5
O P I N I O N
A s consultants, we all find ourselves at times torn between delivering what the client wants and what we believe the client needs. Just as clients of A/E firms come in with a vision for their project that has no clear relationship with their budget, firm leaders come to us with their ideal M&A targets and carefully defined parameters. Blind date If your firm is looking to marry, don’t get hung up on the ‘perfect match.’ Keep your eyes open and you might meet that special someone you didn’t expect.
Jamie Claire Kiser
problem when we find a firm in our research that doesn’t check every box, but might otherwise make a “happy marriage” between firms. To continue the marriage metaphor, consider how different your spouse may be than what you would have described as your idea of a “perfect match.” If you won’t go on the blind date, you may miss “This becomes a problem when we find a firm in our research that doesn’t check every box, but might otherwise make a ‘happy marriage’ between firms.”
Probably the most common “push back” on our end comes when our client – buyer or seller – comes to us with an extensive list of requirements for the target firm. I used a (somewhat) facetious example in a recent seminar to illustrate my point: “I’m a buyer who wants an architecture firm with between 35 and 45 employees, based in Charlotte, that specializes in commercial and healthcare design, no work at all in the education sector, revenue per employee in the upper quartile of the industry, a strong second tier of client-facing leaders, no client concentrations greater than 20 percent of revenue over the last five years, and profitable performance.” Then, the kicker: “And it needs to be a good deal for us!” It’s great – and, in fact, imperative – to have a solid idea of what you are looking for. This becomes a
See JAMIE CLAIRE KISER, page 8
THE ZWEIG LETTER October 10, 2016, ISSUE 1171
Made with FlippingBook Annual report