When I first started at American Securities back in 2003, there weren’t very many operating professionals working in private equity and very few private equity firms had anyone on payroll that wasn’t an investment professional or part of the administrative staff. 

Today our industry has grown substantially.  There are thousands of us and almost all PE firms have embraced the idea that post-close value add is critical and requires expertise.  

Over the years, I have had the pleasure of talking to hundreds of operating professionals and dozens of PE firms.  And what strikes me about nearly all of my conversations is how difficult it is for new operating professionals to feel comfortable in their role, and on the other side, for PE firms to feel confident that they are getting value from their ops team. 

Most new operating professionals are highly talented, very experienced professionals who typically come from either consulting or industry.  They come to PE for the excitement of sharing their expertise with multiple portfolio companies, and  getting paid for the value they create.  

And then they join the PE firm, and they often find that the job is not straightforward.  It is hard to figure out what to work on, and even to know how to get work.  It is often difficult to prove value in an industry that is famously quantitative and metrics driven.  They struggle getting the relationships right.  

And PE firms trying to create new groups will often have failures where they hire a person or a team and after a year or two they decide it isn’t working and try again.  

All of these issues are solvable with a targeted set of professional development trainings and coaching sessions. 

I founded  The OP Academy to provide this and in the process help operating professionals succeed and private equity firms better manage their resources to create the most value for their investors.