Writing

"I don't know how to walk away from this. But I also don't know how to keep going like this."

That's what a family business owner told me in 2018. He was urgently searching for a partner who could help him navigate major growth pains, and he chose Ordiant.

Seven years later, with our intensive hands-on help, his company's annual revenue has nearly tripled, its profits have increased tenfold, and its enterprise value has grown by more than $50 million. I've also gained insight into what it's like to live in a business like this as it transforms.

He knew how to serve customers and build the brand, which had made his business valuable. I learned how to refine the strategy, fix the numbers, raise capital, and build institutional-grade systems that position a company with a strong existing culture to move into the future. Together, we turned a $30 million company stuck on legacy systems into an enterprise with a clear path to $150 million in annual revenue and PE-quality financials.

I founded Ordiant in 2017 as an advisory firm to help privately owned businesses transform and scale their operations. For almost nine years, I've worked alongside founders, families, and partner-owned firms as their advisor—not their investor. That changed in August when I partnered with Global Data Consultants (“GDC”) to form Ordiant Growth Partners (“OGP”). Now, we aim to acquire and operate companies, not just advise them.

We've issued our first "indications of interest" and are meeting regularly with business owners who've responded to our outreach. The relationships we're building with brokers, advisors, and other intermediaries are developing quickly.

My Journey

Before Ordiant, I worked at a boutique investment bank focused on corporate finance. The experience made clear to me that for many medium-sized companies—the economic heart and soul of communities across America—the usual methods of building value were tired and inadequate. They needed better thinking about how to scale and build fresh foundations.

The regional tire dealer and automotive services company I began advising in 2018 is a good example. His dad founded the company in the 1970s, after getting his start selling tires to Florida citrus farmers out of his pickup truck while the family sold eggs from a stand alongside the old highway. Bit by bit, the patriarch started buying land. Today, his acreage, which includes the corporate offices and rows of tire warehouses, has now passed to his son. The family has kept the chicken coop as a reminder of where they came from.

By the time we met, their business had become well-known regionally, boasting hundreds of employees, thousands of loyal customers, and a reputation for honest and reliable service.

Yet, the company was struggling to grow efficiently. Revenue was stuck at around $30 million. Operations and expansion consumed cash. The second-generation owner knew his family had built a valuable business, but he couldn't see the path forward. He had big aspirations and was willing to take calculated risks. But he needed capital, and simply getting banks to call back was tough. However, I found the passion and sincerity in his voice compelling, and I dug in to help him clean up the financials, build systems that could scale, and present a story to banks that would enable us to access capital to fuel growth.

The work was a real grind. Most of the business still ran on manual processes, and we were lucky to get the limited data we had. But he and I bet on ourselves during that first year together, and it was one of the most gratifying experiences I've had. Profits and free cash flow ramped quickly, which gave us confidence. With the public companies I had previously served, the pace of change was painfully slow. With the tire dealer, improvement was immediate and dramatic.

Outside investors showed up, talking a good game. Every conversation followed the same script: they made aggressive growth projections, talked of "professionalizing" operations (translation: firing longtime employees), and promised a five-year exit timeline, accompanied by the famous "second bite at the apple" speech. These deals would have provided the family with liquidity, but its members would have lost forever the satisfaction of involvement in and contributions to the community and local economy, an important part of the role the owner wanted it to play.

Strategic buyers offered premium prices, but the fade would be quicker. These conversations felt cold and lacked the genuine partnership qualities the owners wanted because prospective buyers ignored the elements that were, in fact, the company's soul.

In the end, the CEO turned down all those deals and resolved to hold on, but with the weight of recognition that technology and consolidation are changing the playing field.

I've recently begun working with the CEO's sons—the third generation—to prepare them to excel in a more challenging, professionalized, and competitive industry. The company now has a clear path to $150 million in revenue, while retaining its culture, local impact, and relationships that have made it special to its customers and community leaders.

Partnerships with investors, in some capacity, aren't out of the question in the future, but finding the right fit has been surprisingly difficult.

As the company's advisor for over seven years, I've learned just as much as my clients have about integrity and ownership, even under pressure. I've seen that setting the course for a venerable organization with a proud history involves a lot more than financial engineering. This company's transformation didn't happen because I helped bring in capital or implemented a playbook. It happened because we spent thousands of hours shoulder-to-shoulder together—through a warehouse fire, the COVID pandemic, and market volatility.

At Ordiant, I've found that families and founders are not always open to this kind of hard, complex work. It takes years and doesn't come with an easy button. In addition, building the trust required to implement real change takes time that most owners don't have. Many need a partner who can move faster and bring ideas and resources that are tougher to organize at a smaller scale.

And sometimes, they want to sell to someone who will be a responsible steward.

Deep Alignment in Our Foundation

Greg Courtney founded GDC in 1995 as a solo consulting operation in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. He's a Marine Corps veteran who learned perseverance in the service, which he applied to building an IT services business from scratch. Today, GDC serves commercial companies, educational institutions, and government agencies across multiple states through six integrated IT service lines, ranging from application development to managed services and workforce staffing.

I started working with Greg and GDC years ago when he was navigating his next growth phase. Over several years, he and his team transformed GDC's foundation without losing its culture. That experience showed me something important about Greg: He has the rare combination of recognizing when to evolve and the discipline to execute it well.

In the late 1990s, when IT consulting meant chasing quarterly projects, Greg built annual contracts and recurring revenue streams. In the mid-2000s, when competitors stayed regional, he expanded across state lines while maintaining service quality. In 2008, when the financial crisis crushed most service businesses, GDC didn't retreat—Greg saw talented people available and opportunities to serve clients whose vendors were disappearing.

