A turnaround is only as good as its diagnosis. When leadership treats structural problems as execution problems, the organisation works harder without addressing the reason performance deteriorated in the first place.
I have taken direct operating responsibility for turnarounds, including a healthcare venture that was consuming capital without a credible path to growth. The presenting symptoms - fragmented clients, an unclear proposition, mounting losses - were not, on their own, the actual problem.
The real question was structural: what was this business actually selling, to whom, and why would a rational buyer pay for it. Cost-cutting or working harder inside the wrong structure only produces a smaller version of the same underperforming business.
The turnarounds that work begin with an honest assessment of which parts of a portfolio are recoverable and which are not, followed by the discipline to close what cannot be fixed rather than allow it to continue consuming capital and attention.
Only once that diagnosis is right does the rebuild - new proposition, new commercial model, new operating structure - have a genuine chance of reaching break-even and, eventually, investment.