It’s All About Page 7

by HPA Founder & Managing Director Sumeet Goel

Back in November we published our 2023 Recession Playbook; In April we published an update – OK, smart guys, now what?.

We got amazing responses to both, but what really hit home was one page. The page that everyone reacted to, responded to, and wanted to discuss.

It was Page 7.

Through June, over 94% of our 2023 projects are efficiency based – ops, process improvement, cost take out, org redesign, you name it. In 2022, it was just over 10%.

Our business model is built to easily flex around client needs, but in our 20+ years of existence we’ve never seen a shift like this before. The response to Page 7 has been overwhelming – a mixture of curiosity-driven and we-need-help conversations.

For the curious, we thought it might be helpful to quickly lay out what we’ve been sharing with our clients who are asking about this shift as they relate it to their own situations. Here’s what we’ve seen as the push into transformation, efficiency, and related needs have come to the fore more recently:

• Growth over everything else: The last 10-12 years have seen laser focus on growth at all costs – acquisitions at high multiples, land grabs, etc. Less focus on efficiency, as growth cures all
• The “everything else”: This has left operations, infrastructure, integration, organization, etc., all unchecked and now in need of extensive help
• Business environment: Organizations have not been set up for the level of internal focus that tighter supply chains, decreased consumer demand, channel consolidation, etc., require
• Cost of capital: If you’re reading this email, you don’t need us to explain this bullet and its waterfall effects to you
• Labor markets: This is another one that needs no explanation – if you are running a business, you have been meaningfully affected by this as well
• Leadership experience: Many leadership teams have not operated in turnaround environments and/or were hired to be growth oriented (sales, acquisitions, expansion)

If these things resonate with you, contact us – we’re happy to chat live and directly share more of what we’ve been hearing, working on, seeing results on, etc., as well as provide feedback on what you’re facing.

In the meantime, hopefully Page 7 serves as a reminder that the playbook for value creation and capture can be rewritten and deployed at lightning speed; just look at the pivot we had to do this year.