Stuart Slatter 
Leading Corporate Turnaround 
How Leaders Fix Troubled Companies

Leadership is never more crucial than when corporate survival is at
stake. But the days of the tough guys are over. The leaders who are
driving today’s sustainable turnarounds understand that the
answers to a distressed company’s problems lie almost always
within the firm itself – usually at middle manager level and
below. The secret is cooperation. Drawing on interviews with top
company doctors and advisers, as well as on the authors’ own
experience, Leading Corporate Turnarounds explores seven key
leadership and management skills required for successful
turnaround, and shows why quickly gaining the buy-in and trust of
all stakeholders is the key to ultimate success.

* Written by the founding directors of the Society of Turnaround
Professionals (STP), with a proposed Foreword by the
Society’s Patron Sir John Harvey-Jones

* Considers the different drivers of turnaround, the alternatives
to it, and the restructuring processes required to move beyond
crisis stabilization to sustainable change

* Features international case studies from leading companies
including BT, Virgin Express, Arthur Andersen, Parmalat, GE, Lee
Cooper, New Look and IBM

Table of Content

About the Authors vii

Acknowledgements ix

Introduction xi

1 The Leadership Challenge 1

2 The Turnaround Framework 19

3 Before the Turnaround Begins 49

4 New Leadership 71

5 Crisis Stabilisation 97

6 Stakeholder Management 113

7 Strategic Focus 135

8 Changing Critical Business Processes 159

9 Leading Organisational Change 177

10 Financial Restructuring 197

Appendix Society of Turnaround Professionals 227

Index 229

About the author

Stuart Slatter
Founding partner of Stuart Slatter & Company, Chairman of Stuart Slatter Training and a Visiting Fellow in Strategic and International Management at the London Business School (LBS).
Stuart Slatter has over twenty-five years of experience inproviding strategic consultancy advice and management education tosenior management throughout the world. While a full time facultymember at LBS, he was Dean for Executive Education, Director of the Senior Executive Programme, and Chairman of the Strategic and International Management Department. He has been a Visiting Professor at the University of California (UCLA) and at the University of Capetown. Prior to joining LBS, he was Managing Director of a subsidiary of a UK public company, and a seniormanagement consultant with Booz, Allen & Hamilton in New Yorkspecialising in marketing strategy.
He holds a law degree from Cambridge University, an MBA degree from Stanford Business School, and a Ph D in marketing from London University. He is a qualified barrister-at-law, and is the authorof a number of books and articles, including ‘Gambling on Growth’, Wiley (1992), and ‘Corporate Turnaround’, Penguin Books (1999). He was one of the foundingdirectors of the Society of Turnaround Professionals in the UK, andcan be contacted via www.slatter.co.uk.

David C. Lovett
David Lovett, a Managing Director with Alix Partners and amember of the European Executive group of the firm, is a businessgraduate, a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales, a fellow and a founding member of the Society of Turnaround Professionals. Before joining Alix Partners, David waswith Andersen for 18 years, where he formed Andersen’s London-based turnaround practice in the early 1990s andsubsequently led the Global Turnaround practice. He co-authored’Corporate Turnaround’ with Stuart Slatter in1999.
During the last 30 years, David has advised all the classes ofstakeholders in troubled companies.He has led many corporaterestructurings and turnarounds in both an advisory and officercapacity serving as Chief Financial Officer and Chief Restructuring Officer.
David has extensive cross border restructuring experience and isfamiliar with the changing trends in insolvency and restructuringlegislation. He is driven by a desire to minimise economic loss tostakeholders while his clients manage the turbulence of forcedtransformation.
Alix Partners is recognised internationally as the ‘industrystandard’ for solving complex business challenges, helpingcompanies improve operating and financial performance, andrestoring corporate value.
Founded in 1981, it has been retained by hundreds of companiesthroughout the USA, Europe, Asia and Latin America and has workedin virtually all industries and sectors.

Laura Barlow
Laura Barlow is a Director in Alix Partners’ European Turnaround and Restructuring practice. Over the past 15 years shehas been an adviser to both creditors and debtors in troubledsituations and has worked with numerous companies to help themachieve operational turnaround and financial restructuring. She hastaken interim management roles in several troubled companies, restoring stability and leading the development and implementationof turnaround plans. Her current focus is on providingrestructuring advisory services to corporates, including taking Chief Restructuring Officer positions where appropriate.
Laura is a graduate of Oxford University, a Chartered Accountantand SFA Securities Representative. She is a regular speaker at European conferences on turnaround and restructuring and at the London Business School on the Managing Corporate Turnaroundscourse.