In today’s newsletter:

• Acquisition Opportunity for Small-Midsize Event Agencies

• Event Agency C-Suite Dinner & Roundtable

• Entrepreneurs Run Amok

• Unstuck: Getting to the Next Level

• Hallmarks of a Good Accountability Partner

• The Discipline of Private Equity

• Reaching Your Company’s Potential

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Acquisition Opportunity

I’m working with a meeting & event agency looking to acquire one or more smaller agencies (Adjusted EBITDA of under $1M) as part of their growth strategy. Ideal target agencies should demonstrate strength across key event planning competencies to include some or all the following: 

• Sourcing

• Event Logistics & Management

• Creative & Production

• Event Tech

• Onsite Staffing

• Air Support - Individual & Group

To confidentially explore this opportunity, please call or email me.

Event Agency C-Suite Dinner & Roundtable

Things are getting a little funky out there. Economic & geo-political headwinds are breeding uncertainty like rabbits, while the blistering pace of AI advancement says ‘hold my beer’.

The last time we felt the ground shift like this (the onset of Covid) I organized a private discussion group called The Situation Room, where even agency owners came together to help each other navigate the seismic changes facing their companies and the industry. A similar group called Nineteen was organized in London by Chetan Shah, Founder & CEO of Micebook.

Together we’re co-hosting a dinner on June 3rd at the Hotel Chelsea in NYC for a curated group of 18 event agency owners and executives to discuss the key challenges facing our industry, explore potential opportunities, exchange ideas and build a peer support network to help navigate the current landscape. There are 3 spots left. If you’re interested in attending, please email me.

Accountability

Entrepreneurs Run Amok

One of the best things about owning your own business is that you don’t have to answer to anyone. Ironically, one of the worst things about owning your own business is, wait for it, not having to answer to anyone.

Why? There’s no one to hold you accountable for achieving your goals, particularly your long term goals. Day in and day out you get to do whatever you want, and there’s no one to stop you from getting in your own way. I know; I’ve been there.

Maybe you’re getting sucked into minutiae that is way below your pay grade. You might even like doing that minutiae, but just because it gives you joy doesn’t mean that’s where the company needs you focusing.

Maybe you’re trying to position your firm as more high-end to win bigger-ticket jobs, but you keep saying ‘yes’ to low-end opportunities, even though you know deep down it undermines the brand you’re trying to build.

Maybe you need to be out selling more, because no one can sell your company like you can, but you shy away from it because it’s not in your comfort zone. However, with no one to hold you accountable, your comfort zone is exactly where you’ll remain.

Maybe you’re great at selling and are consistently landing top tier clients, but you you keep struggling to retain quality employees because you don’t recognize that you’re a lousy manager and need to hire a quality COO.

In short, want to know why you’re not growing your business fast enough? Look in the mirror. Most entrepreneurs have a hard time diagnosing themselves and identifying what’s holding them back. Talk to any business owner who complains they can’t quite get to the next level, no matter how hard they try, and chances are they don’t have someone that holds them accountable.

Unstuck: Getting to the Next Level

Getting a business to the next level is fairly straightforward in theory, but surprisingly difficult in practice. In a nutshell, it requires that you:

1. Clearly define what that next level looks like. You’d be amazed at how many times I ask this question and get vague responses. The “next level” means different things to different entrepreneurs, but without defining it you’ve got no roadmap.

2. Develop a plan and structure to get there. If you’re looking for more clients, you probably need to invest in a sales team. If you’re looking to keep the same number of clients but raise your prices, you’ll need to finetune your brand positioning and value proposition to justify premium pricing, which may entail a PR and marketing approach. Whatever the next level is, be brutally honest about what it will take to get there.

3. Break that plan into measurable steps, quarter by quarter, month by month. Clearly identify the building blocks that will get you where you want to go.

4. And finally, unless you have the self-discipline of a monk, you’ll need a trusted advisor to hold you accountable to this plan on a regular basis. If you have active investors, they can provide this role. If not, you need someone from the outside. Think of this person as your personal trainer, helping you get in the best possible shape.

Hallmarks of A Good Accountability Partner

The stock market provides a master class in accountability for companies on a daily basis. Underperform against expectations, and sellers drive down the price of the stock. Exceed expectations and the stock rises. Private equity and other institutional investors offer similar degrees of accountability, but over a slightly longer time horizon, because there’s no public market to reprice the company’s value; that only happens when there’s a sale or some other liquidity event.

