Misfortune is Fortune (Chapter One)

I had an initial working title of 'Misadventures in Corporate Governance - The Upside' but went with something more direct. Bad experiences may seem catastrophic at first, but over time, they often shape us into better people in positive ways. This is the first in a series of circumstances I have experienced that at first seemed quite unfortunate but ended up quite differently.

Many years ago, I was being recruited to be CFO of a publicly traded company. I had heard many times through the grapevine that the company was for sale and was being actively marketed. Not wanting to join a company just to lose my position quickly gave me pause, so I asked the CEO, the President, and the Lead Director directly whether or not the company was for sale. They gave me a great answer. They said it was not for sale, but if someone came in and offered an outrageous price, they would have to consider it.

Based on that answer and trusting the three of them, I joined on June 1st of that year (many years ago). About 90 days later (right after Labor Day), I was told by the CEO to go meet with the CFO of a similar company right down the street. When I got there, an investment banker was there and asked me to get out the projections they were working on at the end of March (60 days before I began). This is how I found out that my company was in the midst of negotiating a sale when they were recruiting me.

The due diligence took place, and the board of the company I was at voted to sell the company to the other in December (a little over 6 months after I joined). However, the buying company did not like what they found during due diligence and decided to not buy the company I was at. Now, the rest of the story.

Yes, trust in my superiors went out the door, and they attempted to sell the company to just about anyone over the next 12 to 24 months with no takers at a price they would consider, but something that changed the course of my career in a positive way had just started. The reasons the other company and subsequent suitors did not want to close on the sale or pay the price the board desired were very real. My company had made some major mistakes and had tried to cover it. Now, things were exposed. Now we could get to work fixing the company, and we did.

Over time, the CEO and the President had to leave the company. We added a few new board members. I was elevated to CEO. Many other very talented and young people stepped up, and completely turned the company around. We went from operating in the 10th percentile of companies in the industry to the 85th percentile.

This led to me for what is now going on almost 20 years of being the CEO of various entities. More importantly, the scores of young talented people that cut their teeth at this company have gone on to excel in CEO, CFO, COO, CIO, CRO and other senior leadership roles at various companies.

To put a bow on this story, the team did such a great job with the turnaround, others started to show up wanting to buy us. I learned my lesson the first time with this board. They were going to sell it no matter what, so this time, from a position of strength and high performance versus weakness and hidden issues, we let it go.

To this day, I am always so pleased to watch where all that talent has ended up and risen over the years. If not for the misfortune (at the time) of being lied to, working for a company that made some big mistakes they tried to cover up, and having potential buyers point out the issues, a lot of people, including myself would never have had the opportunities that catapulted each of our careers.

Was this misfortune? It seemed like it initially. Without the misfortune, I would have not had the opportunity to find my fortune.