Introducing LION: the Lancor Interim Operating Network, and the gap in the PE talent market it was built to close.

Twenty years of placing operating partners, codified into a structured assessment instrument for portfolio operations candidates.

I’ve started asking operating partners a simple question, and I’ve started to dread the answer. Not because it’s bad, but because I’m getting pessimistic about whether one exists at all. The question (or some related version of it): when your portfolio company beats plan, how does your firm establish that your team is the reason? […]

Insights from the field… A few years back, a sponsor brought me in to help replace an Operating Partner they had hired two years earlier. The OP was talented. Strong references, strong pedigree, strong delivery in their last seat. The fit on paper was clean but the fit in practice just didn’t click. The sponsor’s […]

A few years back, an LP investing in mid-market PE asked me a question on a Zoom call that seemed innocuous at the time. He said: “How does an Operating Partner actually scale? You’re one person. You can’t sit in eight management meetings a week.” I gave him the then-standard answer – prioritization, frameworks, repeatable […]

Why outcome-based pricing is coming for professional services — and what it means for PE underwriting There is a number buried in a recent Wall Street Journal exclusive on ServiceNow that should stop every professional services firm — and every private equity investor who owns one — cold. Fifty percent of ServiceNow’s new business revenue […]

I’ve been placing Operating Partners for 20 years. Over that time, I’ve worked on 250+ searches across more than 100 PE firms. When I sat down recently to count how many women I’ve placed into Portfolio Operations roles, I was disappointed. Not because the women I’ve placed aren’t exceptional—they absolutely are. But because after two […]

What Two Decades of Executive Search Taught Me About PE’s Most Important Role Twenty years ago, when I started placing operating partners at private equity firms, the role barely existed. Most funds relied on a handful of retired executives on advisory retainers — no carry, no seat at the table, no real accountability. Today, operating […]

This is a fireside chat from the Wharton Online/Wall Street Prep private equity certificate program featuring Chris Conti, cofounder and Managing Partner of Lancor, a global executive search firm focused on the Private Equity industry. Conti provides an in-depth overview of the Operating Partner role in private equity, explaining how it has evolved over the […]

The AI Future for Portfolio Operations:“It’s not hard to imagine an AI sitting on the investment committee…” Nik Kapauan joined Access Holdings in 2022 as a Managing Director on the Value Creation team. As a member of the team, Nik supports the firm’s thesis development, origination, execution, and portfolio management activities. He also leads Access’ […]