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Cogent Analytics

Delivering Powerful Business Solutions

Ex-Factory Letter

Our company has been in business for 32 years and we sure have seen quite a few ups and downs during those years, especially in 2008 and 2009. Burdened with a $2.5 million bank loan, we had to make drastic changes or lose the business. We survived in spite of a $1O million sales drop. It took us years to recover while paying back the bank loan in small increments. Towards the end of 2019 we were finally bank debt free, but here came COVID-19.

The pandemic did not require significant internal changes since we are a sales organization using online websites to sell capital equipment in the US, Canada and abroad. Our organizational set up with satellite sales offices allowed us to continue our operation without significant interruption. We successfully applied for PPP loans, sales were coming along, and we had money in the bank. One thing we didn’t have, while we are at and beyond retirement age, were plans for succession and a company infrastructure with procedures in place that would allow others to run the company without a longer learning curve.

When I received an introductory phone call from Steve at COGENT, I listened. The timing was right and I said, “yes” to having an analyst from COGENT visit us for three days. Here came Arion Albert, Senior Analyst, in his very refreshing and “wake up to reality” approach with his incredible experience and we signed up. His analysis and assessments were confronting, but very convincing. The option to cancel the engagement at any time without any further obligation got us over the fence. I’m glad we did. After having managed EX-FACTORY for 32 years and having run two other companies, I thought I knew and had seen it all. Speaking with Arion, I realized how much we had fallen into a routine, neglecting some of the key management tools working without a proper budget and with no metrics of measure.

So, Michael Beadle became our Project Director. He himself had extensive experience in sales and was able to relate to our business within a few days. He used a gentle, “nudging us along” approach to move us through the program. I had to relearn a few tools I was
aware of from the past and now we’re using them. He didn’t try to change our business. He implemented improvements within our existing structure. He introduced new procedures, some as basic as an annual review, combined with detailed job descriptions. Working with Michael has become a real pleasure. It showed that he really cared for us and truly wants us to succeed.

Embarrassing to say, we haven’t had company wide meetings for years and since most of our 35 employees work offsite, he organized, guided us, and participated in our first two Microsoft Teams meetings. From now on, the plan is to have regular monthly meetings.
Most importantly, we have the fundamentals of a structure that future managers can easily step into while it also opens up the door for successful succession. We’re looking forward to continuing the Life Cycle Program and we gladly recommend COGENT ANALYTICS to anyone who may be in a similar situation.

Juergen Schumacher – President
Ex-Factory Inc

American Maintenance and Cleaning Services Letter

We had Cogent Analytics out about 5 years ago and they helped us with some daily operational and structuring changes. This time when Merlin VanGerpen, came out we discussed about how far we have come, and ways we could get even better. Due to the climate of business surrounding the Covid 19 pandemic, we were having a hard time attracting and keeping staff. We employ a large number of part time workers. Training, supervision, and retaining staff has been a major hurdle.

The analyst they sent out was Colby Youngblood, for his expertise in leadership and training. Things got off to a rocky start with some of the staff, but the ones that stuck it out learned a lot in the few weeks that Colby was here. We worked on being a strong Leadership team as we trained our supervision staff. Colby conducted a number of presentations with our operation managers and Leadership team.

We now have a lot of tools at our disposal and need to continue the drive to stick to these ideas and goals.We now have weekly meetings with Colby to help keep us on track. These meetings are keeping us moving in the right direction. Cogent Analytics is very good at finding your weakness and helping you realize how much actual money those are costing you. I am excited to see our company continue to grow with support from Cogent Analytics.

Sincerely,

Managing Partner, Carey Winter

American Maintenance and Cleaning Services

Heavy Machines Letter

Our company has grown dramatically over the past ten years. Sounds like great news and in many ways it has been great. But what we realized was that while the revenue grew the profit margins slumped. We were great at growing revenue, but we were horrible at building profitability. We knew we needed some help.

In the spring of 2021, heading toward a record revenue year with still marginal profits, our ongoing conversations with Cogent Analytics heated up. We were ready to do something dramatic for the company, so we were searching for the best fit.

