M&A and integration leadership search.
INC'D recruits integration, corporate development and post-close leaders for PE-backed essential services platforms.
The acquisition closes once. Integration happens every day after.
A platform completing repeated add-ons needs more than a deal team. It needs leaders who can move a business from diligence into a realistic 100-day plan, align systems and functions, retain critical people and hand the operation back without leaving permanent integration debt.
We distinguish between leaders who have advised on integration and those who have owned it in a live, acquisition-heavy operating platform.
Roles we recruit.
What we assess.
- Number, pace and type of integrations personally led.
- Diligence-to-close handoff and 100-day planning.
- Founder, workforce and customer-retention judgment.
- Systems, finance, HR and operational workstream leadership.
- Synergy tracking and accountability.
- Ability to build a repeatable integration function rather than rely on heroics.
Where integration and M&A searches go wrong.
Advisers mistaken for owners
Many candidates have advised on integration. Far fewer have owned it inside a business making repeated acquisitions.
Integration debt
Deals close faster than they integrate. Leaders who cannot keep pace leave a backlog of half-integrated companies.
Relationships lost in transition
Customer, technician and regulator relationships are often personal to the acquired leaders. Losing them destroys the value that was bought.
Systems moved without adoption
Moving an acquired company onto shared software means little if the branch does not actually use it.
How INC'D runs the search.
We establish the acquisition pace, integration model, functional workstreams and value-creation targets before beginning the search. Candidates must separate work they personally owned from work completed by advisers, deal teams or functional colleagues. A typical shortlist contains three to five qualified M&A and integration leaders within two to four weeks of engagement.
How our executive search works →
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