Is Everyone Really a Turnaround Expert?

The market is booming with turnaround "experts." And, I am seeing more and more claims of such expertise every day.

As I wrote in my last post on The Lost Art of Turnarounds, I believe turnarounds are tough stuff. A bonafide turnaround expert requires an awesome array of skills, experiences, and insights. The array is so awesome that one would think that far, far less than 1% of all CEOs, COOs and experienced consultants could actually have what it takes to lead a successful turnaround. Yet,

claims of being a turnaround expert abound.

The vast majority of senior executives who get sacked or laid off and are over 50 years old are going to have a difficult time getting rehired in corporate America at anything close to a similar level of responsibility. Wicked age discrimination is the unspoken part of the downsizing that is occurring in every industry, across the country. In other downturns, some of these executives would have used some of their retirement funds to buy a business or launch a franchised operation. For most of these laid off executives, retirement funds have been decimated by the market meltdown and thus buying or starting an operating business will be an option for far fewer. So, I expect to see more people forming boutique consulting firms and offering themselves up as a turnaround "expert."

Adding to this supply of claimed experts will be the thousands of directors and partners of Restructuring firms whose real experience is in forensic activities, but after twenty years of doing that work now see an opportunity to realize their dream of being a turnaround "expert."

Regretfully, notwithstanding valiant efforts by the Turnaround Management Association, certification of turnaround professionals has never been soundly endorsed by the major Restructuring firms....at least that is what shown in many firms by comparison of the number of Certified Turnaround Professionals in a given firm to the number of professionals claiming turnaround expertise from the firm.

Without a widely accepted standard for certification, or the rigorous ranking of attorneys as provided by Chambers, the hordes of turnaround experts are descending on all the constituencies and offering their expertise. Constituents, left to their own devices, are already starting to use the newbie pricing as a lever against the bigger firms.

What a mess! And just when this country needs great turnaround experts more than ever.

Just another indicator of why I believe that big changes are coming to the Restructuring profession.

This is the third and final post in a series on tunarounds that started here. Up next, a report on the TMA Distressed Investment Conference from Las Vegas.