In 2013 I joined my mum’s health and social care business. My role was within finance and HR. When my brother and I signed a management buyout, we became joint shareholders at the exact time the world closed down.
The COVID-19 pandemic had arrived.
We led our team through two older adult care homes in the Highlands. We kept COVID out for a considerable amount of time, while the rules around us changed weekly.
It was nothing short of relentless, yet we held our KPIs and we believed we had made it through the worst.
In the summer of 2021, COVID arrived in both homes, with little warning. Any care home with an outbreak was required to close to admissions. For us, it was the start of the most difficult path we had ever navigated. So far.
Voluntary administration was the only route
The margins within healthcare are extremely tight, this means having empty rooms is financially very challenging. When the periods of closure were over, we had reached the maximum limits of our finance.
We went to the bank. No further lending was available.
We went to the NHS, who were not able to provide any support to keep us open at that time.
As a family, my brother, my mum and I talked it through, and it became clear that voluntary administration was the only route left that kept the people in our care safe.
That decision took weeks of many difficult conversations and sleepless nights before we made it, alongside our accountants, in early January 2022.
On 23 March 2022, we stood in front of our teams – some I had known since I was eight years old, I was then 33 – and told them the administration team were in the car park and that we would be handing over our businesses to them.
I was five months pregnant with my first child.
It became clear that voluntary administration was the only route left that kept the people in our care safe
What worked (and what didn’t)
What didn’t work was assuming, going in, that an administration wouldn’t be personal, because it is ‘just business’. It’s entirely personal. It’s painful and there are no winners.
If I can take only one thing into an administration process that I am ever involved in again, it would be that.
What worked was communication. This is relentless; it has to be clear and honest. Even when the most honest answer is hard to say, or to hear.
We were unable to answer every question in the early days (would the homes find a buyer? Would people be TUPE’d?) – we did not know, so we would say just that. We didn’t guess or make promises.
We told people plainly that a closure was likely, and what the timeframe would be. Everyone went into consultation, including the directors, with no real answer, no false hope.
It mattered that as a Board we had more than one plan and that we were in agreement before any information was provided to the team. That allowed us to pivot fast as circumstances changed, without the team ever seeing us disagree in public.
Seven lessons learned
- Never take any strong business for granted because things can change very quickly.
- Your professional and your personal relationships are not the same thing, and both will be tested. The professional ones will shift, and it can be lonely and isolating. Invest in your personal ones while things are going well, because you will need them when things are not!
- A genuine end goal is important. Work back from that point, and keep more than one road to that destination open — this will allow you to pivot quickly.
- As a Board, protect a united public front. Losing this can be enough to topple the process.
- Have the difficult conversations early. Putting them off will not make them any easier.
- Resilience isn’t only yours to find. Your team’s world is falling apart too, even while you’re trying to hold yours together, and giving each other grace matters as much as being strong.
- Directors can be made redundant too. Those businesses you helped build are no longer yours.
What didn’t work was assuming, going in, that an administration wouldn’t be personal, because it is ‘just business’
Becoming a different leader
Beyond the practical lessons, the process changed me as a leader. It made me more resilient and, if I am honest, harder too. I am still unclear if that is a good thing. I have the ability to separate emotion from the decision publicly, far more easily than before. The emotion is no longer etched on my face. I am not sure if that is a strength, or something I have lost.
It taught me to listen sooner. Had I listened to some things earlier, maybe the outcome would be different. That being said, we cannot live our lives through ‘what ifs’; we cannot change the past.
I can only see this looking back. It taught me that failure in these businesses doesn’t mean I am a failure, or that the next opportunity will be a failure. It was a chapter, not my whole story.
If you enjoyed this article, read another practical insights piece: Five steps: Your guide for leading with greater clarity