We engaged Cogent for a week-long visit from one of their analysists, which in our case was Merlin VanGerpin. Merlin identified several “leaks” where our margin was slipping away and, with hard data in hand – and without any “selling” – he convinced us to pursue a full engagement with the Cogent team. Two weeks later Sean Robertson and Gregg Jones, our Project Directors, came to see us. We are now in week 16, our final week of the engagement.

With Sean at the lead and Gregg’s understanding of the distributorship model, they started the process by building leaders. All of the managers within the company have gone through a “level-set”, which is a starting over with a 100% forward look. All of the managers within the company have gone through an extremely intense schedule of leadership training. Now, all of the managers within the company are much better leaders, better equipped to lead their areas of responsibility with a keen focus on maintaining our culture while “leading with a purpose” toward profitability. Everything we did as a company was challenged and most things we did changed. We were a 1990’s – type of company; now we are a 2020’s company with endless possibilities. Cogent changed our company from the inside-out.

Without drilling into each of our lines of business, I’ll just report that with the help of the Cogent team we have already seen lower costs of business and dramatic improvements in margin in all of them. We are clicking on all cylinders for the first time, maybe ever.

Our experience with the Cogent Team, and in particular Sean and Gregg, has been nothing short of exceptional. We have all been transformed as leaders and we now, all of us, are equipped to lead the company to much-improved profitability results all the while maintaining our DNA and improving our culture. Heavy Machines will never be the same.

So, my suggestion to any readers of this letter is to learn about Cogent Analytics and engage them. They have the ability to change your company forever.

Jay Nelson

Heavy Machines

New Life Chemical – Letter

We contracted with the operational consulting firm, Cogent Analytics in late April 2021 in order to improve efficiencies within our company by establishing standard operating processes and structure. In a surprisingly quick turnaround, the initial discovery phase with Cogent’s senior business analyst, Dave Drylie began the next week on April 26th. In an equally quick fashion, Mr. Jorge Colon was assigned as our project director and began a 13-week onsite review of our business processes and practices. We began implementing the changes almost immediately after identifying opportunity.

We want to thank Jorge Colon and his team for their effort and hard work across all of the segments of our business. To name a few of our new initiatives, Jorge helped us standardize and align operations procedures through all departments of our business. We were able to eliminate inefficiencies as well as establish clear role definitions, responsibilities and structural hierarchy for smoother operations and succession planning. This structure not only positions us for growth but it also defines a clear career path for retaining valuable employees. We also established key performance indicators to measure success and manage operational efficiency on a daily basis. I personally believe that the structure and measurable goals have lifted employee morale and empowered them to see how their daily work makes a difference in the success of our company.

As Scripture says, “Good planning and hard work lead to prosperity, but hasty shortcuts lead to poverty (Prov. 21:5).” We at New Life Chemical are thankful for the Lord’s blessing and for the wisdom and planning presented to us through Cogent Analytics and Mr. Jorge Colon.

We would not hesitate to recommend these services to those businesses planning to improve and grow.

Tim Northcutt
V.P. Sales/Partner

New Life Chemical

 

E.O. Habhegger Letter

To whom it may concern,

My initial call with Cogent Analytics was highly informative and much different from other calls I have received from business consultants.  Our company was facing various internal and external challenges all at the same time.  Integration of a newly acquired company, management and ownership transitions were just some of them.

Some of Arlon Albert’s previous business experiences correlated to our current situation. This helped identify key areas that were of concern to us as well as some areas that we had often overlooked in the past.  They helped us recognize areas of complacency and identify ways to rejuvenate our environment.

Kai Hungerford worked directly with all members of our management and ownership at length.  He laid out a detailed plan to integrate our staff and various office locations.

New and updated procedures were established which should help all members of our company to work towards the shared goal.  Dashboards helped establish budgets and control costs that we otherwise did not pay close attention to in the past.

Cogent and Kai have really helped us achieve the success that we were looking for and cannot recommend them enough.

