Turnarounds

A turnaround is not a strategy exercise. It is a short, disciplined period in which a business stops losing ground, regains control of its cash and its order book, and earns the right to plan again. We do this work for owners, boards and investors in aerospace, defence and advanced-manufacturing SMEs — usually when the numbers have gone the wrong way for long enough that goodwill with the bank, the shareholders or the key customer is running out.

Stabilise first

In the first days the priority is visibility, not vision. Distressed businesses almost always have worse information than they think, and decisions get made on instinct because nobody trusts the reports. So we establish a short-interval view of what can sink you: cash in and out, the real order book, work in progress and what it is worth, overdue deliveries, and the handful of customer and supplier relationships the business cannot survive without.

Early work normally covers:

• A rolling 13-week cash flow, built bottom-up and updated weekly, with the owner in the room when it is reviewed
• Separating the loss-makers from the earners at product, contract and customer level
• Securing the critical supply chain before a stop-notice turns into a production halt
• Honest conversations with creditors and funders, with a plan they can believe rather than a request for patience
• Identifying the two or three operational failures doing the most damage and fixing those before anything else

Then a plan that survives scrutiny

Once the business is stable, a recovery plan has to stand up to people who are sceptical by trade: specific actions, named owners, dated milestones and a financial model whose assumptions can be defended line by line. Where the answer is restructuring, refinancing or a change of ownership, we say so and help you prepare properly. We do not do insolvency work, and if that is where a business is heading we will tell you early and point you to the right advisers.

Doug Allen leads turnaround assignments. Alongside 25 years in manufacturing operations, he has led a buy-in management buyout and raised investment, so he has sat on both sides of the table — the one explaining the plan and the one deciding whether to fund it. Anna Lavender-Moore is often involved where the root cause runs through the management system or the culture rather than the balance sheet; her background in organisational psychology matters when a demoralised team has to deliver a recovery.

Working alongside your management

Turnarounds fail when an adviser writes a report and leaves. We work in the business for the period that matters — attending the production meeting, sitting with the finance lead, standing on the floor — and we are explicit about what we do ourselves versus what your managers must own. The handover point is agreed at the start, because the objective is a business that runs without us.

Frequently asked questions

How bad does it have to be before we call?

Earlier is cheaper and the options are better. Lenders are more flexible before covenants break, customers more forgiving before deliveries fail, and good people easier to keep before the rumours start. If you are losing cash each month and cannot point to the reason with confidence, that is reason enough for a conversation.

Who will know you are involved?

Discretion is normal and we plan for it. How you describe our role to staff, customers and funders is your decision, and we follow the line you set. In practice most lenders respond well to knowing experienced operational help is on site, so there is often an advantage in being open with them.

Can you guarantee the business will recover?

No, and nobody honest will. Some businesses are past the point where effort changes the outcome, and we would rather tell you that in week one than take a fee for the pretence. What we will do is give you a clear-eyed read on whether recovery is realistic, and the plan to pursue it if it is.