• Unique Career Experience

    It has been my fortune to have so many interesting challenges over the years that I have become somewhat of a master at solving puzzles. In this Gallery I share a number of them.

  • Strategic reorganization

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  • Greener products and practices

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  • Impactful consulting

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  • Restructuring and growth

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  • Hands-on business development

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  • Customer relationships reimagined

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  • People come first, but automation is a close second

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  • Recovery and turnaround

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People come first but automation is a close second

Personally I have remapped business processes many times and automated using various CRMs and a patchwork quilt of connecting apps to make processes run more smoothly. However, the starting point has to be people—clients, colleagues, suppliers, stakeholders… If your processes do not meet their needs, then all the automation and efficiency in the world won’t help you succeed. That is why, for example, at The Barrett Group, I designed and installed the Clarity Program as the first step in the process—to make sure the rest of the program truly meets the clients’ needs.

Strategic Reorganization

Sometimes the market changes and the organizational design no longer fits. This happened to organizations I worked with several times, mainly as buying organizations began to consolidate their purchasing across national lines, consolidate demand, and drive e-tenders. The organization had to change to meet the market more effectively, and it was my pleasure to guide and shape that change—repeatedly.

Recovery and turnaround

In one case the company was facing a huge tax bill due to impending write-downs of liabilities, so I designed a deal structure that provided an off-setting asset to render the write-down painless and eliminate the tax burden. By the way, the firm was about to go bankrupt as well, so I put my shoulder to the wheel and helped lift that company out of its financial woes and raise it to the point where it has been recognized now 5 years in a row as one of the best in the business by no other than Forbes.

Customer relationships reimagined

Several times in my career I have had to manage difficult customers and change the relationship from an antagonistic and even abusive relationship to one between equal partners. We managed this by examining the needs of the clients and then bolstering our ability to explain and meet those needs, sometimes completely retooling in the process to do so.

Restructuring and growth

The magazine was losing money and the membership growth was moribund. What was the association to do? In this case, they hired me and I revitalized the magazine to a profit center by growing revenue 270%, grew the membership by 60%, and increased total revenue by 88% over three years.

Greener products and practices

There are so many opportunities to adjust products and practices to improve a carbon footprint. In one case, the organization I led hired a Swiss CO2 lifecycle consulting firm to evaluate our processes and materials to create a cradle-to-gate carbon footprint so that we could launch probably the first ever CO2-reduced product in that country and category—something our competitors could not easily match.

Impactful consulting

When a client complained that his organization spent too much energy sending ineffective emails, I designed a program of reeducation and training that rolled out over the course of 9 months across multiple plans affecting hundreds of employees. Over the course of five “flights” we achieved significant quantitative and qualitative improvements in the company’s email culture.

Hands-on business development

The company wanted to privatize a former communist factory in Moravia, revitalize it, develop a sales organization, initiative marketing, and grow their branded mayonnaise business. They needed a German-speaking development manager willing to take on the project. That turned out to be me, and by the time I left 4.5 years later, the company was headed for $50 million in annual turnover and held about 60% of the mayonnaise market.