 

Chris Hagman, E.O. Habhegger 

Associated Construction Letter

We have recently concluded a company process improvement project.  For this project we consulted with Cogent Analytics.   We spent 3+ months with Cogent working together to discover areas for improving our company operations.  Our initial Analyst was Merlin VanGerpen, our Project Director was Sean Robertson.  It was readily apparent that both individuals were highly skilled & very capable of assessing and acting upon business functions.  Be it leadership practices, culture, skillsets, behaviors, financial strategies and any number of other aspects.  The speed at which they executed their work was very impressive.  We were into details and down to business on day one.  I can say that I can work at a torrid pace, I met my match with Cogent.  The approach was very effective, we are left with a host of improvements and a plan for future ongoing positive change.

An organization is only as good as it’s team.  In evaluating our team, leadership growth was a primary focus early on.  Our executive team was taught to be much more effective in it’s clarity, expectations, processes, coaching, training and mentoring.  A major change in the mindset of the leadership team was to view their role through the eyes of an owner; in other words think and act like an owner.  We were taught to execute in a positive supportive company environment.  We found that working with leadership skills first made us much more effective at growing our entire team.  We have revamped our organizational structure to provide a very effective 360degree feedback loop to which our staff responded very well. Cogent’s observations have led our senior management to significantly change our leadership approach for the better.

Opportunities were identified in our various processes.  Many processes needed a 3rd parties objective view to open our minds to suggestions that would produce better results.  Cogent fulfilled that mission very well.  We had quick action on our safety, schedule, budget control and business development processes to name a few.  Our business development and marketing processes have really taken a turn down a better road.  We have a road map for developing further process change that will continue to yield benefits.

Our financial controls went from being reporting history to being used for future profit engineering.  Cogent provided the techniques and taught us the skillsets needed to be able to better control and have the whole company pitching into the company’s planned profitability.  This effort tied our Operations, Estimating, Business Development and Accounting departments together in pressing for a common goal.  We launched a bonus incentive plan based on profitability that further gives our entire team “skin in the game” to achieve our financial goals.

Succession and the future longevity of the company is very much a concern.  Cogent helped chart a map for the future leadership of ACC that will assure the company will remain viable.  Recognizing the value of being stewards of this company for the future generation was a major change in mindset that emboldened our leadership.  Certainly changes the perspective on our roles.  Having a 3 year, 4 to 8 year plan & beyond was a have to have that enables us to plan for the future of the company. This component existed in bits and pieces before Cogent; it now has a course to follow.

So we now have a company that is better for it’s people and it’s customers.  Associated will continue to develop and become more effective as we norm the principals and practices that Cogent has instilled.  We are onto the lifecycle portion of Cogent’s work.  The spot checks over the next year are invaluable to assuring we understand and stay the course.  Sean Robertson did a great job of transferring his vast skills in company operations and culture.  Cogent’s efforts were very effective; I felt from day one that they were a cut above their competition in business consulting.  Having done this in the past some years ago with another firm, I can truly say that they have proven to be more that just a cut above.  Well done!

Sincerely,
Joseph Jankowski
President
The Associated Construction Company

FL Crane & Sons Letter

Upon the departure of our branch president at our Off-site Construction operation, we realized that there were some changes that needed to be made to ensure our success moving forward. At the time, we were unfamiliar with Cogent Analytics, but through some brief conversations about their methods and willingness to spend significant time on-site and “get involved” with the operations of our branch, we felt that it would be worth bringing them in for the discovery process.

During the discovery we were pleasantly surprised by the depth of understanding the analyst had of our branch. The amount of information he was able to pull together from our financials and the brief 3-day on-site meeting was impressive.

Following the discovery we elected to proceed with a 13 week consulting program where a consultant would spend 40 hours per week with our team. The work they put in, and the changes they made during this process was game-changing. Through this program our team’s thought process about measuring and tracking everything completely changed. Our team is dialed in and excited about the future.

We are very pleased with the work Cogent did for F.L. Crane, and would recommend them to anyone in need of this type of service.

Ty Crane
President of F.L. Crane & Sons, Inc.
FL Crane & Sons

 

 

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