When a first-time CEO takes control of a newly acquired company, the real challenge begins after the ink dries. Financial models give way to human dynamics. Employees watch for empathy. Customers test reliability. And the founderʼs shadow still lingers in every hallway. Thatʼs why experienced operators often rely on a simple but powerful framework: Transition, Stabilization, and Optimization (TSO).

Transition (0–12 months): The opening year is about humility. Listen more than you talk. Shadow key employees. Sit in on customer calls. Spend time on the shop floor. The goal isnʼt to redesign the business; itʼs to understand why it has survived and succeeded so far.

Search CEOs who skip this step often stumble. Moving too fast breaks the social fabric that made the business resilient. The best leaders use this phase to learn the language of the company before trying to rewrite it.

Stabilization (6–24 months): Once the dust settles, the focus shifts to systems. This is where leaders start to professionalize, introducing structure without suffocating culture. (More on this in our previous newsletter here) 

Three levers dominate: People, Process, and Technology.

Upgrade weak links, install consistent KPIs, and build a cadence of communication. Publish dashboards. Hold a transparent all-hands. Replace founder intuition with shared metric. Treat safety and onboarding as non-negotiables. 

Done right, stabilization transforms a personality-driven company into a process-driven one. Done poorly, it creates bureaucracy and burnout. The art is in balancing accountability with autonomy. Your target looked resilient at signing because of the people and the rhythm. So protect both.

Optimization (24+ months): In Europe’s current deal market, add-ons dominate. About two-thirds of PE buyouts in early 2025 were add-on acquisitions. In 2024, there were 4,150 add-on deals in Europe, an 8% increase from 2023.

Integration discipline is the moat here. Buy-and-build can work, especially for PE and experienced operators with real scale synergies. But it isn’t a cure-all. Without integration muscle or deal know-how, it destroys value. If those foundations are missing, prioritize simpler levers like expanding organic sales, deepening customer insight, and resetting pricing.

Only when the house is in order should growth begin. This is where strategy turns outward toward pricing refinement, exploring adjacent markets, bolt-on acquisitions, or geographic expansion.

Too many CEOs chase expansion before the base business runs smoothly. Those who thrive approach optimization as a privilege earned. They focus on repeatability.

Transition -> Stabilization -> Optimization. Then back again. Each cycle deepens understanding, resilience, and capability.

The best leaders are not the boldest at the start; they are the most consistent over time. They connect deeply in the beginning, execute relentlessly through the middle, and innovate boldly once the business can bear the weight of experimentation.

Leadership in ETA isnʼt about changing everything. Itʼs also about knowing when not to.

In 2025, the balance of power between search funds and private equity is shifting. According to Evermark, first-time buyers are increasingly winning deals, not by outbidding PE firms, but by aligning with what sellers truly value: stewardship, continuity, and trust. Data backs it up. Stanfordʼs 2024 study reports a 35.1% median IRR for search funds compared to ~13.5% forecasted PE returns, with 63% acquisition rates and a $14.4M median deal size. Nearly 98% of searcher intent now targets the $1–3M EBITDA.

Value-driven investor Reggie Pryor Jr. (founder, Pryor LLC) walks through a blunt operating playbook: buy overlooked assets, fix the cash engine, and hold, often borrowing against assets rather than selling. He credits early mentorship (Jimmy Gibbs), classic value roots (Graham & Dodd), and using collateral to get started, then layers in discipline across four portfolio companies to turn “unlovedˮ into durable cash flow.

Toby Henry on Buying Accelerator Solutions and Leading with Culture (M&A Zing)

Self-funded searcher Toby Henry shares why he skipped the traditional fund route, sourced a brokered deal, and structured a founder-friendly partnership to acquire a 25-year people & change consultancy. He shares insights on day-one trust building as an incoming CEO, productizing services without breaking culture, and pragmatic ways SMEs can deploy AI while staying human-first. Plus, the role of mentors and peer groups, sales reality in a soft market, and what’s next on his buy-and-build roadmap.

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