Episode 029
Gabe Mesanza, Huron Capital | An Expert Perspective on Culture, Growth and Cash Flow in Private Equity
A Partner and Resource Group Lead from Huron Capital, Gabe Mesanza, joins the Karma School of Business to discuss a wide variety of tactics for business leaders and private equity professionals. In this episode, we discuss:
1:20 - Gabe's path to private equity and engineering mindset
9:58 - The traits of a great business: people and culture
17:27 - Perspective into the evolution of value creation in the PE industry
25:42 - Growing through uncertain economies
33:10 - Gabe's advice to his younger self
38:58 - A life hack for handwritten note takers
For more information on Huron Capital, go to https://www.huroncapital.com/
For more information on BluWave and this podcast, go to https://www.bluwave.net/podcast
1:20 - Gabe's path to private equity and engineering mindset
9:58 - The traits of a great business: people and culture
17:27 - Perspective into the evolution of value creation in the PE industry
25:42 - Growing through uncertain economies
33:10 - Gabe's advice to his younger self
38:58 - A life hack for handwritten note takers
For more information on Huron Capital, go to https://www.huroncapital.com/
For more information on BluWave and this podcast, go to https://www.bluwave.net/podcast
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Sean Mooney:
Welcome to the Karma School of Business Podcast. In this episode, we have a fantastic conversation with Gabe Mesanza, partner and resource group lead with Huron Capital. This episode is brought to you today by BluWave. I'm Sean Mooney, BluWave's founder and CEO. BluWave is the go-to expert of those with expertise.
BluWave connects proactive business builders, including more than 500 of the world's leading private equity firms and thousands of proactive companies to the very best service providers for their critical, variable, on point and on time business needs. Enjoy. Gabe, thank you so much for joining us today.
Gabe Mesanza:
Thanks for having me.
Sean Mooney:
It's always fun to particularly this podcast we're doing in person and it's something that I personally felt like we've been missing, obviously for the last few years.
Gabe Mesanza:
Sure, absolutely.
Sean Mooney:
Great to see you in real life here.
Gabe Mesanza:
Absolutely. Absolutely, yeah.
Sean Mooney:
Maybe if we jump right in here, I'd love to hear more about the story of you. How did you come up in your career? How did you enter the private equity industry?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, I'll give you my origin story. I didn't even know this stuff existed, very honestly. I had an undergrad and master's in engineering. I was an engineer at GM. That's what I did. But I was always drawn to these situations where there was a bit of a urgency to whatever I was doing. I worked on a launch of a product at a plant. I would do different things that had... Even back then, doing things that had some time constraint or urgency to them. As I started looking at decisions that were being made, I worked at GM at the time, I looked at decisions that were being made, I just didn't understand them.
I said, "Well, I must be the unintelligent one here. How is it that someone is launching a Pontiac Aztek and they think it's a good vehicle?" I saw all these people that are in executive ranks, they have this thing called an MBA. Okay, what's an MBA? I'll go look at that. I had an engineering master's at that point. I looked into it, I said, "Well, that doesn't look that hard. I'm sure I can go do that." I went down that path and I got into consulting after business school. One of my final things I did at Deloitte was a carve out of a plant that was former Visteon sold to another company.
Then they were carving out to sell them off individually. I was like, wow, this is really interesting. There's a lot of work that goes into this that I just had never really understood. It wasn't part of my lexicon, but part of my experience. I filed that away. That's interesting. And then I did another consulting gig at another company, and I went over to KPMG to the transaction services group where it was purely due diligence, purely acquisition type work. That's where I really started getting into the world of M&A.
Not really working directly with sponsors at that time, maybe some smattering of operating partners that had existed back then, but really got me into the idea of acquisitions and how to think about a company in a scope of a finite timeframe. It really wasn't until I got into Alvarez and Marsal that I really started working directly for private equity. There I was doing due diligence, but then I got into doing interim management. We're running companies or parts of companies for sponsors.
Wow, how interesting, right? I mean, the thing that really drew me to private equity is this very focused, very deliberate approach to what we're doing. We're going to look at a company. We're going to understand what's going on right now. We're going to have a thesis about where the future's going to take us. We're going to deploy cash ourselves and equity to grow that company hopefully through more acquisitions. We're going to have a very specific focus on cash and EBITDA during the ownership cycle.
What was interesting that I had this misconception, I think, or maybe it was an outdated perception of private equity that was going in, taking on a lot of debt, pay yourself a bunch of money, cut costs, and let the company ride. This idea that you actually have to create value within the company to be able to create equity value on the backend is something that really appealed to me. I didn't feel like I was going in and just cutting costs. I was really growing companies. And that's what drove me to really focus on private equity.
I still wasn't ready to come into the industry myself, so I went to work at a startup. I ran operations somewhere, and then I was the CEO of another company. It was at that point I was looking, do I go back to consulting, or do I do something else? I got a call from Huron and met the people there, and they were very operationally focused, and it just felt like the right fit. I really believed in what Huron was doing at the time and wanted to be part of it. Long way of going about it, but it wasn't something that was natural for me that my whole life I've been thinking about this topic for sure.
Sean Mooney:
I love your description of this path. We hear that more and more in modern private equity where there's so many entry points and yet really capable people keep on finding a way to it. In some ways on paper looks planned, but it almost organically happens on this.
Gabe Mesanza:
Not planned. Not planned. My 18 year old, 22 year old self couldn't piece the things together to get to this point. There are a lot of entry points now, especially with the growth of the operating roles within the sponsors. I'm the last person you want to be talking to about capital structuring. That's not my focus area. That's where I rely on my partners to focus on those areas, and I think they rely on me on these operational ones.
Sean Mooney:
That's great. The other thing I really liked that you pointed out is I think a lot of people still have this notion that private equity is a 1980s Wall Street movie or it's Pretty Woman or something. Maybe that was the truth in the 1980s. I was too young to know, but at the time these movies came, but they stay in people's perception. I think you pointing out what the industry really is, it's about growing, it's about enhancing the value of companies versus cutting costs.
Gabe Mesanza:
I think so, if you're doing it right, I mean, I'm sure there's probably some still pullover bad actors out there. But very honestly, we buy companies from founders and connecting with them and giving them the sense that this child that they've raised is going to be in good hands going forward. It's such an emotional decision for a founder to think through that.
The only way that we could get deals done is by aligning ourselves with their interests, aligning ourselves with the growth, making sure that they understand and they believe that we're going to be good stewards of their business and we're going to grow it into something that is beyond what maybe they could have done themselves. Otherwise, I just don't see how this works. There's too much cash is cash. Everyone has it. All the sponsors have it. It's not a differentiator. You just have a fund. Again, especially with founders, you need to have something that differentiates you.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. Gabe, if we go a little deeper, I like to ask this question, we'd know you better if we knew this about you. What's one of the tidbits of trivia about yourself that would help us know you better?
Gabe Mesanza:
I think it's a bit of a surprise when I talk to people about the things that I do outside of work. As an engineer who isn't... I don't think you're ever non-engineer once you're... You're an engineer even before you get the degree.
Sean Mooney:
When you're five, you are probably the engineer.
Gabe Mesanza:
When you're five, you're tearing things apart and there's always a box of nuts and bolts that are left there after you put something together. That's how you know you're an engineer. You've made it more efficient. I've put it back together and I didn't need all the parts.
Sean Mooney:
Lots of legos probably still in your parents' home somewhere.
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, right, they're still stepping on them. You're always an engineer. There's this need that I have personally to have a very tactile approach to things. I do woodworking on the side.
Sean Mooney:
Oh wow.
Gabe Mesanza:
I'll just go down these rabbit holes around 3D printing or CNC machining and things of that nature. When I have a need at home to do something, I go, I need to hang a ladder up, instead of going to Amazon to look for something, I first go onto my computer. I design something in 3D. I print it in my 3D printer and I see if it works. Maybe it works half the time and maybe the other half I have to go back to Amazon and go buy it.
But that's something that to me is important. I like to have this idea that there's a problem, I've thought through a solution, and I've created this tangible output of it. It's minor and it's silly, but it's something that really feeds that engineer aspect of me. The intellectual curiosity around that is something that never goes away.
Sean Mooney:
What is one of the most interesting things that you've created on your 3D printer? And then in turn, what is one of the most interesting things you've built from wood?
Gabe Mesanza:
Actually just recently I did a ski holder. I had these skis that were just laying against the wall in my garage, and I went online and saw they had these ski holders. You just prop them up and these two tabs close on it and holds it up through friction. I can do that. I probably spent a couple hours or maybe a day designing on a computer, and I went through probably four or five prototypes and I finally figured out the one that worked. My skis are not hanging in the garage.
And then as far as woodworking, there's an evolution. You go from being a rough carpenter to being a cabinet maker, to being a furniture maker. I'm somewhere in the cabinet maker world. I've built three or four basements of different houses I've had, done all the framing, done all the work. I've built cabinetry in my home office. If I were ever on Zoom, you'll see them. I built all those. I'm just trying to find enough time to... And maybe some more tools. I probably need more tools.
Sean Mooney:
Always need more tools.
Gabe Mesanza:
Always need more tools to get into real furniture making. Not to sell, but just to, again, the idea of I have an idea of a piece of furniture that I've seen or something I've thought about and I go build it, see how it works.
Sean Mooney:
There's a lot of things that I'm envious of others on. Not in a bad way, but maybe I really appreciate those skills. One is people who can do music. The other thing is people who can build and create things from nothing like wood. I have zero of those skills.
