Private Equity FunCast

Kevin and Jim spend an hour with Ben Harrison, Co-Founder and President, Financial Services at DealCloud about the DealCloud platform and how we use it at ParkerGale. Our collective paths have crossed over the years, so as per usual we digress into some private equity history along the way.

No serious athlete steps on the field without a scouting report. No serious professional should lead without one either. In this episode of the Funcast's Leadership Series, Paul and Jim discuss a simple document that can help you clarify working styles and create a high-performing team. This episode references our recently published article, which can be found at parkergale.com/scoutingreport.

Jim talks with Ryan Milligan about the use of debt in private equity deals and the state of the lending market in uncertain economic environments.

Jim talks with Kelley Powell, Alan Williamson and Jim Headley from the MacLaurin Group about tackling large-scale technology projects in a private-equity-backed company. All four of us worked together on a very complicated project some years ago. We focus our discussions on the Valley of Anguish, the deep hole between the initial enthusiasm and the finished project.

Jim, Jimmy and Dr. Steve Julius get together to discuss the denouement of The Last Dance. Dr. J leads the discussion around managing a superstar to become part of a broader system and why so few stars make the transition to being great coaches -- and the parallels for middle market PE portfolio companies.

Jim, Jimmy and Dr. J discuss everything from "The Last Dance" and the Warren Commission to John McCain as part of a new intro to a classic episode in which Devin and Kevin Fitzgerald talk with Steve Julius, PhD aka "Dr. J" about organizational behavior and team dynamics. Dr. Julius opines on human behavior, organizational dynamics and business development.

Jim talks with Paul Petefish from Evolve Security about the ins-and-outs of an actual security assessment -- ours. We cover everything from penetration testing to phishing attacks.

The conclusion of our two-part episode (both recorded before the coronavirus pandemic) with ParkerGale advisor and former Chicago Bulls team psychologist Dr. Steve Julius discussing how elite sports franchises think about organization and team culture and what can be applied into a business context.

In episode 1 of a 2-part episode (both recorded before the coronavirus pandemic), Jim, Jimmy, and Paul are joined by ParkerGale advisor and former Chicago Bulls team psychologist Dr. Steve Julius to discuss how elite sports franchises think about organization and team culture and what can be applied into a business context.

Weeks ago, before we were all focused on the coronavirus pandemic, Jim and Jimmy recorded our (mostly) annual March Madness episode. We hit pause on posting this one for a while, but on what would have been the finals of the men's college basketball tournament, we thought a little levity would be something listeners could use. In this episode, the months of the year face off in a battle for supremacy.

We talk with Paul Petefish, Founder and CEO of Evolve Security about some simple and fast suggestions to make remote working more secure.

A fan favorite episode -- The FunCast spends an hour with Kirkland & Ellis partner Ryan Harris (formerly of McDermott Will & Emery LLP) talking about the legal traps founders fall into when setting up their companies and when they sell them. What's the best company structure -- C Corp, S Corp, LLC? How do you handle employee equity? Hear about the infamous "Cubs side letter." What are the common issues Ryan sees when founders go to sell their business and how can you avoid them? Listening to this conversation won't make you stronger, but it sure will make you smarter! Enjoy.

Jim and Jimmy are joined by Marla Caceres and Nelson Velazquez, improvisors at Chicago's famous Second City Theatre. They discuss how ParkerGale has leveraged the Second City Works to provide professional development for senior executives in addition to the concepts that underpin the Second City philosophy and why they are so important to fostering growth, teamwork, and innovation. Oh – and don't miss the end when the crew improvises a song entitled "The Ugly Burning House."

On this episode, Jay Nathan (Founder of Customer Imperative) joins Paul Stansik to share how companies can be more intentional in building intimacy and delivering value to their customers. We talk about how his consulting firm builds customer success teams, how business leaders get this wrong, and the baby-steps that anyone can take to "make the renewal a no-brainer."

Jimmy sits down with Dean Brown, CEO of Ipro Tech. Dean discusses his upbringing in a military family, his education in Industrial Psychology, the serendipity of a career, his love of products and product strategy, his experience founding, scaling, and ultimately selling his startup, why culture is so important to him in business, and much more.

