House Cleaning Sometimes Needed

Aug. 16, 2010 - PRLog -- Executives in the design industry have expressed mixed feelings about whether a management shakeup is necessary when a new leader takes the helm during a business turnaround.

Speaking for the August 23 issue of The Zweig Letter, ZweigWhite’s weekly flagship publication, executives said a few basic steps should be followed when contemplating such decision.

“You are ultimately responsible for your company, so you need to get your team in place. If that means you need to change out some personnel then so be it,” said William Siegel, president and CEO of Kleinfelder, a San Diego consulting engineering firm. However, he added, “act decisively but not rashly.”

“While it is important to act as needed and in a timely manner, it is also important to be thorough and consider all aspects of your potential moves,” he said. “While changing out one under performer might signal you will hold people accountable, arbitrarily switching out your whole team might send a whole host of bad signals.”

Gregory DiFrank, president of River Consulting, LLC in Columbus, OH, said that cleaning house may not always prove necessary.

“My predecessor arrived in April of 2004 at a time of less than stellar results, and chose to retain the entire upper management team,” he said. “By August we were tracking upwards, and over the next three years we tripled our revenue.”

Brian Eggers, founder and principal of AKT Peerless Environmental & Energy Services in Saginaw, MI, on the other hand said CEO’s main function is to assure business survival, even in difficult circumstances.

“When things are going well, people resist major changes or try to get by with minor adaptations,” he said. “A crisis provides the leader with the platform to get things done that were required anyway and offers the sense of urgency to accelerate their implementation.”

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