Management Due Diligence

Clear and objective opinions for investors

We support and strengthen the wider due diligence process by assessing the individual and group capabilities of your leadership team

Our assessments provide insights into:

Individual leadership skills

Approach to problem-solving

Self-awareness and resilience under pressure

Aspirations and motivations

Agility and culture-fit

Derailers

How Does This Benefit You?

Management due diligence assessments provide you with the information to:

Make the right hiring and acquisition choices

Manage individuals and teams more effectively

Build a team with the capabilities to deliver and aligned aspirations that will drive value to exit

As your trusted advisor, we ensure that you have the best team you can, at all stages of the deal cycle.

Laidlaw Associates can be depended upon to provide quick and insightful appraisals, which utilise just the right amount of scientific underpinning to support the art of crystallising key character traits, skills, fit with the existing team and likely developmental areas.

PARTNER

BUYOUT AND GROWTH CAPITAL PE FIRM

Application of Our Services Across the Deal Cycle

1. PRE DEAL MANAGEMENT DUE DILIGENCE

Team member capabilities

Next steps for individuals

Unacknowledged motives / personal conflicts

Insights for new Chairman / Investor Director

2. MANAGING CHANGE DURING DEAL

Strategic & tactical thinking

Ability to deliver change at pace required

Individual & team development needs

Gap analysis & actions required

3. PLANNING FOR EXIT

Can current team attract buyers?

Attributes necessary to take business public

Gaps and development needs

Next steps for individual team members

4. SUCCESSION PLANNING

Levels of team motivation

Drivers and ambitions

Likely team tenure

Future landscape & middle-management potential

Development requirements for rising stars

It has been an absolute pleasure working with Caroline. The insights she is able to deliver on the basis of tests and an interview are very impressive. She is responsive and easy to work with. We will absolutely be using Laidlaw Associates again.

JACOB POLNY, CIO

TELEMOS CAPITAL

PHASE 1: Pre-deal Management Due Diligence

Before you sign the deal, we assess your senior management team to establish:

If the current team is likely to be able to deliver. We examine team members individually in relation to their specialist discipline and their role within the management team.

Do they need to be developed, augmented or replaced?

Are there any unacknowledged motives or personal conflicts between individuals in the team?

What insights can we give an incoming Chairman or Investor Director to help them get the best from the management team?

PHASE 2: Managing Change through the deal

It is rare to generate real shareholder value without a strong senior management team that can affect significant change. We assess your current senior management team for:

Their ability to think strategically yet act tactically. Can they shift direction and focus in response to threats and opportunities?

Their capacity to drive change at the pace required for success. How do they need to be developed, both individually and as a team? Where are the gaps and how can they be filled?

PHASE 3: Succession Planning

We make assessments that help you build a deeper, better bench of talent – increasing business performance and resilience.

Are current management teams still motivated? What drives their ambition? Are they likely to stick around?

What is the future landscape? Who are the rising stars that could fill the talent pipeline?

Can you unleash further potential from middle-management? Where are the gaps? How are these people being developed, stimulated and their potential realised?

PHASE 4: Planning for Exit

Our assessments can start answering these questions from day one, when exit planning should start:

Are the current team the right ones to make the business attractive to a buyer?

Do they have the attributes needed to take a business public? If not, what needs to change?

Do they need to be developed, augmented or replaced?