Gabe Mesanza:
Man, if I could play the guitar, I'll tell you, I think everybody has a jealousy of someone who can play a guitar and sing. I cannot. I tried it. It's been miserable for anyone who's been around me. I think I've decided I'm old enough that I've decided that that ship has sailed.
Sean Mooney:
Well, you've got one of the two, so that's really good.
Gabe Mesanza:
I guess. I guess.
Sean Mooney:
Someday I'll have a hobby that I can talk about.
Gabe Mesanza:
If you need something fixed in your house, just give me a call. It's a nice backup plan. I can always be a handyman.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. We'll have you into Nashville to do biscuits and bourbon.
Gabe Mesanza:
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Sean Mooney:
Gabe, you've had this really interesting career covering a lot of the steps that give you this, I think, uniquely broad and insightful perspective on business. What are some of the traits when you first go into one of your portfolio or companies or prospective portfolio company and you're looking for traits, what are some of the traits you say this is what a good business has or could or should has that makes this company an attractive investment opportunity?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, I think it's very easy, and I used to do this, especially when I was in consulting and going through my checklist of diligence and things of that nature, Salesforce effectiveness, what's their sales and operations planning process, how their delivery mechanisms work. Great. I think the more I've experienced things and the more I learn about what works and what doesn't, it's honestly a single thing, it's the culture and the people in the company. Really the culture. Because most of the times, again, when we look at companies, we're looking at founder-led companies.
We know that in order to grow them, to create a real platform, we have to add more resources around it. But you can't have talent without culture. That's the thing that I think is the ultimate determinant of success or failure in any company, but specifically in the timeframe that we have. Is it a culture that appropriately rewards ownership of projects, of financials, of delivery or customer service, whatever that is, but they appropriately reward that, it's something they're very proud of?
Is it a company that develops their people and tries to find opportunities for them to grow personally and professionally, even if it's outside of their own company? I love when I talk to people and they say, "Well, so-and-so had this great opportunity and we couldn't keep on growing them here just because of the size that we were. I personally called someone else that I knew and found this opportunity for them." That is immeasurable, if you will. The amount of goodwill that you get.
The amount of other ability to attract more talent and retain talent is just amazing that you get with that. Do people trust each other? People in the management team or across the organization look at each other, do you get that sense that they trust each other? I mean, these are all the things I think that start to define what culture means. Culture is a very difficult thing to put two or three words. You can use a bunch of buzzwords to define it, if you will. I think you know it when you see it and when you experience it.
I definitely saw it when I joined Huron, for example, and I think I see it when I go talk to new companies that we're looking to acquire. I think they see it in us and other sponsors that are out there, what the culture is of this partner that I'm going to be in a relationship with. That to me is the single biggest trait. Honestly, the single biggest differentiator between success and failure is that quality of the leadership team and the culture they've developed. That's the only thing that holds everything together.
Sean Mooney:
I like what you shared there because, A, culture's very hard to describe, and I think you did a really nice job of describing some of the facets of what culture is. In full candor, in my earlier days, I didn't really appreciate the value.
Gabe Mesanza:
Right, I didn't either.
Sean Mooney:
Maybe it's not until later, and particularly I think in the earlier days of private equity, and it's a business that substantially evolved. It was a lot of type A people who were gathering accomplishments. And not because they were bad people, it's just that's who they were. They just didn't even think about it. It was just we're moving so fast. And then I think particularly even in COVID, a lot of people have realized this really matters, after hundreds of thousands of years we've been tribal species being together and then we suddenly were broken into little boxes.
I think everyone's got appreciation for it, but this is something that I can personally say I went through a big evolution, not only while I was in PE, but even when I started BluWave because it's like this really matters and you got to get this right. If you get that right, everything else is so much easier.
Gabe Mesanza:
Well, and generationally, and it's just easier to do. But generationally also, people aren't working for the same company for 30, 40 years anymore. You're not retiring from the company that you started working for when you were in your 20s. It's very easy to change jobs. Maybe a little bit harder right this moment, but we're still at 3.5% unemployment. If you want a job, you can get a job right now. The only thing that holds someone to your company is that culture.
It's not the salary, that's an aspect of it, but ultimately that can be replaced somewhere else. There's always someone willing to pay just a dollar more for your services. I agree with you. I mean, the thing that holds you there, the retention aspect of it is fully culture.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely.
Gabe Mesanza:
I probably didn't even do justice in describing all the different adjectives that you can say to describe culture, and I think everyone describes it a little bit differently. This is why it's more of a feeling than you can really put into words, I think at least.
Sean Mooney:
I think you're exactly right. I remember when I was getting BluWave going, it's something where I very purposely tried to say, what is our culture and our values? I intermingled them going to be, if you could... The liberating thing I experienced was you're starting with a blank slate and you could create anything you wanted it to be. We, in our early days, went through a lot of just team work sessions. What's the best way you could ever do it?
I think the one that we ended up with very purposely and intentionally trying to build is part of the secret to our success. Your founder-owner businesses, whether they did it intentionally or not, it's probably often a reflection of the values and the culture of that first core that started that company and then it nurtured, but it makes things so much easier.
Gabe Mesanza:
I think you said something that's really interesting, the idea of being deliberate about it. That it's not something that just... Even though it's maybe a little bit difficult to describe, but it's not something that just emerges out of the ground on its own. You have to be very deliberate about it. Actually, with our companies, we'll go through strategy sessions when we first buy the company. The mission, vision, values, we spent a fair amount of time on that upfront. We do it once usually.
You don't want to be messing around with that stuff on a yearly basis, but ultimately, you need a way to communicate that to other folks. Especially when we start growing, we need a way for us to be able to communicate to people that are coming into the organization what culture is to us and what it means.
Sean Mooney:
I think that's also another really insightful perspective that we hire to our culture and our values and it's part of our structured interviewing process. Occasionally, we're usually really good at hiring, but occasionally, we fire to our culture too if they're not going to... In the same way it can be extremely value added, it can be equally destructive.
Gabe Mesanza:
Well, and the same individual with the same level of talent could do a phenomenal job at one company and completely fail at a different one, because for whatever reason, the way they approach the world, the way they work just doesn't match the culture of the company. Honestly, culture is always going to win. It's going to chew up and spit out people.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. It's almost like what the Zappos used to do where they would hire people and then at the end they'd say, "I'm going to pay you if you don't want to go."
Gabe Mesanza:
No, that's right. Absolutely. I think it's how you also depart with people is also a part of the culture. It also says something to folks around and to others. I mean, we're very big proponents of, look, you might not be the right person for us at this point, but we recognize everything you've done for us to get here and we will carry you on our shoulders out the door and make sure that you have a good landing. Just because it's not the right situation right now doesn't mean that we ignore all the great things that an individual may have done for us.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. Gabe, as you think about the private equity industry and how it's evolving, the line is you've seen one private equity firm, you've seen one private equity firm. While many P firms from the outside may look similar to another, and in reality they're all quite doing things quite differently, how does your firm approach value creation?
Gabe Mesanza:
We try to do a lot of our work even ahead of the acquisition itself. As we're getting to know... We're buying primarily from founders. We're really developing a relationship. We're developing trust and really trying to understand the business. We'll start learning even before we get to the point of having a company available to us. Our sector lead spend a lot of time learning about their industry, making connections, understanding what works, what doesn't work in particular industries.
When a particular company comes up, they already have a very strong base of knowledge in that sector. There's an immediate ability to connect with that founder and have them feel like, hey, we understand, or at least from the outside end perspective, we understand the industry. We're not just here as complete idiots. And then really the work kicks off when we get to the point of an LOI. We try to do as much of the value creation planning ahead of the acquisition.
We will go in with a plan that we develop with our third party providers or diligence providers and ourselves and our river guides or operating partners that are external to us to say, okay, these are the things that are important from an investment thesis perspective. These are the things that are important to this local team. These are the gaps that exist. Do we all agree in general large buckets that these are the things that we want to go off and do?
That makes its way into our financial models so that we know what SG&A, for example, we might having to build, also what resources we have to hire. We try to pre-fund things ahead of time as well. If we know there's going to be a big digital transformation that's going to cost money, we try to pre-fund it so that we're not in the middle of a budget conversation and we say, "Oh, by the way, there's this massive project you have to allocate a million dollars to," that doesn't exist right now.
We try to do a lot of that upfront. We have a group of operating partners from the outside, phenomenal people who are very experienced, tons of great relationships that they bring to the table, really deep industry experiences, we align those guys also to our companies. And then there's an internal group that I lead that focuses on the building of the company itself, if you will. We're responsible for the value creation plan, and we work with the management team in the first 12, 18 months or however long to really go off and deploy it.
And then we work with trusted outsiders like you guys to help us in situations where we need an extra pair of hands or a specific knowledge gap that we have to deploy that value creation plan. But it's all done with the management team, with the leadership. Everyone's bought in, so that when we do buy the company, there are no questions. This is what we're going to go do.
Sean Mooney:
I really like your approach. It's been a privilege for us because we get to see how you all do things on the other side of not really necessarily the curtain, but we get to see how you all do things in multiple phases. It's really impressive. What I really liked about your approach is this idea of trying to form an idea about what the company could or should be before you even make the investment. And then refining that once you actually make the investment with the management team, but not going in and saying, "We're going to figure it out afterwards."
