What the First 100 Days Decide for PE Portfolio Companies 

PE firms know that there is no shortage of “best practices” for the first 100 days after an acquisition. 

For example, the familiar version of that advice focuses on getting the executive team right from the start, a comment that we agree with wholeheartedly.  

However, the math behind PE returns has recently changed significantly, and that has affected the very framework of a PE firm’s operational strategy. Bain’s 2026 report sums it up in a phrase that has become shorthand inside the industry, “12 is the new 5.” During the cheap-debt decade, a typical deal needed 5 percent annual EBITDA growth to deliver a 2.5x return over a five-year hold. With borrowing costs in the 8 to 9 percent range and entry multiples at record levels, the same target return now requires roughly 10 to 12 percent annual EBITDA growth. 

McKinsey’s 2026 report makes the same point, only in different words. Returns now come from operational improvement rather than from financial engineering or multiple expansion. Alpha, the report argues, will increasingly be made through leadership development, disciplined capital deployment, and continuous operating value creation. 

The bottom line? There is less margin for error if a PE firm gets the first 100-day diagnostics wrong. 5 percent EBITDA growth tolerated minor misalignment between sponsor and management on what to prioritize in the opening months. 12 percent will not. 

After conducting hundreds of mid-market portfolio searches at Stanton Chase, we have learned that there are three areas where our clients’ perspectives differ from the myriads of suggestions we regularly read about.   

Look Below the C-Suite When You Build the First 100-Day Plan

When you build the first 100-day plan, you need a defensible view of the small set of people whose decisions drive most of the EBITDA. That includes the controllers and FP&A directors, regional sales leaders, and operations managers who sit one and two layers below the C-suite. That layer is where the value creation plan gets executed day to day, and it rarely makes it onto a sponsor’s diligence list before closing. 

The most concrete version of this point comes from McKinsey’s PE practice. One portfolio company told the McKinsey team that 37 roles among thousands of employees in the organization drove 80 percent of its EBITDA, which then changed how senior leaders allocated time, focus, and apprenticeship priorities. 

The implication is that the diligence question the sponsor needs to answer goes beyond identifying the right CEO and confirming the CFO can hold the new reporting rigor. The harder question is who those decision-makers below the executive team are and what the value creation plan needs from them. Most sponsors arrive at this question through underperformance six months into the hold rather than through diligence before closing. 

Translate the Value Creation Plan into Job Descriptions Before Close

The next piece of advice sounds obvious until you see the data. Before closing, the value creation plan needs to be translated into specific job descriptions and accountabilities for each executive. Most sponsors set growth targets at the company level, but far fewer translate those targets into what each individual executive is responsible for delivering. 

Bain’s research on portfolio company talent puts numbers on this disconnect. In their survey of PE professionals, 80 percent said they use the value creation plan to set company-level growth targets, but only 34 percent translate those targets into clear and actionable executive position descriptions. Only half use the value creation plan to set objectives for individual executives at all. Bain’s more recent 2026 report frames this as the work of “full potential due diligence” that lets sponsors hit the ground running on Day 1 of ownership rather than catching up to operational reality six months later. 

This is where most first 100-day plans drift. The sponsor and management team agree on a value creation plan with quantified targets, but the targets do not make it into the job descriptions and incentives of the people who are supposed to deliver them. The plan ends up living in the board pack and the LP report rather than in the day-to-day work of the executive team. 

Our clients have shared with us that their successful portfolio companies get ahead of the curve. Kelsey Cusack, Asset Manager at Argonaut Private Equity in Tulsa, shared:

At Argonaut, we work closely with management pre-close to develop and define the value creation plan, so we are aligned from the outset and positioned to maximize momentum in the first 100 days. A critical part of that work is assessing the organization chart, aligning incentive plans, and identifying where the team needs to be reinforced, not only at the executive level, but across the organization to support future growth.

By the time the first 100 days begin, every member of the executive team should know what the value creation plan needs from their seat in the next year, and the sponsor should have a defensible view of whether each member of the team can deliver it. 

