Our client is a 40+ year old mechanical contractor operating in a major metropolitan area with revenues in excess of $100 MM. Operating divisions include HVAC constructions, HVAC service, and a number of synergistic business units.
Rapid growth led to several growing pains related to scalability and ownership and executive management identified a need to evolve to the next level of operating maturity. As the owner managed company had grew from a small shop to a leading regional contractor, the organizations processes and operating structure evolved in a reactive manner to accommodate their growth. This resulted in unclear roles and responsibilities, disparate systems, and inefficient processes.
Additionally, the owners started to look towards retirement and wanted to develop a path to transition the business to either a next generation of leadership or position the company for sale to an outside party.
The company determined that they needed some outside perspective to advise the organization on how to restructure their operations, processes and systems to bring it to the next level. ATX was selected as their business partner for the transition due to our deep expertise in strategic planning, operational process improvement, technology system implementations, and industry expertise.
We started with a complete assessment of business needs to develop a strategic improvement plan which resulted in an organizational face lift. With multiple business sectors underneath the company umbrella, this restructure included restructuring the organizational chart, adding and removing roles, organizing sales teams, aligning titles with specific job descriptions, and hiring and onboarding new talent.
Then came the overall business processes / application infrastructure which included:
The multi-year change has resulted in dramatic increases in not only revenue but in significant gains in operating income which was driven by efficiencies created by having a more mature operating model, processes, and systems. Throughout the transition, the company continued to deliver exceptional client service at a competitive price as the net income grew over 300% while gross margin remained at industry averages.
The short and long-term planning framework also allowed for the employees to stay current with the company goals and benchmarks which lead to higher sales numbers, increased operating margins, and better employee engagement with the company. Having better reporting and analytics has allowed the organization to monitor performance and make critical adjustments when necessary. All this has allowed the company to continuously thrive in the industry and exponentially grow business value.