In late 2019, this medium sized metal pressing and stamping business faced a perfect storm of crises.
An unexpected leadership void with no succession plan, mismanaged asset and equipment acquisition, increasing customer complaints about quality, and overall loss of financial control had brought it close to failure even before the challenges of Covid-19.
Since ValueStep was invited by the company’s owner to carry out an initial review in January 2020, we have helped to transform its performance and prospects.
The Value Step
Our recommended programme has achieved a remarkable turnaround, based on introducing interim senior executive leadership (MD, FD and HR) who have restructured and refinanced the whole business.
Our work has embraced the following activities:
- Immediate grip of operations, addressing H&S issues, quality assurance, new operational systems and procedures.
- Upgrade of all finance functions and controls.
- Workforce review and resizing, with managed redundancy programme completed.
- Response to Covid 19 restrictions, including securing a Coronavirus Business Interruption Scheme (CBILS) loan.
- Business priorities reassessment, orderbook cleansing, stock controls review, customer relationship management review.
- Full strategy review leading to new three-year business plan and refinancing.
Outcome
The business has left the shadow of failure behind. It is now consistently improving month on month in quality and production performance, has a motivated workforce and is delivering profit significantly ahead of forecast.
ValueStep continues its oversight and has been invited by the owner to review his next strategic ‘value step’ options, including further value creation, potential acquisition and his potential exit.
The net value gain to date has been £5m.