Gabe Mesanza:
No, I think the world... I mean, look, we have a privilege that a lot of the deals that we do are proprietary. I completely understand that might not be the case for everybody in auctions and you just don't have time. I think that a lot of the sell side bankers are doing a phenomenal job in really pushing the processes along to force decisions, which is exactly what they should be doing.
Sometimes you do have to catch things up once you buy the company, but this is why we're spending so much time ahead to learn the industry, to go to conferences, to make relationships in that industry so that we're not learning about the industry and the company at the same time. That's something that's very difficult to do. The other thing that we look at is we develop these maturity continuums along five different pillars, financial excellence, commercial, operations, IT, and human capital.
A basic maturity continuum, one to five. We also look at what do we need this company to be at in that maturity continuum along all these different metrics for us to feel like we've done our job as an investor and what do we feel as a company we want to build upon exit. We'll look at and say, "Okay, well, we have a bunch of things that we need to be leading in versus others that we just need to be baseline at." If we have too many things, say we have to be world-class, we'll probably say, "Well, that's not a deal for us. That's not something we can really win."
Realistically, if you're doing more than three, four things in any given company, it's already too many things to focus on, major initiatives. And then the other thing that helps us do as well is to see the gaps. We look at where we want to be and where the company is right now. If we see major gaps in a lot of different areas, that also tells us that maybe in this three to five year period that we have, not the right thing to go after.
Sean Mooney:
Bridge too far at some point.
Gabe Mesanza:
A little bit, right? Because there's the art of the possible and the art of the practical. And then one of the big learnings for me in transitioning from consulting to being an operator to now being in private equity is that especially I think when I was in consulting, there was a sense that, of course, this could be done. Of course, you can go do this. Of course, this is the right thing to do. Why aren't they doing this thing that is so evident in front of them? In reality, you have to be much more practical about things.
If they one thing that they always push back on our third party providers is, great, you've told me I need to go do these 10 things over the next six months. No, put yourself in the shoes of the person doing it. What are the real important things they have to go do right now? What are the things that we can wait on, and what are the things that we'll do it if we get to it? That practical approach. Maybe that makes us a little bit less aggressive, but I think it helps us build a more consistent business.
Sean Mooney:
And it makes you confident in what you can achieve by not taking too much on at once. I think that's the biggest thing, particularly from a theoretical perspective. Oh, everything. The world's your oyster. You can do all of this
Gabe Mesanza:
In engineering, in order to teach concepts, they always use a frictionless surface in a vacuum, just so you can take out externalities from whatever equation you're trying to figure out, the problem you're trying to solve. I think the intellectual approach to it that comes from sometimes when you haven't been in the seat is a little bit like that. They say, "Well, I'm going to go do these five initiatives because they're going to yield me results." Sure they are. Okay, who's going to do it? Who's going to own it?
Why should they do this versus something else that they're trying to do, again, because you can only do three or four things at a time? Oftentimes, actually in the last year, I can tell you there's been two or three situations where a couple of our companies were looking to do projects. We're going to do them in the next 12 months. We actively said, "Why don't you take 18 months to do it?" Because we kind of know from experience that that was just a lot of burden to put on the organization.
When you do that, your everyday work starts to suffer. There's the day job of selling, delivering, doing all that work that just has to happen regardless of what's happening out there in the world and what projects you're doing. When you start deploying your organization to do a special project, you start losing focus on those things that you have to do well every day. I always tell people, you have to earn the right to be strategic, and you earn the right to be strategic by doing the day-to-day activities really well.
Sean Mooney:
I really like that point. Even if I were to turn in a very candid way to light on my former self, I came up through investment banking and the deal side of private equity. It was really easy to put something in my model. You said, how can that not happen? And now that I've started and building a company, my perspective on this is very different in terms of what you can get done and focusing more on fewer things. I really, really like that process that you all do and the acknowledgement of what really can be done not only from a theoretical, but a practical perspective.
Gabe Mesanza:
Look, it's a struggle. It's a constant negotiation. It's a struggle. It's a lot of debating very honestly, because people come at it from different perspectives of what's important. This is why having that north star with the culture, with the vision of the company is something we constantly go back to. Is this thing, whatever this thing is, going to help us get there? If not, why are we doing it?
Sean Mooney:
That makes a ton of sense. This economy that we're in and have been in is almost like, I think about it, it's almost like summer in Florida. You've got these storm clouds that are whipping through. It's not raining everywhere, but it's raining a lot of places. There's pockets of sun. There may or may not be a big storm cloud right off the horizon. You're not sure if it's going to hit where you are or miss you.
Within this, there's all this churn and unease, but there's still some really good things going on. As you think about thematically with your portfolio companies, how do you help them think through not only being safe and get your foundation steady just in case or to weather the potential storm that's coming, but also to say, "No, we're going to go find success as well?"
Gabe Mesanza:
To extend of that analogy, I think of this as a... And I grew up in Florida, so I'm very familiar with it. This is that really humid damp blanket that you have after the storm I think is what's happening now in the economy, where it's just getting through every day seems like a sly. Everything just seems harder these days. I go back to the basics of earning the right to be strategic is doing those basics. The basic is focus on cash. Just understand your cash position because that is really the lifeblood of the company.
If you're struggling with cash, then you really can't think about much else, very honestly. That is all consuming, and it leads you to short-term decisions that are often counter to to the long-term goals of the company. That to me is first, second, third. In a crisis, focus on cash. I did a number of turnaround work at A&M and that's exactly what we did. Let's just take that as the obvious, assuming your cash position is fine. This is the time to get really close to your customers. It's understanding who are your buyers, not what company are your buyers.
Who specifically at the company is your buyer? Who is the decision maker that can really make a difference? What's your relationship with them? How often are you talking to them? What does that conversion look like from a funnel perspective? Why are they buying from me versus someone else? What pressures are there on themselves that they're seeing that are going to get transferred one way or another over to me or provide an opportunity for me to provide a solution for them, if you will?
Why are we differentiated? Why should you buy from me versus someone else? Really getting close on that. We have two or three projects right now across the portfolio on Salesforce effectiveness, funnel management, pipeline management, things of that nature, conversions from top to the bottom of the funnel. The other one is that, again, assuming you're in a good cash position, assuming that that you're close to your customers and the revenue is still coming in, great time to do M&A right now.
Despite the interest rates where they are, despite whatever, this is a phenomenon opportunity, especially for us in buy and built environment. We're buying small companies. We're trying to aggregate regions or groups of services together. Tons of opportunities out there for people who are getting close to retirement potentially and they're just looking around and saying, "Ugh, I just don't want to do this anymore. I've gone through this in the '80s, in early '90s. I went through this in 2001.
I went through this in 2008. I just don't have another one in me." It's a great opportunity to have a strong company to then aggregate other opportunities there. We're continuing to do deals. For us, it's really not slowing down. But again, it makes the assumption that you have an underlying company that is able to absorb that is good. And that's why, again, we focus so much upfront on creating that platform. For us, if we don't do an acquisition the first year, that's fine.
If we're building the infrastructure to then be able to every acquisition that happens happens faster and your returns are higher for the acquisition, then great. But now is really a good opportunity I think for those of us who are able to.
Sean Mooney:
I think those are great points that every business leader should think about and embrace. The M&A is going to be a little harder if you don't have a private equity partner. But if you do or you want one, this is the perfect time to do some very unique things. Also, your point on liquidity I think is an important one because I think it's lost on so many.
Maybe like you, my formative experiences as a young professional were in Houlihan Lokey's Financial Restructuring Group, and I learned very early on good companies don't necessarily go out of business because they're good or bad, they go out of business because they run out of cash.
Gabe Mesanza:
Absolutely. We've seen a couple of examples of that here recently. Having worked for large companies, even sometimes we ran into really good executives that ran business units and you ask the question of cash, they never even thought about it. Cash was just something that was there and it was swept at the end of the day. When you needed to do a project, you went and asked for the money and it showed up. The idea of cash is not something that is natural for a lot of people, and it's surprising the number of people who mistake EBITDA for cash.
Not being an accountant, not being a base financial person, I look at statements of cashflow. I'm like, well, that's garbage for me. I need to know how much cash is coming in today, how much cash is going out, how much cash is coming in today. I don't really care what the math tells me. That's something that I think is missed on all of people because you're just never exposed to it. Not right, wrong or indifferent, just never exposed to it.
Sean Mooney:
I think a great exercise, particularly for smaller businesses that haven't been backed by PE, is try to forecast your cashflow on a 13-week basis week to week and see if you can do it.
Gabe Mesanza:
One of the first things we do is a 13-week cashflow. It's interesting for founders, a lot of their personal finances are intertwined with the company, a lot of their personal expenses flow through the company, whether it's a car or whatever the case is. You look at your bank account. Do I have cash or do I not have cash? It's a different decision. The moment that you start adding debt to a company and you have quarterly debt payments that you have to make, boy, that really becomes some different level of conversation.
The change to being owned by private equity is that we really only want to put in equity or cash into a company to grow it, to build it, to buy other things. We don't want to put cash in to run the operations. Founders very often will do that to keep it going, which is exactly as they should do, but the dynamic changes, and so helping founders go through that transition to understand that this is something that's absolutely needed. It's the lack of experience. That's all it is.
Sean Mooney:
But it's a great lesson, I think, for every business builder out there to be thinking about.