Absent either of those scenarios, CEOs and entrepreneurs need a trusted third party to hold their feet to the fire. Sometimes an individual investor can do that, but more often than not it’s too infrequent to be effective, and by the time they step in firmly it’s usually too late to right the ship. Peer groups like Vistage or YPO can help by giving owners a cohort of fellow entrepreneurs to advise them, but their focus is more on encouragement and support than true accountability.

Whether it’s an investor or an outside advisor, a good accountability partner should have the following attributes:

• Guardian of the Long-Term Goals. Perhaps most importantly, a strong accountability partner keeps owners and executives focused on the company’s long term objectives. They need to be the guardian of those goals, ensuring that the CEO doesn’t get too bogged down in minor details. Whatever excuses the CEO might have for not meeting certain short-term goals, the advisor needs to say, “I’m sorry, but this is not going to get us to hit our year-end sales goals, and I know how important that is to you.”

• Telling Truth to Power. Most business owners rarely have their ideas challenged or are given any constructive criticism by their teams. It’s not easy to challenge the boss, and few organizations have a culture that encourages that. A good advisor needs to speak up if they feel the owner’s strategy is misguided, or if they’re carrying a poor employee way too long. It’s an advisor’s job to tell the owner what they need to know, for their own best interest, even if it may not be easy to hear.

• Calling Bullshit. If an owner commits to making 10 prospect calls by the next meeting, and says he was only able to make 2 because (fill in the blank), the accountability partner has to call him out on it. He might have a good excuse - maybe a new lead came in or a key employee gave notice - but the advisor needs to stand firm and hold him to his commitments. If he decides to give him a pass, it should not be a regular occurance, and the owner should be pressed to present a plan to make up for the missed calls.

• Encouragement, Strategy & Support. All of this doesn’t mean the accountability partner has to be obnoxious and adversarial. The message can be stern but the delivery should be professional, and with advice on how to fix the issue. E.g. “I know it may be hard to hear this, but the company suffers when you don’t meet your commitments, and part of why you brought me here is to help keep you on track to achieve the goals that you determined. I’d be remiss in my responsibilities if I didn’t hold you to account. Now, let’s discuss what happened and strategize a plan to help you meet those commitments.”

The Discipline of Private Equity

Over the past few months I’ve spoken to a number of CEOs of companies owned by private equity firms, some of whom have only just recently sold their companies to them, and one thing they all talk about is how accountable they have to be for their companies’ performance. Whether it’s formal board meetings on a monthly or quarterly basis, or weekly or bi-weekly informal check-ins with their PE partners, CEOs of PE-owned firms have to report on their progress in hitting key milestones that drive toward the long-term goals they’ve committed to. And if they’re not on track, they need to explain why, and present a plan to work through the current challenges.

That external accountability brings a level of discipline that is extremely difficult to replicate on your own. While individual investors can impose some degree of accountability, it can’t compete with that of private equity. For one thing, the PE firms themselves are accountable to their fund investors, and if they can’t grow the companies they acquire large enough to deliver sizable returns when sold, they have some explaining to do, in addition to the fact that they typically make 20% of the profit on the sale. Further, by managing a broad portfolio of companies, they can identify the best practices of all their operators, which they measure you against.

Reaching Your Company’s Potential

While it might seem like a nightmare to have investors breathing down your neck like that, most CEOs I’ve spoken to appreciate that accountability, and acknowledge how important it is in driving growth. Working with the right accountability partner is like a professional athlete having a demanding coach that might sometimes be a pain to play for, but gets you to reach the highest level of your potential.

Nobody can do it alone. I’ve hired a number of coaches over the years while trying to grow my businesses, and the ones that stood out were the advisors who could challenge me and hold me accountable in a way that improved my performance, and that of the company.

If you’d like to explore working with me as your business coach and accountability partner, you can schedule a free 30-minute exploratory call.

Here’s to taking your event business to the next level!

Howard Givner
Senior Advisor | Oaklins: DeSilva & Phillips (M&A) email me
CEO | Heathcote Advisory Group (Consulting) email me

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Catch up on recent articles:

• How Much Is Your Event Agency Actually Worth?

• A Tale of 2 Acquisitions: Opus Group CEO Shares M&A Insights

• AI Is Creating Winners & Losers In Events: Which Will You Be?

• How to Help Your Clients Define, & Weight, Their Event Goals

If and when you’re ready, here are ways I work with agency owners:

• Business Coaching & Owner Accountability

• Business Diagnostic & Company Valuation

• Growth Consulting

• Exit Planning

• M&A (Buy Side & Sell Side)

Wanna chat? Email me, or schedule an intro call.

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