J.H. Cohn’s Turnaround and Crisis Management Practice encompasses a core group of experienced business professionals and seasoned financial executives who concentrate on delivering superior management consulting services to businesses in a variety of industries. We are a full-service professional management consulting practice, offering a complete range of turnaround, restructuring, crisis management, and related services.
Our primary goal is to leverage our backgrounds and expertise to assist distressed companies in their recovery. We also provide guidance in the early stages of stress to avoid crisis. J.H. Cohn maximizes value for all stakeholders during the asset recovery process and provides leadership in business process change. Problems in underperforming or distressed companies are often rooted in operational deficiencies. Our professionals assist our clients in identifying solutions and executing remedial actions with speed and competency.
We stand ready to consult and advise, actively manage on an interim basis, or direct the asset recovery process in challenging situations. The nature and level of our assistance depends upon the requirements of each situation. We work with all parties who have a vested interest in a company to ensure that the necessary actions are taken to warrant their continued support and involvement, including:
- Investors and boards of directors concerned that performance is below expectations
- Existing shareholders who require an objective assessment of the company
- Senior management requiring specialized assistance in dealing with profit and productivity decline, financial or operational crises, or problems associated with growth
- Companies seeking equity or debt financing and that are prepared to welcome active investors
- Lenders, existing or new, that may require specialized assistance in evaluating a company
Turnaround Services
- Management Leadership With Urgency
- Streamline management, acting as Chief Restructuring Officer to effect dramatic, decisive actions on behalf of stakeholders
- Provide guidance to boards of directors in times of crisis and stress
- Provisional management, filling the voids caused by the planned or unexpected loss of a chief executive, operating, or financial officer
- Crisis containment, resolution, and prevention
- Project management to implement critical structural changes
- Liquidity Management and Control
- Working capital management and optimization
- Short-term cash management and control
- Cash flow forecasting and planning
- Vendor and lender management and negotiations
- Operational Restructuring
- Business strategy and operational/financial plan development and implementation
- Business line/customer/SBU profitability analyses, restructuring, and rationalization
- Aggressive and evolutionary operating overhead reduction and structuring programs
- Organizational restructuring and staff realignment alternatives to right-size the resources employed in the business
- Business process and systems improvements to achieve operating efficiencies
- Facilities rationalization, consolidation, and disposal
- Balance Sheet Restructuring
- Debt workouts, both in and out of the court system
- Optimization of working capital levels and utilization
- Senior and subordinated debt refinancing
- Balance sheet capitalization to optimize the capital structure
- Corporate Estate Management and Maximization
- Acting as Plan Agent or Responsible Person to resolve a Chapter 11 proceeding
- Maximizing asset recoveries through liquidation or the sale of business units
- Minimizing liabilities through vendor negotiations or claims management/resolution
- Minimizing administrative expenses by accelerating the wind-down process.
Select Turnaround and Crisis Management Engagements
- J.H. Cohn was retained by a major retailer to supplement the Company’s senior management team. We accomplished the following results:
- Designed and implemented weekly reporting of key indicators for the benefit of the lender, senior management, and the Board
- Created short- and long-term financial plans
- Negotiated a newly arranged revolving credit facility, and resurrected the flow of goods into the Company through the establishment of credit and Letter of Credit facilities
- Worked with the Company’s information technology and finance staffs to implement departmentalized budgeting and responsibility accounting
- Took control of the disbursement process, and implemented improvements in the expense reimbursement process
- Served as the Company’s liaison to the lenders, the Board, and the Company’s investors in financial matters
- J.H. Cohn was engaged by a marketer and importer of consumer products to identify and implement profit improvement initiatives through overhead reductions. The company’s gross margins were eroding due to the changing retail landscape. We interviewed company personnel to obtain an understanding of the company’s operations. Upon gaining an understanding of the company’s profit drivers, we performed a detailed analysis of operating expenses and identified potential savings of 25 percent of the total cost structure, primarily related to the outsourcing of warehousing and distribution services, elimination of personnel, and simplification of the supply chain operations. The company’s implementation of our recommendations resulted in it achieving its desired improvement in profitability.