Gabe Mesanza:
I would say if you're looking to sell your business, start thinking about that right now because it's going to come at you and you might as well just get into it and understand it and whatnot. You don't have to do it formally. You can just informally talk to the person that's usually a controller or something like that that's handling your finances and say, "Okay, let's sit down and do it." You don't need to do it 13 weeks. Start with four weeks, and then go to six weeks, go to eight weeks, go to 10 week.
See how far you can take it and just see what decisions it drives you to make or not make with that. You might find that one of your core beliefs is that you want to pay your suppliers in 15 days. That's great, phenomenal, but you have 30 days to pay it and you're not getting any benefit from paying it in 15 days. It's a nice to have, but what would it do to your cashflow if you paid them in 30 instead of 15, well within the contract? It's little things like that that I think forces you to be more thoughtful about it.
Sean Mooney:
I think you're exactly right, and it's the same thing I do too. I look at the cashflow statement first. That's a really good discipline I think for any business builder. I think the points you brought up are... If you're not on it, you should try and you should learn and work on getting better. Like you said, just start somewhere. It doesn't have to be try it one week, four week, eight weeks.
Gabe Mesanza:
I like cash because it's a leading indicator. I can't be profitable on EBITDA basis if I'm not generating cash. I might as well just look at generating cash.
Sean Mooney:
That's what matters. Suddenly it's in vogue again, so it's good to hear.
Gabe Mesanza:
I don't think it ever went out of style, but then again, look how I'm dressed.
Sean Mooney:
Speaking of things in the past, in the future and lesson learned, one of the things that I love about working with BluWave and working with really, really insightful folks like you is I learn things every day where I wish I've said, why didn't I know this before? It's very humbling to work with all these exceptional folks like you, Gabe. I always go, wow, if I could go back and meet my 22-year-old self, what would I share? There's pages and pages, if not volumes of it. What would be one of the things if you look back and went to younger Gabe?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, it's a dangerous thing to look backwards because it's a lot of regrets if you really start analyzing things. Especially if you then asked the question of someone else, what should they have done differently, you get another volume, another Encyclopedia Britannica. This is a question that you posed to me earlier, and I really had to think about it. To a comment that you made earlier about you approach things in a very hard hitting, just getting to the next level, and early on that's really all that mattered to me. I was just thinking about, I worked at GM, how do I get from this level to this next level?
How do I get promoted? What's my next thing I'm going to go off and do? When I was in consulting, I was also, how do I get promoted from senior associate to manager to director, senior director, things of that nature? Always chasing that next immediate thing. And then I achieved a lot at a very young age. But now interestingly enough, the things that I find myself connecting with these founders on are those things in my 20s, are those very tactical engineering type aspects, is the fact that I worked at a plant, the fact that I spent time supervising hourly people.
I did all these things in my early days. Those are the things I find myself connecting with founders a lot more now rather than whatever I may have done, some integration planning or some other. The things that I've done tactically are the things that matter and the things I can connect with. I wish I would've taken more time in such a hurry early on in my career to get past that doing things with your hands type and that daily and hourly requirement of a business.
Once you start progressing in business and especially in private equity, we lose touch with the idea that someone has to be thinking about a topic on an hourly basis. If you're in a manufacturing environment, you have a hour by hour boards that are on a shop floor and people are measured, did you achieve that output at that quality level? In our service businesses, I try to push people to think about winning the day. For me to win the day, it means I need to win that morning, which means every piece of equipment has to be available for the employee when they show up.
They can get what they need. They know where they're going to go. They go off and do it. It's not like when I do a project and I have to go to Home Depot 10 times to finish it, that's okay in my personal life, not okay in business. But just understanding the fact that at some point, the people who actually make money for you are thinking about things in a very discreet hour by hour basis, project by project basis. I wish that I would've spent more time in that world earlier on, not been in such a hurry to get into more of the business side of things, to get promoted to do all these other things.
Just take your time there. These other things are going to come at you, but just take your time in those early experiences. I think that's the feedback I would give to people coming out of college now. Don't worry about where your first job is. It doesn't define your career. But just spend enough time there so that you can really get a sense of appreciation of what exactly has to happen in those levels before you move on.
Sean Mooney:
I think that's great advice. Certainly this whole idea of always being present in whatever you're in now.
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, right, that's a good word for it.
Sean Mooney:
And learning the basics, because it's all cumulating, it's all foundational, and it builds on things. I 1,000% wish I did that more the same thing because you're always looking so far ahead and whatever ribbon or badge or metal you're trying to get. Certainly I was 1,000% the same way, but understanding that path and where you are now and being okay with understanding it while not looking past it is something that I think anyone can...
Gabe Mesanza:
And especially now that our useful working lives have been extended. Starting in your 20s, I mean, you could be working close to 70 and beyond. We have plenty of people that we work with that are in their 70s, very productive, very active, and love spending time with them because of the level of knowledge that they bring. Just pace yourself.
Sean Mooney:
It's a marathon. There's a tortoise and a hare.
Gabe Mesanza:
I thought about my career in decades. I thought about my 20s of doing phase of my life and the 30s about the practicing in the 40s about leading, I'm 47 now. I always accelerate it by two or three years. At the end of that decade, I was always kind of like, yeah, okay, I'm going on to the next thing. I just really wish I would spend the time.
Sean Mooney:
Yeah, absolutely. It's one of those things that it's really hard in the time to do it. But once you figure out how do you just look around while you're on this path, it certainly makes life more enjoyable, but it's also...
Gabe Mesanza:
It might not be a realistic thing to give people advice on because new opportunities present themselves when you do a good job and there's a natural momentum to progress people fast when the right situations come up for them and it's exciting for you financially, personally, and whatnot. I think it's only something that you can reflect on when you're our age.
Sean Mooney:
Exactly, in retrospect.
Gabe Mesanza:
I don't think when you're in it. When you're in the middle of it, I don't know that you can really absorb it.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely, and I still struggle with it today.
Gabe Mesanza:
That's right. That's right. You're always thinking about the next set of meetings and whatnot. Just absorb what's going on right now. Be present.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. The last question for you that I'd love to get your perspective on as an engineer's mind, someone who's dealing with a hectic world, this whole notion of that I always try to figure out and tinker with and is these little life hacks or gizmos and gadgets or things that can make your life just a little better, a little more fun. Do you have any of those in your life?
Gabe Mesanza:
Very recently, I have this mental quirk where I can't remember something that I don't hand write. Maybe I've always been an old man. I don't know. I just can't remember something that I don't hand write. But once I hand write it, I almost have a photographic memory about it. It's just a weird quirk. I've never been able to take notes on a laptop, for example. I also don't like being in a meeting and everyone has their laptops in front of them. It's almost like a shield. It's a barrier. I don't like having that to communicate with people.
I used to carry a notebook everywhere. It was great because it got me what I needed, but I couldn't refer back very easily because I would have sequential meetings of different topics and I'd have to go chase it back to remember what date it was. I just switched over everything on an iPad and I went through a couple of those e-readers and figured out I didn't like how they worked. I decided to just use my old trusty iPad and I got a cover for it that has a little bit more resistance to it, so it feels more like handwriting.
I use the Apple Pen. I use an app called Goodnotes that allows me to... You write it down, and then you can search against your handwriting. I mean, I'm probably maybe four months into this. Love it.
Sean Mooney:
Game changer.
Gabe Mesanza:
Love it. Game changer.
Sean Mooney:
How good is your handwriting?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, it's pretty good. I do find myself... Again, being an engineer, I'll erase things that I write because I just don't like the way it looked.
Sean Mooney:
Okay.
Gabe Mesanza:
As I'm writing, I'll just look at it... Again, just...
Sean Mooney:
Precision and process.
Gabe Mesanza:
You're going to learn about my quirks. I'll write something and say, "I just don't like the way that word looks." It'll erase it and write it over again. But also what it allows me to do is I'll go back after a meeting and I'll sometimes rewrite my notes to better reflect the actual point that was versus my stream of consciousness notes. It's been really interesting to edit the past, if you will, on my notes and create something that gives me a little bit more longevity later on. I'm a convert.
Sean Mooney:
That's great. I'm going to have to look into that because I similarly like to write things down and I have hundreds of these Moleskine books somewhere, but I can never find the notes when I need them. It's really more about getting it into my head in a more efficient way, but I can never go back.
Gabe Mesanza:
I started using this other app Todoist it's called, which is just a to-do list, very honestly. You can put classify, you can put dates to it. I'm probably using 10% of the capabilities of the thing. But again, maybe as an engineer, I like the idea of checking things off.
Sean Mooney:
Yeah, satisfaction.
Gabe Mesanza:
There's very much satisfaction of I can check that off and it physically disappears from the things to do. That's something that, again, maybe it's the engineering mindset, I just enjoy that.
Sean Mooney:
It makes a lot of sense. There's gratification in just being able to accomplish something.
Gabe Mesanza:
Kind of. Kind of. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Sean Mooney:
Well, this has been great, Gabe. I've learned a ton across a whole host of topics here. Thank you so much for joining us today. It's really generous.
Gabe Mesanza:
No, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thank you.
Sean Mooney:
Thank you. Special thanks to Gabe for joining. If you'd like to learn more about Gabe and Huron Capital, please see the episode notes. That's all we have for today. For more information on this podcast and BluWave, go to bluwave.net/podcast. That's B-L-U-W-A-V-E. Please continue to look for us anywhere you find your favorite podcast, including Apple, Google, and Spotify.