In part 3 of a 3 part series on Product Strategy, Jim and Cici continue the discussion of how product strategy ties into value creation, and how specifically as a PE firm, we monitor our portfolio companies' product strategy through taking a detailed look at their product roadmaps. We discuss how we conduct Product Strategy Reviews – the objectives, who's in the room, and what we actually cover. We talk about why we're focused on outcome-driven product roadmaps, how we work with our portfolio companies to prioritize what actually gets built and why that's so critical when we're allocating scarce resources to create value.

In part 2 of a 3 part series on Product Strategy, Jim is joined by Cici to discuss the private equity investor's perspective on how and why products get built. Living in a world of limited resources, we discuss the framework that we use to help shape the discussions with our portfolio companies about prioritizing their products and features. We talk about market segments versus markets, the Ansoff matrix and Geoffrey Moore's famous "Bowling Alley" strategy.

In part 1 of a 3 part series on Product Strategy, Jim is joined by Cici to discuss the three levers of value creation - risk mitigation, revenue growth, and cost reduction, and how we think about the three in the portfolio. Jimmy joins as well to add the People dimension.

On this episode, Keith Hadley from the Table Group joins Paul Stansik to chat about how we build aligned C-suite teams and healthy portfolio companies. We cover what healthy organizations do differently, why most team offsites are not time well spent, and how to tell if you're on (or leading) a dysfunctional team.

Devin and Jim kick off the new year with our annual predictions episode. Come have a listen as we opine on what 2020 has in store for Private Equity.

Jimmy Holloran talks with Stacey Kacek, OnePlus Systems CEO. They discuss her early career as an engineer at Motorola, her transition into leadership, and her perspective on being a CEO. Along the way, they cover key influences in her life, lessons learned, and as well as advice for aspiring CEOs.

Jim recently got massively over-billed by Hertz, prompting a discussion about what happens to customers when process automation goes off the rails. Ryan Milligan jumps in with a Zappos story that will warm your heart.

As part of our continuing People Operations series, ParkerGale Principals Jimmy and Paul dive into the 9box, a talent management framework commonly used to assess an organization's breadth and depth of talent. Jimmy and Paul cover why this matters, how to effectively review an organization's entire talent base, and why it pays for investors to be involved in the process.

Devin sits down with Cici to discuss some easy but very important things you should be doing to extract deeper customer and market insight into your software products.

Partner Ryan Milligan talks with Mike Trasatti, CEO of DealerBuilt and Bill Lamm of Presidio Technology Partners about how a deal really gets done. Covering everything from the banker signing up to represent DealerBuilt to ParkerGale courting and successfully completing the deal with management.

Come have a listen as Stephen Tallamy CTO of EditShare talks about strategies for making technology transitions for complicated software platforms.

Hiring technical people is hard when you don't know all the buzzwords and acronyms. Devin and Jim help you with good process and some helpful questions to ask when you are hiring Engineering and Software Development leaders.

Continuing our on-going series of interviews with ParkerGale portfolio company CEOs, Jimmy interviews Tom Obermaier, CEO of Rippe and Kingston. We talk baseball, growing up in New York, leadership lessons from President Washington, rising to Chief Risk Officer at Citi Bank at the time of the financial crisis, and his evolution as a CEO at RDC and Rippe.

Jim talks with fellow Babson College Alum, current portfolio company CTO, Tom Shore about application software from the early 80s through today. We talk Digital Equipment PDP/11s all the way through the current no-code fascination.

We talk to PG Principal Kara Master about her journey from the model UN and a career in journalism to joining the deal team at ParkerGale.

Buckle your seatbelts for a fast-paced conversation with Dave Kellogg. Dave and I first met back in the early 80s at Ingres, when I was a pre-sales engineer and Dave was a technical support rep. We've each spent over 25 years in enterprise software, in mixed roles that involve both technology and sales & marketing. We reconnected recently and met up up in Chicago at ParkerGale's "intergalactic headquarters" for a pretty broad-ranging conversation about a recent blog post that Dave wrote (Things to Avoid in Selecting an Executive Job at a Startup) along with a lot of interaction about differences between PE-land and VC-land. Come have a listen -- where else are you going to hear the phrase "Axe Battle of Differentiation"?

In the kickoff to the new People Operations Series, ParkerGale Principals Jimmy and Paul provide an overview of ParkerGale's People Ops team. Having worked together at Bain, they bring some history together to the firm and their work leading all things people, talent, and culture across the portfolio. They dive into how ParkerGale thinks about building a cohesive leadership team, hiring great talent, and creating learning and development opportunities across the portfolio. They also set up what to expect over the coming months in the on-going People Ops Series.