Build the Assessment Before You Build the Search

Once a portfolio company’s value creation plan is translated into role-specific accountabilities, the work is to assess each existing leader against those accountabilities. Bain’s survey found that 93 percent of PE professionals view changing CEOs as risky or highly risky, but when sponsors decide to make the change, the result is broadly successful 75 percent of the time. The 18-percentage-point distance between perception and outcome lives in the quality of the assessment that informs the decision. 

The pattern repeats below the CEO level, too. Clients who arrive at a search engagement with a defensible assessment in hand brief us better, give us a sharper search target, and end up with a higher rate of placement success in the first six months. When the brief is vague, the same search becomes longer, more iterative, and less certain in outcome.  

The practical version of this advice is that the assessment work needs to happen on the calendar before the search work, not in parallel with it. The executive assessment of the existing team is part of the first 30 days, not the second 60. Search work, when it begins, is briefed against specific shortfalls in the existing team rather than against generic role profiles. 

What This Looks Like in Stanton Chase’s Searches

These three pieces of advice show up in the demand pattern we see across PE-backed clients. The roles that come to us cluster around a small set of recurring needs, and the pattern lines up with what the value creation plan asks for. 

The CFO role is the most-filled position for our PE-backed clients. Behind that, we see consistent demand for FP&A capability uplift, controller-level depth, and quality of earnings support during the post-close cleanup. Outside of finance, operations leadership requests arrive when the value creation plan calls for a transformation the sitting COO has not run before. For many of our clients that were founder-led prior to PE’s investment, a VP of sales or chief commercial officer is next on the list of executive search “to-dos.” Finally, the newest pattern in our pipeline is decision intelligence and AI strategy hires, driven by sponsors who want defensible AI integration plans before exit. 

What ties this demand pattern together is the same diagnostic question. Each of these searches works best when the brief is based on a clear picture of what the existing team can deliver, what the value creation plan needs that the existing team cannot deliver, and which roles below the executive committee are part of the answer either way. 

Most of these searches turn out to be reinforcements rather than replacements. Stanton Chase works alongside existing leadership teams to build out the bench, add the specific capabilities the value creation plan asks for, and complement what is already inside the business rather than clearing it out.  

What Does This Mean in Practice?

The first 100 days are not the place to figure out which people matter, what the value creation plan needs from them, or whether the existing leaders can deliver it. By then it is too late to organize the work properly. 

The diagnostic process needs to happen earlier, ideally before closing, or certainly within the first 30 days. The output is a mapping of value-driving roles below the C-suite, an assessment of the existing leaders against the value creation plan, and a sorted view of which roles are already filled with capable people, which are stretched, and which are missing. 

The sponsors who get a return on their first 100 days, from what we see, are the ones who treated the opening weeks as a diagnostic exercise first and a hiring problem second. The hiring that follows is faster, sharper, and more likely to land on the first try, and the resulting business is poised for more rapid and sustainable growth. 

Ms. Cusack also shared:

Stanton Chase has been a valued partner in helping us address those people needs effectively, bringing perspective and execution support that allows us to move quickly, stack hands with management, and build the team around the plan.

About the Author

Finley Konrade is a Managing Director at Stanton Chase, Regional Vice President for North America, and leader of the firm’s North America Private Equity practice. Based in the Dallas office, she has more than twenty years of experience identifying, assessing, and placing senior leaders across North America, EMEA, and APAC, with a focus on private mid-size enterprises and private equity portfolio companies. Since joining Stanton Chase in 2013, she has worked cross-functionally for clients in the industrial sector as well as financial and professional services, spanning executive search and board services, and she holds a Bachelor of Arts in Corporate Communications and Public Affairs from Southern Methodist University’s Meadows School. Outside the firm, she is an active member of the Association for Corporate Growth and a dedicated volunteer with Equest Therapeutic Horsemanship, combining her love of horses with a commitment to improving quality of life for children, adults, and veterans with diverse needs.