The result was the right kind of growth. GDC never sold equity to an institution for a short-term boost or sacrificed culture for scale. It demonstrated how to build enterprise-grade operations while maintaining independent ownership. Greg and his team also expanded through acquisition. By the time we began working together, GDC had lived what OGP now represents: You can scale without sacrificing an organization's core ethos.

When Greg and I started discussing a partnership, it wasn't just about combining capital and advisory expertise. It was about codifying the principles from GDC and Ordiant to combine operational and investor mindsets that deliver exceptional outcomes.

We also agreed that businesses represent more than their financial performance. Greg's approach to people mirrors what I learned with the tire dealership and other clients. He promotes from within and invests in training. I've found his intuition for when to push and when to consolidate, how to scale profitably without breaking what works, when an acquisition fits, and when it doesn't, exceptionally impactful from the start.

That backing—capital, operational depth, pattern recognition, and judgment earned through our years working together—makes OGP different from any other platform in the market.

The partnership doesn't stop with Greg. Each of the other GDC leaders in OGP brings distinct experience that creates an exceptional opportunity for founders and families transitioning their businesses.

The Choice Founders and Families Fear

After working with dozens of companies navigating transitions, I've heard their leaders say they fear the options presented to them by prospective buyers.

If they sell, they'll get cash but see their employees laid off as "redundant headcount." They’ve heard of promises of partnerships by private equity firms and strategics that fade quickly.

If they hold, they retain control and independence but acknowledge the risk of opportunities slipping away as consolidation accelerates around them.

If they hand it down, they know they’ll preserve the family’s legacy, but hope that succession doesn't break what they built, that their heirs are up to the challenges of the coming decades, and that market forces don't overwhelm them.

We believe legacy deserves stewardship, not liquidation.

We formed OGP as a fourth option to give founders and owners hope, stability, freedom, and assurance that they're doing the right thing for themselves, their families, employees, and communities when partnering with us.

To be sure, we're not for everyone. We won't be the fastest to close or pay the highest valuations. Yet we're well-suited for founders and families who've built an enduring business that matters and want a partner who thinks in decades and brings institutional rigor and fresh ideas.

What I've Learned in the Trenches

The tire dealership's transformation, along with so many others I've led, taught me lessons no consulting engagement or business school case study could:

• Trust unlocks sophistication. The deep relationship built over seven years allowed us to implement high-quality financial strategies, governance architecture, strategic frameworks, and performance management. When trust enables change, a business can achieve excellence while reflecting its values well.

• Culture creates more value than financial engineering. I've spent as much time on human capital and performance alignment as on financial systems, and the returns have been extraordinary. Engaged teams who understand strategy and feel ownership execute with relentless focus. Spreadsheets don't. Most PE treats culture as "soft." We treat it as a durable and irreplaceable competitive advantage.

• Crisis means opportunity. Each crisis—the warehouse fire, COVID, market shifts—refined our approach. What started as reactive problem-solving evolved into proactive system-building. Pressure forges strength when you have the proper foundation.

• Patient growth compounds better than explosive growth. We delayed profitable acquisitions because our systems couldn't handle the integration. We killed "growth" initiatives that would have destroyed returns. We turned down good opportunities because the timing wasn't right. Knowing when to accelerate and when to consolidate makes the difference.

But the most important lessons came from GDC’s journey:

• Countercyclical thinking creates lasting value. GDC expanded in 2008 when others cut. Greg invested in systems during the good years. The organization hired talent when competitors were shedding people. Acting when you have capacity, not when you're desperate, creates the foundation for long-term success.

• Long-term ownership is a competitive advantage, not a constraint. GDC could make ten-year decisions that PE-backed competitors on five-year clocks couldn't. The business could invest in culture, turn down bad revenue, and build for the long term without outside investors demanding exits.

• Operational excellence and patient capital aren't opposing forces. The discipline to build institutional-grade systems while continuing to innovate and search for opportunities is a core tenet of OGP’s philosophy.

These lessons now form the foundation of OGP's approach.

How We Think About Transition

Founders and families face hard choices when industry consolidation, pending retirement, stalled growth, or a big investment cycle forces a decision. How do you preserve what you built while positioning the business to grow beyond what you can achieve alone?

Here are some topics we'll cover in the series of essays I'm publishing over the coming months:

Foundation: The choice founders and families face

• The moment you realize you can't do this forever
• What industry consolidation or a big event means for your business
• The false choice: Maximum price vs. right outcome
• What traditional PE gets wrong

The OGP difference: How we think about ownership

• Why long-term ownership works better: The 30-year case for patient capital
• Investor + operator: Why this combination matters
• Against the playbook: Why context matters more than cookie-cutter formulas

Core owner concerns: The questions worth asking

• Succession without stagnation
• Culture as capital
• The liquidity question
• What partnership actually looks like
• When OGP is right (and when it's not)

Practical mechanics: What actually happens

• Post-close: The first 90 days
• How we value businesses
• From first call to close
• Building a regional platform

This series is for you if:

• You've built a business that matters to your customers, your employees, your community, your family
• You're starting to think about what comes next, whether that's three years from now or feeling more urgent
• You've gotten calls from PE firms and strategics, and something about those conversations didn't sit right
• You want liquidity, but not at the cost of everything you built
• You care about your people
• You want a partner who thinks in decades, not quarters

If you're facing that critical moment, or suspect it's on the horizon, this series is for you.

Feel free to reach out whenever you'd like to chat. If you're navigating these questions and want to discuss your specific situation, I'm always open to connecting.

You can reach me directly at smorgan@ordiant.com.

Most founders and families who’ve built a business over the decades feel that same tension. They can't walk away, but can't keep going the same way. That's who OGP was built for.