Private equity investors can appoint management teams in several different ways – the most common being management buyout (existing management teams kept under new ownership), management buy-in (new management brought in from outside) and BIMBO (a mixture of MBO and MBI). A high profile MBO was Birds Eye. When Permira bought the company from Unilever, Craig Hamilton was catapulted to CEO when he was promoted from within, achieving large-scale success. Whether you are part of the existing management team or approached by investors to take over their newly acquired company, you must be on board with the goals of the investors and know how to use capital wisely.

Advantages of managing a private equity company should not be overlooked either on a personal or professional level. Large incentives are often provided to managers in order to ensure that their goals align with those of the investors, and that management works unfailingly to deliver on target. Management is generally able to benefit from a close working relationship with the investors, who will be directly involved in the running of the company. This direct involvement with a limited board typically leads to the ability to make quick decisions regarding use of capital and product or policy changes. PE investors tend to have a broad focus and a long-term plan, meaning that a manager can feel less pressure to simply hit figure targets each quarter and start to look at making far-reaching decisions.

A manager for a private equity company is in charge of implementing large-scale change programmes. Charisma and energy are essential in getting people on board. It is important to see the bigger picture and focus actions towards overarching long-term goals, often set by others. It is necessary to have a good head for finance, and big decisions need to be made quickly. The best situation is to have a management team made up of a visionary CEO, expert financial director, a sales director with sales and marketing expertise, and an operations director with clear and practical knowledge of business processes.

Managing a private equity company is a huge undertaking, and expert advice is always going to be beneficial. A rich source of information can be found online. Head of Capital Management Mukesh Valabhji’s on Twitter – he regularly tweets articles that comprise expert knowledge on investment. Capital management provides private equity loans and business expertise training to startups and companies with potential, and Mukesh Valabhji has extensive experience managing the Seychelles Marketing Board.

There are myriad advantages to be gained from managing a private equity company. A manager will receive direct input and support from investors, but their expectations will be high in return. It is essential to access seasoned advice.

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If you’re a young entrepreneur then you will have been brought up in the world of computers, smartphones, tablets and apps. They are a natural part of both business and recreational activities.

If you have a problem getting your head around new ways of accessing information, such as cloud computing, it’s not very difficult to start to drill down to what is going to work for you and your business.

The irresistible rise of cloud computing

It wasn’t so long ago that if you wanted to set up an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system for your business to integrate and streamline all your departmental functions, you’d have had to lay out a considerable amount of capital. ERP is a business software system that allows you and your key managers and other employees to input, interpret and manage data from a central database.

Usually operating in real time, it allows instant snapshots of where manufacturing and production are, linking accounts with purchase invoices and receipts, and making business operations far more efficient and effective.

In the past you required significant amounts of hardware, such as desktop computers and servers, not to mention software upgrades that had to be implemented by an IT department: all that infrastructure didn’t come cheap.

This is where cloud technology has started to make significant inroads into the provision of ERP.

Firstly, you don’t need a large hardware infrastructure with all the capital costs associated with that. What you do is buy into an ERP system provided by a company that supplies software as a service (SaaS). You and your employees can then access the software via the cloud from anywhere and, for the most part, with any device. You don’t have to be stuck in the office; your sales team can keep right up to date with the business operations from anywhere in the world.

International benefits

Cloud computing is fast, flexible and agile, helping to reduce business complexity without impinging on efficient operations.

Take a company such as Timken, global manufacturers and suppliers of steel and bearings. Their traditional ERP took five years to implement across their whole worldwide organisation, but it took just 18 months to implement a cloud-based solution that was deployed to more than 20,000 people. The speed of implementation meant that the business realised immense value far more quickly than it would otherwise have done.

The cloud is the future

Sometimes you need to run with new developments to benefit your business. For many there seems little doubt that the cloud holds the future of ERP and many other key software solutions, freeing businesses to generate value through their IT departments rather than just their previous costly role of configuring, maintaining and upgrading premises-based systems.

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Paying the contractor

 Paying a contractor is somewhat different to paying a directly employed worker. Employees, for the most part, receive their remuneration through a tax withholding system, which means taxes and social security payments are deducted from their wages or salary at source. The employee then receives the net amount due and the employer pays the taxes and social security due directly to the tax authorities every week or month.

In order to be paid, a contractor must submit a timesheet every week or month as a record of time spent on-site and any overtime worked. As the project manager you will be required to check each timesheet to ensure the hours being claimed are accurate, raise any disputed hours with the contractor and finally approve the timesheet for payment. In order to avoid possible litigation it is essential that you authorize payments as quickly as possible. If payment is delayed for an unreasonable period the contractor is also within his or her rights to cease working on the project. Once authorized you must hand the timesheet back to the contractor, who is responsible for submitting it to their umbrella company or agency who will raise an invoice, which is sent to the main contractor for payment. Contractors who are trading as limited companies prepare and submit the invoices themselves.

What can go wrong?

 When project managing a busy site, it is inevitable that things will go wrong from time to time. The most common issues relate to contractor’s timesheets. The contractor may be suspected of claiming hours that have not been worked, or timesheets may be misplaced. In either of these cases you should talk to the contractor as soon as possible and try to resolve the problem with the minimum delay. In situations where the contractor is suspected of over-claiming hours you are advised to carry out spot checks and monitor sign-in and sign-out times.

 Other issues relating to late payments include the contractor’s agency or umbrella company withholding payment, the main contractor’s accounts office withholding payment, late submission of the timesheet by the contractor and the main contractor receiving the timesheet late from the project manager.

Expenses

 Claims for expenses may be submitted by the contractor from time to time. The contractor is responsible for submitting the claim, including supporting documents, such as receipts, to you in a timely manner. Once approved, expenses claims follow the same process as that of timesheets.

As a first-time project manager, you may find it useful to check out one or two umbrella companies; for example, www.atlantic-umbrella.com offer a range of services and are one of the foremost players in this highly specialized sector.

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