Jim and Jimmy talk to ParkerGale Operating Principal, Paul Stansik -- DECA medal winner and ex-professional Lacrosse player.

Guest hosts Jimmy Holloran and Ryan Milligan invite Andy Hulett onto the funcast to discuss the benefits of outsourced HR for small, growing businesses. Turns out there's a lot more to it than managing benefits and payroll.

Guest host Jimmy Holloran talks with EditShare CEO Conrad Clemson. Find out how a physics major from William & Mary ended up working as a private equity CEO.

More madness with the Mad Scotsman, Alan Williamson and special guest Tom Shore. We talk about the just how much automation and software tooling do you need to write applications. The big social media software companies would claim that nothing short of continuous delivery is enough. But is this really necessary for smaller companies that are delivering enterprise-class applications?

Guest host Jimmy Holloran talks with Jim about the bevy of useless email solicitations that we get after every deal announcement. We talk about the PE 2/20 model and how it applies to buying services from vendors -- and the right and wrong ways to pitch PE funds.

In our latest episode, we talk with Rick Noble, CEO of Aircraft Technical Publishers. He has led several market-leading digital publishing organizations over the course of his career, holding positions that include CEO of Triumph Learning and Haights Cross Communications, CEO of Blackboard Engage, CEO of Medical Media Holdings, and President & CEO of Thomson Healthcare.

Jim talks with ParkerGale's newest addition to the Operating Team handling talent management -- Jimmy Holloran. He joins us from the mean streets of St. Louis with stops at Nortel, Teach for America, Bain & Company and HomeChef along the way.

Jim and the MacLaurin Group Team -- Alan, "The Mad Scotsman", Jim Headley and Kelley Powell tackle Paul Graham's "Makers versus Managers" essay. How do you balance the need for managers to "meet up" with programmers/writers/creators need for large blocks of uninterrupted time to complete projects?

Devin interviews True Search Partner and CFO-whisperer Matt Goldstein about how to land a CFO job at a PE-backed company. They cover the process from the candidate side and the company side. How to differentiate yourself; how to prepare for interviews; what PE funds are looking for; what goes wrong when things go wrong; what you should expect to get paid and how much equity you should expect.

We're back with the Mad Scotsman, Alan Williamson and his partner in crime, Jim Headley, of the MacLaurin Group. Alan and Jim give us their thumbs up and thumbs down on various development tools, cloud platforms and business intelligence software stacks.

Devin and Jim talk about macro and micro events for 2019 including; the global economy, the U.S. economy, politics, the tech market and the implications for private equity in the new year.

A far-reaching conversation with Brent Beshore, CEO of adventur.es, a buyout shop based in Columbia, Missouri. Brent recently released his book "The Messy Marketplace", the ultimate "how to" book for selling a business in the world of imperfect buyers.

No awkward musical guests or actors passed-their-prime --- just Devin and Jim giving thanks for another year of fun with the podcast.

Jim talks with ParkerGale Operating Principal, Jake Petoskey, about optimizing back office systems at portfolio companies. In this episode we focus the discussion on organizing Sales Opportunities as the tip of the spear using Insight Squared with Salesforce.com

The first episode in a five-episode arc discussing ParkerGale's four operating pillars: Systems, Talent, Growth and Product. In part one, Devin and Jim introduce the four pillars. The follow-on episodes will feature deep-dive interviews with ParkerGale's OPs team.

The first in a series of interviews with the CEOs of ParkerGale's portfolio companies. In this week's episode, we talk with Len Finkle, CEO of Profisee. Have a listen and find out how he made the journey from intrepid salesperson to private equity CEO.

This week's topic comes from our listeners and it's one of our favorite subjects -- us! It's the "how did we get into private equity" episode. So hop into the wayback machine with Devin and Jim and find out how we got from Albany, New York and Brockton, Massachusetts all the way to private equity in Chicago.

Talking with Drake Paulson and Graeme Faulds from eVestment, a Nasdaq company, about the results of their 2018 Private Markets Due Diligence Survey. Find out how Limited Partners feel about fees, the use of credit facilities to close deals and due diligence.