In March – May 2021, Navigator Consulting completed a training and consultancy programme on Turn Around Management (TAM) in Cyprus. The programme provided managers of SMEs in Cyprus with a strategic and structured framework for financial crisis and wider growth management.
Nicosia, Cyprus: 2 June 2021
The TAM training and consultancy programme attracted 14 small enterprises representing a multi-sectoral audience including tourism, property, manufacturing, and shipping firms. Following a 2-day training programme held on Zoom, each company received a full-day consulting visit by the trainer, Philip Ammerman.
While the subject of the training was affected by the COVID-19 Pandemic and the disruption this had on many industries, the lessons are far wider and correspond to competitive and business cycle events in the Cypriot and wider economies.
Some of the common challenges that affected the training participants were:
Addressing cyclical impacts in industries such as construction or shipping, where high variations in growth exist that cause significant financial damage during a downturn;
Managing internal growth drivers and barriers, including the decision to focus on profitability versus scale, or managing the generational successions in small enterprises;
Managing debt and operating costs in period of depressed demand due to COVID;
Developing a profit-centre approach to operations, including critical decisions in terms of restructuring based on profit centres, geographic operations, strategic business units and other forms of company organization;
Managing growth in a highly competitive market environment;
Ensuring that innovation and disruption, whether from technology or other factors; can be effectively managed.
The 2-day training on Turn Around Management provided a detailed set of methodologies to diagnose, understand and act upon the root causes of a financial crisis:
Financial Crisis: Types and Impacts
Risk Management
Modelling and Analysing Strategic Corporate Operations
Basic Corporate Finance
Measuring the Cost of Sales
Turn-Around Management Diagnosis
Customer Segmentation and Pathways to Change
Optimising Production and Industrial Operations
Turn Around Management Planning: Summary of Measures
The in-company consultations applied the knowledge gained during the classroom training on how key principles of Turn Around Management/Financial Crisis Management could be adapted to each participating company.
The Turn Around Management training and consultancy programme has been developed by Navigator Consulting Group based on 26 years of training and consulting in highly challenging environments.
Our clients have been affected by a multitude of negative events:
The East Asian Financial Crisis of 1997-1998 and the Russian devaluation and debt default of 1998-1999;
The 1999-2000 dot.com bubble and crash;
The 2007-2008 global banking and sub-prime mortgage crisis;
The 2010 Greek sovereign debt crisis, with metastasized into public debt crises in Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Cyprus;
The 2013 Cyprus banking crisis and sovereign debt crisis;
The 2014-2015 crisis in Ukraine and Russia as a result of the Crimea invasion and subsequent embargo;
The 2020 COVID-19 crisis.
There have also been micro-cycle and sectoral crisis, for example the negative impact of tourism caused by the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Through this experience, we have developed a robust methodology for dealing with both an immediate financial crisis or a longer turn around management situation.
This is based on:
a. Developing a crystal-clear understanding of enterprise business models;
b. Translating this into an operating and financial business model capable of scenario planning and sensitivity analysis;
c. Further data-driven investigation into areas such as sales performance, customer profitability, portfolio profitability, order cycles, production model profitability, logistics and other key areas in the firm;
d. Understanding working capital, free cash flow, debt service, cash conversion and value-added value models relating to debt, cash flow and working capital;
e. Making specific decisions based on data and observable outcomes.
Our methodology incorporates well-known methods such as the turn-around curve, Porter’s Value Chain, Porter’s Competitive Advantage, certain aspects of lean management, risk analysis and classic financial modelling and analysis.
The training was delivered by Philip Ammerman. Philip is an experienced consultant and entrepreneur who has advised companies through a series of catastrophic downturns as well as high growth periods. He has worked through the 1998 Russian sovereign debt crisis, the 1999-2000 dot com crash, the 2000 stock market crash in Cyprus, the 2008 banking crisis, the 2010-2018 Greek debt crisis, the 2013 Cyprus bail-in crisis and the current COVID-19 Pandemic. He has advised on over 220 business plans, corporate restructurings, mergers and recovery plans worth over € 6 billion.
If you are interested in organising a turn around management training programme or consultation for your company or institution, please contact us.