We truly appreciate your support. If you like what you hear, please follow, review, and share. It really helps us when you do those things, so thank you in advance. In the meantime, let us know if there's anything we can do to support your success onward.
Welcome to the Karma School of Business Podcast. In this episode, we have a fantastic conversation with Gabe Mesanza, partner and resource group lead with Huron Capital. This episode is brought to you today by BluWave. I'm Sean Mooney, BluWave's founder and CEO. BluWave is the go-to expert of those with expertise.
BluWave connects proactive business builders, including more than 500 of the world's leading private equity firms and thousands of proactive companies to the very best service providers for their critical, variable, on point and on time business needs. Enjoy. Gabe, thank you so much for joining us today.
Gabe Mesanza:
Thanks for having me.
Sean Mooney:
It's always fun to particularly this podcast we're doing in person and it's something that I personally felt like we've been missing, obviously for the last few years.
Gabe Mesanza:
Sure, absolutely.
Sean Mooney:
Great to see you in real life here.
Gabe Mesanza:
Absolutely. Absolutely, yeah.
Sean Mooney:
Maybe if we jump right in here, I'd love to hear more about the story of you. How did you come up in your career? How did you enter the private equity industry?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, I'll give you my origin story. I didn't even know this stuff existed, very honestly. I had an undergrad and master's in engineering. I was an engineer at GM. That's what I did. But I was always drawn to these situations where there was a bit of a urgency to whatever I was doing. I worked on a launch of a product at a plant. I would do different things that had... Even back then, doing things that had some time constraint or urgency to them. As I started looking at decisions that were being made, I worked at GM at the time, I looked at decisions that were being made, I just didn't understand them.
I said, "Well, I must be the unintelligent one here. How is it that someone is launching a Pontiac Aztek and they think it's a good vehicle?" I saw all these people that are in executive ranks, they have this thing called an MBA. Okay, what's an MBA? I'll go look at that. I had an engineering master's at that point. I looked into it, I said, "Well, that doesn't look that hard. I'm sure I can go do that." I went down that path and I got into consulting after business school. One of my final things I did at Deloitte was a carve out of a plant that was former Visteon sold to another company.
Then they were carving out to sell them off individually. I was like, wow, this is really interesting. There's a lot of work that goes into this that I just had never really understood. It wasn't part of my lexicon, but part of my experience. I filed that away. That's interesting. And then I did another consulting gig at another company, and I went over to KPMG to the transaction services group where it was purely due diligence, purely acquisition type work. That's where I really started getting into the world of M&A.
Not really working directly with sponsors at that time, maybe some smattering of operating partners that had existed back then, but really got me into the idea of acquisitions and how to think about a company in a scope of a finite timeframe. It really wasn't until I got into Alvarez and Marsal that I really started working directly for private equity. There I was doing due diligence, but then I got into doing interim management. We're running companies or parts of companies for sponsors.
Wow, how interesting, right? I mean, the thing that really drew me to private equity is this very focused, very deliberate approach to what we're doing. We're going to look at a company. We're going to understand what's going on right now. We're going to have a thesis about where the future's going to take us. We're going to deploy cash ourselves and equity to grow that company hopefully through more acquisitions. We're going to have a very specific focus on cash and EBITDA during the ownership cycle.
What was interesting that I had this misconception, I think, or maybe it was an outdated perception of private equity that was going in, taking on a lot of debt, pay yourself a bunch of money, cut costs, and let the company ride. This idea that you actually have to create value within the company to be able to create equity value on the backend is something that really appealed to me. I didn't feel like I was going in and just cutting costs. I was really growing companies. And that's what drove me to really focus on private equity.
I still wasn't ready to come into the industry myself, so I went to work at a startup. I ran operations somewhere, and then I was the CEO of another company. It was at that point I was looking, do I go back to consulting, or do I do something else? I got a call from Huron and met the people there, and they were very operationally focused, and it just felt like the right fit. I really believed in what Huron was doing at the time and wanted to be part of it. Long way of going about it, but it wasn't something that was natural for me that my whole life I've been thinking about this topic for sure.
Sean Mooney:
I love your description of this path. We hear that more and more in modern private equity where there's so many entry points and yet really capable people keep on finding a way to it. In some ways on paper looks planned, but it almost organically happens on this.
Gabe Mesanza:
Not planned. Not planned. My 18 year old, 22 year old self couldn't piece the things together to get to this point. There are a lot of entry points now, especially with the growth of the operating roles within the sponsors. I'm the last person you want to be talking to about capital structuring. That's not my focus area. That's where I rely on my partners to focus on those areas, and I think they rely on me on these operational ones.
Sean Mooney:
That's great. The other thing I really liked that you pointed out is I think a lot of people still have this notion that private equity is a 1980s Wall Street movie or it's Pretty Woman or something. Maybe that was the truth in the 1980s. I was too young to know, but at the time these movies came, but they stay in people's perception. I think you pointing out what the industry really is, it's about growing, it's about enhancing the value of companies versus cutting costs.
Gabe Mesanza:
I think so, if you're doing it right, I mean, I'm sure there's probably some still pullover bad actors out there. But very honestly, we buy companies from founders and connecting with them and giving them the sense that this child that they've raised is going to be in good hands going forward. It's such an emotional decision for a founder to think through that.
The only way that we could get deals done is by aligning ourselves with their interests, aligning ourselves with the growth, making sure that they understand and they believe that we're going to be good stewards of their business and we're going to grow it into something that is beyond what maybe they could have done themselves. Otherwise, I just don't see how this works. There's too much cash is cash. Everyone has it. All the sponsors have it. It's not a differentiator. You just have a fund. Again, especially with founders, you need to have something that differentiates you.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. Gabe, if we go a little deeper, I like to ask this question, we'd know you better if we knew this about you. What's one of the tidbits of trivia about yourself that would help us know you better?
Gabe Mesanza:
I think it's a bit of a surprise when I talk to people about the things that I do outside of work. As an engineer who isn't... I don't think you're ever non-engineer once you're... You're an engineer even before you get the degree.
Sean Mooney:
When you're five, you are probably the engineer.
Gabe Mesanza:
When you're five, you're tearing things apart and there's always a box of nuts and bolts that are left there after you put something together. That's how you know you're an engineer. You've made it more efficient. I've put it back together and I didn't need all the parts.
Sean Mooney:
Lots of legos probably still in your parents' home somewhere.
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, right, they're still stepping on them. You're always an engineer. There's this need that I have personally to have a very tactile approach to things. I do woodworking on the side.
Sean Mooney:
Oh wow.
Gabe Mesanza:
I'll just go down these rabbit holes around 3D printing or CNC machining and things of that nature. When I have a need at home to do something, I go, I need to hang a ladder up, instead of going to Amazon to look for something, I first go onto my computer. I design something in 3D. I print it in my 3D printer and I see if it works. Maybe it works half the time and maybe the other half I have to go back to Amazon and go buy it.
But that's something that to me is important. I like to have this idea that there's a problem, I've thought through a solution, and I've created this tangible output of it. It's minor and it's silly, but it's something that really feeds that engineer aspect of me. The intellectual curiosity around that is something that never goes away.
Sean Mooney:
What is one of the most interesting things that you've created on your 3D printer? And then in turn, what is one of the most interesting things you've built from wood?
Gabe Mesanza:
Actually just recently I did a ski holder. I had these skis that were just laying against the wall in my garage, and I went online and saw they had these ski holders. You just prop them up and these two tabs close on it and holds it up through friction. I can do that. I probably spent a couple hours or maybe a day designing on a computer, and I went through probably four or five prototypes and I finally figured out the one that worked. My skis are not hanging in the garage.
And then as far as woodworking, there's an evolution. You go from being a rough carpenter to being a cabinet maker, to being a furniture maker. I'm somewhere in the cabinet maker world. I've built three or four basements of different houses I've had, done all the framing, done all the work. I've built cabinetry in my home office. If I were ever on Zoom, you'll see them. I built all those. I'm just trying to find enough time to... And maybe some more tools. I probably need more tools.
Sean Mooney:
Always need more tools.
Gabe Mesanza:
Always need more tools to get into real furniture making. Not to sell, but just to, again, the idea of I have an idea of a piece of furniture that I've seen or something I've thought about and I go build it, see how it works.
Sean Mooney:
There's a lot of things that I'm envious of others on. Not in a bad way, but maybe I really appreciate those skills. One is people who can do music. The other thing is people who can build and create things from nothing like wood. I have zero of those skills.
Gabe Mesanza:
Man, if I could play the guitar, I'll tell you, I think everybody has a jealousy of someone who can play a guitar and sing. I cannot. I tried it. It's been miserable for anyone who's been around me. I think I've decided I'm old enough that I've decided that that ship has sailed.
Sean Mooney:
Well, you've got one of the two, so that's really good.
Gabe Mesanza:
I guess. I guess.
Sean Mooney:
Someday I'll have a hobby that I can talk about.
Gabe Mesanza:
If you need something fixed in your house, just give me a call. It's a nice backup plan. I can always be a handyman.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. We'll have you into Nashville to do biscuits and bourbon.
