shared about their experience parachuting into a business that was struggling with operational inefficiencies.

This executive, like many interims, kicked off the assignment by meeting face-to-face with the management team and employees to learn how the business functions, what’s working, and what isn’t. Their findings would turn into an operational roadmap of the business, where they would set out and implement a go-forward plan. When meeting with one team member and learning about what they did, the executive pointed to a process they had in place asking “why do you do that?”

 The answer: “Because we’ve always done it that way”

 (Alarm bells begin to loudly ring)

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June 29, 2018

How Turning Around a Company Looks Different Today

How Turning Around a Company Looks Different Today

Turnarounds aren’t what they used to be.

Like a good spy movie, turnarounds used to center around a strong central figure making things happen. Turnaround stars and distress experts were born, like Stephen Cooper of Enron and Krispy Kreme fame.

In 1985 the Turnaround Management Association started as a conference of company turnaround specialists in Chapel Hill, ultimately creating a rigorous formal program and exam for Certified Turnaround Professionals.

“Back then the time frame for turnarounds was long,” Richard Lindenmuth, an executive who has completed 23 turnarounds over the years said. “There was bridge financing from banks that would facilitate a turnaround and bankruptcy was really used as a tool for restructuring a company.”

Times have changed. Many of the Fortune 500 companies from those days have merged or disappeared due to outdated technology, products, or services (think RCA, Blackberry, Zenith). At the same time, the way to turn around a struggling business has transformed, being driven by several factors:

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March 13, 2018
Bob Jordan

Poor Company Performance? Work on Mastering Nuance

Bob Jordan | CEO, InterimExecs
Poor Company Performance? Work on Mastering Nuance

The Olympics are the perfect example of the difference between champions who win gold, silver or bronze, and everyone else who goes home empty handed. The winner could be winning by just one ten thousandths of a second.

Why do you think you or I are any different in our work – if we could improve our performance just a couple percentage points, we’d stand out from the masses clear as day.

Steve Jobs was genius at nuance, the subtle improvement that could cause massively asymmetric outcomes in favor of Apple. Thirty companies had MP3 products delivering hardware, software and content for streaming music. The category was done. Then along came the iPod. Not major changes, but so much better!

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February 7, 2018

Interim Tackles Challenges When CEO and CFO Fired for Stealing From Public Company

Interim Tackles Challenges When CEO and CFO Fired for Stealing From Public Company

Everything seemed to be going well for a public software company. Growing at a rate of 50-100% for three years straight, the company was gaining momentum until one day it all came to a screeching halt. Just weeks before the annual 10-k report was due the board uncovered that the CEO and CFO had been taking a few too many creative liberties with expense reports and were stealing money from the company…yes, they were embezzling funds – a nightmare scenario for a public company.

The board went to work, firing both of the full-time executives for cause. They immediately appointed an Interim CEO and reached out to us at InterimExecs in search of the right interim CFO to help them navigate through murky waters.

“It was a full-fledged crisis that included issues with culture, staff, investors, analysts, debt holders, Board members, auditors, the SEC and activist shareholders,” said a board member.

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June 30, 2017

Case Study: How Interim CEO Led Turnaround of Family Owned Manufacturer Losing Millions

After two years of unrelenting decline and $6M in losses, the owners of Styrotek, a packaging manufacturer for table grapes decided they needed to bring in outside help to turn things around.

Styrotek was founded in 1973 by a group of grape growers who came together to produce boxes for their farming operations in the central valley of California. While manufacturing was not originally in the company DNA, the business got to the point of creating a consistent product and quickly grew along with the grape industry.

That was until 2014 when things started to go sideways. “The company was somewhat in disarray,” Chris Caratan, one of the owner’s of Styrotek said. “Our management team at the time was not working up to par and there were some surprises in year-end numbers.”

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June 23, 2017
Robert Jordan

Business Owners Should Demand Action from Leadership

Robert Jordan | CEO, InterimExecs
Business Owners Should Demand Action from Leadership

“Action and feeling go together, and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling.”
– William James

One of the biggest benefits business owners report when they take on fresh leadership, whether an interim or fractional executive is a sense of relief. Of having done the right thing. They report the feeling that someone else shouldered a burden that was becoming impossible. Just too large to handle alone, or with the current resources on hand.

The real reason behind this for all of us business owners is that the challenge is just too painful to deal with on our own. Whether it’s family dynamics, lack of future planning, or declining business, we get embroiled in the inertia of our organizations. Sometimes the pain is so vast, the only solution is to sell the company.

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April 26, 2017
James B Treleaven

Seven Signs an Interim Executive Can Help Your Company

James B Treleaven | Interim CEO, Turnaround

Interim executives, or interims, have recently become an important tool that organizations can use to effectively address a variety of pressing needs. Having said that, many companies are either unaware that interims are even available or appropriate for their current situation. The most common understanding of the role of an interim is to fill an immediate need in the executive team caused by a sudden voluntary or involuntary departure. In this case, a seasoned executive can step right in and allow the company to progress unabated. While much of what an interim does is similar to consulting, successful execution is critical and unique to the role of interims. This blog presents seven case studies to help companies better understand other instances where interims can help. There are certainly more examples, but these are representative. While seven represents everything from the apocalypse to luck in gambling, we’ll stick with seven.

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March 3, 2017

We Fix. We Optimize. We Grow. We Lead.

Interim Execs works with companies, board members, and investors to match them with C-level talent wherever needed. And it’s not just about title – our Rapid Deployment Program looks at where you are at, and where you want to go.

Maybe there is a leadership gap, or maybe you are trying to get the business to the next level – expanding overseas, acquiring and integrating other businesses, transforming technology and operational processes. Maybe you see trouble on the horizon if you don’t make changes fast.

Interim executives specialize in quickly assessing your business, creating a strategy moving forward, and actually executing on it. Yes, that means doing the work. This is not consulting. We don’t deliver long reports that you can’t act on. We fix. We optimize. We grow. We lead.

October 20, 2016
Olivia Wolak

Executive Search May Be Long, But Interim Execs Deploy in 48 Hours

Olivia Wolak | President, Association of Interim Executives

There is no question that the executive search process is long. When a C-level executive bolts or an organization is going through a transformation – acquisition, product launch, market expansion, etc. – the right leadership needs to be in place, and needs to be in place now.

Vision Share, a consortium of eye banks, experienced this firsthand. Their mission, ensuring corneas be sent worldwide for transplant by eye surgeons, was hampered by organizational problems. The board of directors knew a new CEO was needed, but “the permanent search was estimated to be 6-9 months and came with a guarantee of a year’s employment,” Cindy Reed, Board Member at Vision Share said. “We really felt like we needed more than that.”

The board went to the Association of Interim Executives’ Rapid Executive Deployment Program to bring in Gregg Steinberg as Interim CEO to stabilize the organization, achieve immediate growth goals, and prepare them to hire the permanent CEO.

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June 24, 2016
William Mince

An Executive To Do List: How Interims Quickly Understand the Organizational Health of a Business and Team

William Mince | Interim CEO, COO, Turnaround

Interim executives are becoming a popular alternative to using a consultant or leaving a position vacant while a search for the right person is conducted. An interim executive also brings a fresh, unbiased review of factors driving organizational health and operational results. The interim executive does not waste time or company resources trying to secure a full time job, but is driven by the opportunity to make changes which lead to a sustainable value increase for all the stakeholders of the business. The client and their customers can expect immediate improvement in delivery, quality, and cost while a search is conducted to fill the permanent position.

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