Industrial Reboot: Elevating Performance and Value

Background:

A major investment firm acquired a vertically integrated paper and packaging enterprise comprising a mill site and several corrugating/box facilities across the western U.S. The company was experiencing significant operational and financial underperformance, largely due to ineffective leadership and a lack of strategic direction. We were retained by the acquiring firm to stabilize operations, improve safety, unlock capacity, and drive profitable growth.

Critical Issues:

• The leadership team lacked cohesion and operational alignment.
• Serious safety violations at the mill posed regulatory and operational risks.
• Chronic underutilization of its capacity due to inefficient processes and poor planning.
• Experiencing deteriorating performance and poor margins.

Approach:

The team led a comprehensive transformation effort focused on executive coaching, lean execution, and operational turnaround across the mill and several corrugating facilities.

Key Actions Include:

• Executive coaching across mill and divisional leadership.
• Operational turnarounds at the mill and several corrugating plants
• Lean workshops targeting cash cycle improvement, quality, throughput, and responsiveness.
• Implemented leading safety practices.
• Strategic projects to enhance energy performance and revenue generation.
• Business model redesign to align production to demand.

Results:

• Enterprise-wide output increase.
• Safety culture overhaul resulting in zero lost-time injuries for months.
• Dramatic improvement in cash-to-cash cycle.
• Faster changeovers and more agile order fulfillment.
• Upgraded quality and delivery performance.
• Standardized playbooks for Lean execution adopted across all sites.
• Established as a stable, profitable enterprise with a strong culture and reputation.

This transformation not only delivered exponential financial returns but created a replicable operating model rooted in discipline, flexibility, and frontline accountability. It stands as a benchmark example of how coordinated leadership development, lean execution, and operational discipline can rapidly restore performance, reputation, and enterprise value—turning a challenged industrial asset into a recognized market leader.

Praised by one of the managing banks as “an impressive industrial turnaround”.