Gabe Mesanza:
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Sean Mooney:
Gabe, you've had this really interesting career covering a lot of the steps that give you this, I think, uniquely broad and insightful perspective on business. What are some of the traits when you first go into one of your portfolio or companies or prospective portfolio company and you're looking for traits, what are some of the traits you say this is what a good business has or could or should has that makes this company an attractive investment opportunity?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, I think it's very easy, and I used to do this, especially when I was in consulting and going through my checklist of diligence and things of that nature, Salesforce effectiveness, what's their sales and operations planning process, how their delivery mechanisms work. Great. I think the more I've experienced things and the more I learn about what works and what doesn't, it's honestly a single thing, it's the culture and the people in the company. Really the culture. Because most of the times, again, when we look at companies, we're looking at founder-led companies.
We know that in order to grow them, to create a real platform, we have to add more resources around it. But you can't have talent without culture. That's the thing that I think is the ultimate determinant of success or failure in any company, but specifically in the timeframe that we have. Is it a culture that appropriately rewards ownership of projects, of financials, of delivery or customer service, whatever that is, but they appropriately reward that, it's something they're very proud of?
Is it a company that develops their people and tries to find opportunities for them to grow personally and professionally, even if it's outside of their own company? I love when I talk to people and they say, "Well, so-and-so had this great opportunity and we couldn't keep on growing them here just because of the size that we were. I personally called someone else that I knew and found this opportunity for them." That is immeasurable, if you will. The amount of goodwill that you get.
The amount of other ability to attract more talent and retain talent is just amazing that you get with that. Do people trust each other? People in the management team or across the organization look at each other, do you get that sense that they trust each other? I mean, these are all the things I think that start to define what culture means. Culture is a very difficult thing to put two or three words. You can use a bunch of buzzwords to define it, if you will. I think you know it when you see it and when you experience it.
I definitely saw it when I joined Huron, for example, and I think I see it when I go talk to new companies that we're looking to acquire. I think they see it in us and other sponsors that are out there, what the culture is of this partner that I'm going to be in a relationship with. That to me is the single biggest trait. Honestly, the single biggest differentiator between success and failure is that quality of the leadership team and the culture they've developed. That's the only thing that holds everything together.
Sean Mooney:
I like what you shared there because, A, culture's very hard to describe, and I think you did a really nice job of describing some of the facets of what culture is. In full candor, in my earlier days, I didn't really appreciate the value.
Gabe Mesanza:
Right, I didn't either.
Sean Mooney:
Maybe it's not until later, and particularly I think in the earlier days of private equity, and it's a business that substantially evolved. It was a lot of type A people who were gathering accomplishments. And not because they were bad people, it's just that's who they were. They just didn't even think about it. It was just we're moving so fast. And then I think particularly even in COVID, a lot of people have realized this really matters, after hundreds of thousands of years we've been tribal species being together and then we suddenly were broken into little boxes.
I think everyone's got appreciation for it, but this is something that I can personally say I went through a big evolution, not only while I was in PE, but even when I started BluWave because it's like this really matters and you got to get this right. If you get that right, everything else is so much easier.
Gabe Mesanza:
Well, and generationally, and it's just easier to do. But generationally also, people aren't working for the same company for 30, 40 years anymore. You're not retiring from the company that you started working for when you were in your 20s. It's very easy to change jobs. Maybe a little bit harder right this moment, but we're still at 3.5% unemployment. If you want a job, you can get a job right now. The only thing that holds someone to your company is that culture.
It's not the salary, that's an aspect of it, but ultimately that can be replaced somewhere else. There's always someone willing to pay just a dollar more for your services. I agree with you. I mean, the thing that holds you there, the retention aspect of it is fully culture.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely.
Gabe Mesanza:
I probably didn't even do justice in describing all the different adjectives that you can say to describe culture, and I think everyone describes it a little bit differently. This is why it's more of a feeling than you can really put into words, I think at least.
Sean Mooney:
I think you're exactly right. I remember when I was getting BluWave going, it's something where I very purposely tried to say, what is our culture and our values? I intermingled them going to be, if you could... The liberating thing I experienced was you're starting with a blank slate and you could create anything you wanted it to be. We, in our early days, went through a lot of just team work sessions. What's the best way you could ever do it?
I think the one that we ended up with very purposely and intentionally trying to build is part of the secret to our success. Your founder-owner businesses, whether they did it intentionally or not, it's probably often a reflection of the values and the culture of that first core that started that company and then it nurtured, but it makes things so much easier.
Gabe Mesanza:
I think you said something that's really interesting, the idea of being deliberate about it. That it's not something that just... Even though it's maybe a little bit difficult to describe, but it's not something that just emerges out of the ground on its own. You have to be very deliberate about it. Actually, with our companies, we'll go through strategy sessions when we first buy the company. The mission, vision, values, we spent a fair amount of time on that upfront. We do it once usually.
You don't want to be messing around with that stuff on a yearly basis, but ultimately, you need a way to communicate that to other folks. Especially when we start growing, we need a way for us to be able to communicate to people that are coming into the organization what culture is to us and what it means.
Sean Mooney:
I think that's also another really insightful perspective that we hire to our culture and our values and it's part of our structured interviewing process. Occasionally, we're usually really good at hiring, but occasionally, we fire to our culture too if they're not going to... In the same way it can be extremely value added, it can be equally destructive.
Gabe Mesanza:
Well, and the same individual with the same level of talent could do a phenomenal job at one company and completely fail at a different one, because for whatever reason, the way they approach the world, the way they work just doesn't match the culture of the company. Honestly, culture is always going to win. It's going to chew up and spit out people.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. It's almost like what the Zappos used to do where they would hire people and then at the end they'd say, "I'm going to pay you if you don't want to go."
Gabe Mesanza:
No, that's right. Absolutely. I think it's how you also depart with people is also a part of the culture. It also says something to folks around and to others. I mean, we're very big proponents of, look, you might not be the right person for us at this point, but we recognize everything you've done for us to get here and we will carry you on our shoulders out the door and make sure that you have a good landing. Just because it's not the right situation right now doesn't mean that we ignore all the great things that an individual may have done for us.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. Gabe, as you think about the private equity industry and how it's evolving, the line is you've seen one private equity firm, you've seen one private equity firm. While many P firms from the outside may look similar to another, and in reality they're all quite doing things quite differently, how does your firm approach value creation?
Gabe Mesanza:
We try to do a lot of our work even ahead of the acquisition itself. As we're getting to know... We're buying primarily from founders. We're really developing a relationship. We're developing trust and really trying to understand the business. We'll start learning even before we get to the point of having a company available to us. Our sector lead spend a lot of time learning about their industry, making connections, understanding what works, what doesn't work in particular industries.
When a particular company comes up, they already have a very strong base of knowledge in that sector. There's an immediate ability to connect with that founder and have them feel like, hey, we understand, or at least from the outside end perspective, we understand the industry. We're not just here as complete idiots. And then really the work kicks off when we get to the point of an LOI. We try to do as much of the value creation planning ahead of the acquisition.
We will go in with a plan that we develop with our third party providers or diligence providers and ourselves and our river guides or operating partners that are external to us to say, okay, these are the things that are important from an investment thesis perspective. These are the things that are important to this local team. These are the gaps that exist. Do we all agree in general large buckets that these are the things that we want to go off and do?
That makes its way into our financial models so that we know what SG&A, for example, we might having to build, also what resources we have to hire. We try to pre-fund things ahead of time as well. If we know there's going to be a big digital transformation that's going to cost money, we try to pre-fund it so that we're not in the middle of a budget conversation and we say, "Oh, by the way, there's this massive project you have to allocate a million dollars to," that doesn't exist right now.
We try to do a lot of that upfront. We have a group of operating partners from the outside, phenomenal people who are very experienced, tons of great relationships that they bring to the table, really deep industry experiences, we align those guys also to our companies. And then there's an internal group that I lead that focuses on the building of the company itself, if you will. We're responsible for the value creation plan, and we work with the management team in the first 12, 18 months or however long to really go off and deploy it.
And then we work with trusted outsiders like you guys to help us in situations where we need an extra pair of hands or a specific knowledge gap that we have to deploy that value creation plan. But it's all done with the management team, with the leadership. Everyone's bought in, so that when we do buy the company, there are no questions. This is what we're going to go do.
Sean Mooney:
I really like your approach. It's been a privilege for us because we get to see how you all do things on the other side of not really necessarily the curtain, but we get to see how you all do things in multiple phases. It's really impressive. What I really liked about your approach is this idea of trying to form an idea about what the company could or should be before you even make the investment. And then refining that once you actually make the investment with the management team, but not going in and saying, "We're going to figure it out afterwards."
Gabe Mesanza:
No, I think the world... I mean, look, we have a privilege that a lot of the deals that we do are proprietary. I completely understand that might not be the case for everybody in auctions and you just don't have time. I think that a lot of the sell side bankers are doing a phenomenal job in really pushing the processes along to force decisions, which is exactly what they should be doing.
Sometimes you do have to catch things up once you buy the company, but this is why we're spending so much time ahead to learn the industry, to go to conferences, to make relationships in that industry so that we're not learning about the industry and the company at the same time. That's something that's very difficult to do. The other thing that we look at is we develop these maturity continuums along five different pillars, financial excellence, commercial, operations, IT, and human capital.
A basic maturity continuum, one to five. We also look at what do we need this company to be at in that maturity continuum along all these different metrics for us to feel like we've done our job as an investor and what do we feel as a company we want to build upon exit. We'll look at and say, "Okay, well, we have a bunch of things that we need to be leading in versus others that we just need to be baseline at." If we have too many things, say we have to be world-class, we'll probably say, "Well, that's not a deal for us. That's not something we can really win."
