It's been my experience that restructuring a business is more of an art form rather than a science. In rolling up 18 IT companies, I realized that I was not following my investors pace. Instead I was focusing on the underlying businesses. Does that affect the business? sure it does. does it impact your management decisions, absolutely.
So why pace yourself to your investors timing? Because they are the source of capital, and they don't care what's inside the blackbox, they only care about capital gains and returns. And they are right.
Frequently CEOs in a roll-up become wrapped up in putting together the right organization, the perfect business unit, the optimal technology partnerships. This is fine, but it does not fill your investors objectives.