Realistically, if you're doing more than three, four things in any given company, it's already too many things to focus on, major initiatives. And then the other thing that helps us do as well is to see the gaps. We look at where we want to be and where the company is right now. If we see major gaps in a lot of different areas, that also tells us that maybe in this three to five year period that we have, not the right thing to go after.
Sean Mooney:
Bridge too far at some point.
Gabe Mesanza:
A little bit, right? Because there's the art of the possible and the art of the practical. And then one of the big learnings for me in transitioning from consulting to being an operator to now being in private equity is that especially I think when I was in consulting, there was a sense that, of course, this could be done. Of course, you can go do this. Of course, this is the right thing to do. Why aren't they doing this thing that is so evident in front of them? In reality, you have to be much more practical about things.
If they one thing that they always push back on our third party providers is, great, you've told me I need to go do these 10 things over the next six months. No, put yourself in the shoes of the person doing it. What are the real important things they have to go do right now? What are the things that we can wait on, and what are the things that we'll do it if we get to it? That practical approach. Maybe that makes us a little bit less aggressive, but I think it helps us build a more consistent business.
Sean Mooney:
And it makes you confident in what you can achieve by not taking too much on at once. I think that's the biggest thing, particularly from a theoretical perspective. Oh, everything. The world's your oyster. You can do all of this
Gabe Mesanza:
In engineering, in order to teach concepts, they always use a frictionless surface in a vacuum, just so you can take out externalities from whatever equation you're trying to figure out, the problem you're trying to solve. I think the intellectual approach to it that comes from sometimes when you haven't been in the seat is a little bit like that. They say, "Well, I'm going to go do these five initiatives because they're going to yield me results." Sure they are. Okay, who's going to do it? Who's going to own it?
Why should they do this versus something else that they're trying to do, again, because you can only do three or four things at a time? Oftentimes, actually in the last year, I can tell you there's been two or three situations where a couple of our companies were looking to do projects. We're going to do them in the next 12 months. We actively said, "Why don't you take 18 months to do it?" Because we kind of know from experience that that was just a lot of burden to put on the organization.
When you do that, your everyday work starts to suffer. There's the day job of selling, delivering, doing all that work that just has to happen regardless of what's happening out there in the world and what projects you're doing. When you start deploying your organization to do a special project, you start losing focus on those things that you have to do well every day. I always tell people, you have to earn the right to be strategic, and you earn the right to be strategic by doing the day-to-day activities really well.
Sean Mooney:
I really like that point. Even if I were to turn in a very candid way to light on my former self, I came up through investment banking and the deal side of private equity. It was really easy to put something in my model. You said, how can that not happen? And now that I've started and building a company, my perspective on this is very different in terms of what you can get done and focusing more on fewer things. I really, really like that process that you all do and the acknowledgement of what really can be done not only from a theoretical, but a practical perspective.
Gabe Mesanza:
Look, it's a struggle. It's a constant negotiation. It's a struggle. It's a lot of debating very honestly, because people come at it from different perspectives of what's important. This is why having that north star with the culture, with the vision of the company is something we constantly go back to. Is this thing, whatever this thing is, going to help us get there? If not, why are we doing it?
Sean Mooney:
That makes a ton of sense. This economy that we're in and have been in is almost like, I think about it, it's almost like summer in Florida. You've got these storm clouds that are whipping through. It's not raining everywhere, but it's raining a lot of places. There's pockets of sun. There may or may not be a big storm cloud right off the horizon. You're not sure if it's going to hit where you are or miss you.
Within this, there's all this churn and unease, but there's still some really good things going on. As you think about thematically with your portfolio companies, how do you help them think through not only being safe and get your foundation steady just in case or to weather the potential storm that's coming, but also to say, "No, we're going to go find success as well?"
Gabe Mesanza:
To extend of that analogy, I think of this as a... And I grew up in Florida, so I'm very familiar with it. This is that really humid damp blanket that you have after the storm I think is what's happening now in the economy, where it's just getting through every day seems like a sly. Everything just seems harder these days. I go back to the basics of earning the right to be strategic is doing those basics. The basic is focus on cash. Just understand your cash position because that is really the lifeblood of the company.
If you're struggling with cash, then you really can't think about much else, very honestly. That is all consuming, and it leads you to short-term decisions that are often counter to to the long-term goals of the company. That to me is first, second, third. In a crisis, focus on cash. I did a number of turnaround work at A&M and that's exactly what we did. Let's just take that as the obvious, assuming your cash position is fine. This is the time to get really close to your customers. It's understanding who are your buyers, not what company are your buyers.
Who specifically at the company is your buyer? Who is the decision maker that can really make a difference? What's your relationship with them? How often are you talking to them? What does that conversion look like from a funnel perspective? Why are they buying from me versus someone else? What pressures are there on themselves that they're seeing that are going to get transferred one way or another over to me or provide an opportunity for me to provide a solution for them, if you will?
Why are we differentiated? Why should you buy from me versus someone else? Really getting close on that. We have two or three projects right now across the portfolio on Salesforce effectiveness, funnel management, pipeline management, things of that nature, conversions from top to the bottom of the funnel. The other one is that, again, assuming you're in a good cash position, assuming that that you're close to your customers and the revenue is still coming in, great time to do M&A right now.
Despite the interest rates where they are, despite whatever, this is a phenomenon opportunity, especially for us in buy and built environment. We're buying small companies. We're trying to aggregate regions or groups of services together. Tons of opportunities out there for people who are getting close to retirement potentially and they're just looking around and saying, "Ugh, I just don't want to do this anymore. I've gone through this in the '80s, in early '90s. I went through this in 2001.
I went through this in 2008. I just don't have another one in me." It's a great opportunity to have a strong company to then aggregate other opportunities there. We're continuing to do deals. For us, it's really not slowing down. But again, it makes the assumption that you have an underlying company that is able to absorb that is good. And that's why, again, we focus so much upfront on creating that platform. For us, if we don't do an acquisition the first year, that's fine.
If we're building the infrastructure to then be able to every acquisition that happens happens faster and your returns are higher for the acquisition, then great. But now is really a good opportunity I think for those of us who are able to.
Sean Mooney:
I think those are great points that every business leader should think about and embrace. The M&A is going to be a little harder if you don't have a private equity partner. But if you do or you want one, this is the perfect time to do some very unique things. Also, your point on liquidity I think is an important one because I think it's lost on so many.
Maybe like you, my formative experiences as a young professional were in Houlihan Lokey's Financial Restructuring Group, and I learned very early on good companies don't necessarily go out of business because they're good or bad, they go out of business because they run out of cash.
Gabe Mesanza:
Absolutely. We've seen a couple of examples of that here recently. Having worked for large companies, even sometimes we ran into really good executives that ran business units and you ask the question of cash, they never even thought about it. Cash was just something that was there and it was swept at the end of the day. When you needed to do a project, you went and asked for the money and it showed up. The idea of cash is not something that is natural for a lot of people, and it's surprising the number of people who mistake EBITDA for cash.
Not being an accountant, not being a base financial person, I look at statements of cashflow. I'm like, well, that's garbage for me. I need to know how much cash is coming in today, how much cash is going out, how much cash is coming in today. I don't really care what the math tells me. That's something that I think is missed on all of people because you're just never exposed to it. Not right, wrong or indifferent, just never exposed to it.
Sean Mooney:
I think a great exercise, particularly for smaller businesses that haven't been backed by PE, is try to forecast your cashflow on a 13-week basis week to week and see if you can do it.
Gabe Mesanza:
One of the first things we do is a 13-week cashflow. It's interesting for founders, a lot of their personal finances are intertwined with the company, a lot of their personal expenses flow through the company, whether it's a car or whatever the case is. You look at your bank account. Do I have cash or do I not have cash? It's a different decision. The moment that you start adding debt to a company and you have quarterly debt payments that you have to make, boy, that really becomes some different level of conversation.
The change to being owned by private equity is that we really only want to put in equity or cash into a company to grow it, to build it, to buy other things. We don't want to put cash in to run the operations. Founders very often will do that to keep it going, which is exactly as they should do, but the dynamic changes, and so helping founders go through that transition to understand that this is something that's absolutely needed. It's the lack of experience. That's all it is.
Sean Mooney:
But it's a great lesson, I think, for every business builder out there to be thinking about.
Gabe Mesanza:
I would say if you're looking to sell your business, start thinking about that right now because it's going to come at you and you might as well just get into it and understand it and whatnot. You don't have to do it formally. You can just informally talk to the person that's usually a controller or something like that that's handling your finances and say, "Okay, let's sit down and do it." You don't need to do it 13 weeks. Start with four weeks, and then go to six weeks, go to eight weeks, go to 10 week.
See how far you can take it and just see what decisions it drives you to make or not make with that. You might find that one of your core beliefs is that you want to pay your suppliers in 15 days. That's great, phenomenal, but you have 30 days to pay it and you're not getting any benefit from paying it in 15 days. It's a nice to have, but what would it do to your cashflow if you paid them in 30 instead of 15, well within the contract? It's little things like that that I think forces you to be more thoughtful about it.
Sean Mooney:
I think you're exactly right, and it's the same thing I do too. I look at the cashflow statement first. That's a really good discipline I think for any business builder. I think the points you brought up are... If you're not on it, you should try and you should learn and work on getting better. Like you said, just start somewhere. It doesn't have to be try it one week, four week, eight weeks.
Gabe Mesanza:
I like cash because it's a leading indicator. I can't be profitable on EBITDA basis if I'm not generating cash. I might as well just look at generating cash.
Sean Mooney:
That's what matters. Suddenly it's in vogue again, so it's good to hear.
Gabe Mesanza:
I don't think it ever went out of style, but then again, look how I'm dressed.
Sean Mooney:
Speaking of things in the past, in the future and lesson learned, one of the things that I love about working with BluWave and working with really, really insightful folks like you is I learn things every day where I wish I've said, why didn't I know this before? It's very humbling to work with all these exceptional folks like you, Gabe. I always go, wow, if I could go back and meet my 22-year-old self, what would I share? There's pages and pages, if not volumes of it. What would be one of the things if you look back and went to younger Gabe?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, it's a dangerous thing to look backwards because it's a lot of regrets if you really start analyzing things. Especially if you then asked the question of someone else, what should they have done differently, you get another volume, another Encyclopedia Britannica. This is a question that you posed to me earlier, and I really had to think about it. To a comment that you made earlier about you approach things in a very hard hitting, just getting to the next level, and early on that's really all that mattered to me. I was just thinking about, I worked at GM, how do I get from this level to this next level?
How do I get promoted? What's my next thing I'm going to go off and do? When I was in consulting, I was also, how do I get promoted from senior associate to manager to director, senior director, things of that nature? Always chasing that next immediate thing. And then I achieved a lot at a very young age. But now interestingly enough, the things that I find myself connecting with these founders on are those things in my 20s, are those very tactical engineering type aspects, is the fact that I worked at a plant, the fact that I spent time supervising hourly people.
I did all these things in my early days. Those are the things I find myself connecting with founders a lot more now rather than whatever I may have done, some integration planning or some other. The things that I've done tactically are the things that matter and the things I can connect with. I wish I would've taken more time in such a hurry early on in my career to get past that doing things with your hands type and that daily and hourly requirement of a business.
Once you start progressing in business and especially in private equity, we lose touch with the idea that someone has to be thinking about a topic on an hourly basis. If you're in a manufacturing environment, you have a hour by hour boards that are on a shop floor and people are measured, did you achieve that output at that quality level? In our service businesses, I try to push people to think about winning the day. For me to win the day, it means I need to win that morning, which means every piece of equipment has to be available for the employee when they show up.
They can get what they need. They know where they're going to go. They go off and do it. It's not like when I do a project and I have to go to Home Depot 10 times to finish it, that's okay in my personal life, not okay in business. But just understanding the fact that at some point, the people who actually make money for you are thinking about things in a very discreet hour by hour basis, project by project basis. I wish that I would've spent more time in that world earlier on, not been in such a hurry to get into more of the business side of things, to get promoted to do all these other things.
Just take your time there. These other things are going to come at you, but just take your time in those early experiences. I think that's the feedback I would give to people coming out of college now. Don't worry about where your first job is. It doesn't define your career. But just spend enough time there so that you can really get a sense of appreciation of what exactly has to happen in those levels before you move on.
Sean Mooney:
I think that's great advice. Certainly this whole idea of always being present in whatever you're in now.
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, right, that's a good word for it.
Sean Mooney:
And learning the basics, because it's all cumulating, it's all foundational, and it builds on things. I 1,000% wish I did that more the same thing because you're always looking so far ahead and whatever ribbon or badge or metal you're trying to get. Certainly I was 1,000% the same way, but understanding that path and where you are now and being okay with understanding it while not looking past it is something that I think anyone can...
Gabe Mesanza:
And especially now that our useful working lives have been extended. Starting in your 20s, I mean, you could be working close to 70 and beyond. We have plenty of people that we work with that are in their 70s, very productive, very active, and love spending time with them because of the level of knowledge that they bring. Just pace yourself.
Sean Mooney:
It's a marathon. There's a tortoise and a hare.
Gabe Mesanza:
I thought about my career in decades. I thought about my 20s of doing phase of my life and the 30s about the practicing in the 40s about leading, I'm 47 now. I always accelerate it by two or three years. At the end of that decade, I was always kind of like, yeah, okay, I'm going on to the next thing. I just really wish I would spend the time.
Sean Mooney:
Yeah, absolutely. It's one of those things that it's really hard in the time to do it. But once you figure out how do you just look around while you're on this path, it certainly makes life more enjoyable, but it's also...
Gabe Mesanza:
It might not be a realistic thing to give people advice on because new opportunities present themselves when you do a good job and there's a natural momentum to progress people fast when the right situations come up for them and it's exciting for you financially, personally, and whatnot. I think it's only something that you can reflect on when you're our age.
Sean Mooney:
Exactly, in retrospect.
Gabe Mesanza:
I don't think when you're in it. When you're in the middle of it, I don't know that you can really absorb it.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely, and I still struggle with it today.
Gabe Mesanza:
That's right. That's right. You're always thinking about the next set of meetings and whatnot. Just absorb what's going on right now. Be present.
Sean Mooney:
Absolutely. The last question for you that I'd love to get your perspective on as an engineer's mind, someone who's dealing with a hectic world, this whole notion of that I always try to figure out and tinker with and is these little life hacks or gizmos and gadgets or things that can make your life just a little better, a little more fun. Do you have any of those in your life?
Gabe Mesanza:
Very recently, I have this mental quirk where I can't remember something that I don't hand write. Maybe I've always been an old man. I don't know. I just can't remember something that I don't hand write. But once I hand write it, I almost have a photographic memory about it. It's just a weird quirk. I've never been able to take notes on a laptop, for example. I also don't like being in a meeting and everyone has their laptops in front of them. It's almost like a shield. It's a barrier. I don't like having that to communicate with people.
I used to carry a notebook everywhere. It was great because it got me what I needed, but I couldn't refer back very easily because I would have sequential meetings of different topics and I'd have to go chase it back to remember what date it was. I just switched over everything on an iPad and I went through a couple of those e-readers and figured out I didn't like how they worked. I decided to just use my old trusty iPad and I got a cover for it that has a little bit more resistance to it, so it feels more like handwriting.
I use the Apple Pen. I use an app called Goodnotes that allows me to... You write it down, and then you can search against your handwriting. I mean, I'm probably maybe four months into this. Love it.
Sean Mooney:
Game changer.
Gabe Mesanza:
Love it. Game changer.
Sean Mooney:
How good is your handwriting?
Gabe Mesanza:
Yeah, it's pretty good. I do find myself... Again, being an engineer, I'll erase things that I write because I just don't like the way it looked.
Sean Mooney:
Okay.
Gabe Mesanza:
As I'm writing, I'll just look at it... Again, just...
Sean Mooney:
Precision and process.
Gabe Mesanza:
You're going to learn about my quirks. I'll write something and say, "I just don't like the way that word looks." It'll erase it and write it over again. But also what it allows me to do is I'll go back after a meeting and I'll sometimes rewrite my notes to better reflect the actual point that was versus my stream of consciousness notes. It's been really interesting to edit the past, if you will, on my notes and create something that gives me a little bit more longevity later on. I'm a convert.
Sean Mooney:
That's great. I'm going to have to look into that because I similarly like to write things down and I have hundreds of these Moleskine books somewhere, but I can never find the notes when I need them. It's really more about getting it into my head in a more efficient way, but I can never go back.
Gabe Mesanza:
I started using this other app Todoist it's called, which is just a to-do list, very honestly. You can put classify, you can put dates to it. I'm probably using 10% of the capabilities of the thing. But again, maybe as an engineer, I like the idea of checking things off.
Sean Mooney:
Yeah, satisfaction.
Gabe Mesanza:
There's very much satisfaction of I can check that off and it physically disappears from the things to do. That's something that, again, maybe it's the engineering mindset, I just enjoy that.
Sean Mooney:
It makes a lot of sense. There's gratification in just being able to accomplish something.
Gabe Mesanza:
Kind of. Kind of. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Sean Mooney:
Well, this has been great, Gabe. I've learned a ton across a whole host of topics here. Thank you so much for joining us today. It's really generous.
Gabe Mesanza:
No, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thank you.
Sean Mooney:
Thank you. Special thanks to Gabe for joining. If you'd like to learn more about Gabe and Huron Capital, please see the episode notes. That's all we have for today. For more information on this podcast and BluWave, go to bluwave.net/podcast. That's B-L-U-W-A-V-E. Please continue to look for us anywhere you find your favorite podcast, including Apple, Google, and Spotify.
We truly appreciate your support. If you like what you hear, please follow, review, and share. It really helps us when you do those things, so thank you in advance. In the meantime, let us know if there's anything we can do to support your success onward.
THE BUSINESS BUILDER’S PODCAST
Private equity insights for and with top business builders, including investors, operators, executives and industry thought leaders. The Karma School of Business Podcast goes behind the scenes of PE, talking about business best practices and real-time industry trends. You'll learn from leading professionals and visionary business executives who will help you take action and enhance your life, whether you’re at a PE firm, a portco or a private or public company.
BluWave Founder & CEO Sean Mooney hosts the Private Equity Karma School of Business Podcast. BluWave is the business builders’ network for private equity grade due diligence and value creation needs.
BluWave Founder & CEO Sean Mooney hosts the Private Equity Karma School of Business Podcast. BluWave is the business builders’ network for private equity grade due diligence and value creation needs.
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