Piccadilly Food Cost Succcess
This engagement with Piccadilly Cafeterias, a $160,000,000 company, was completed in October 2013. In April 2010, Piccadilly engaged Liuzza to initiate and lead a comprehensive food cost reduction program. In addition to the program’s design and its components, Liuzza worked closely with all levels of management to remove organizational impediments that inhibited the full development and success of the program. By the end of the third year, cumulative savings totaled $4,305,000 and were at a running rate of over $2,000,000 annually. See below the Executive Summary, presented with permission, of a detailed report prepared for creditors. Piccadilly Restaurants, LLC Report on food Cost Savings / Cost Avoidance Initiative Executive Summary In April 2010, Piccadilly’s food cost was 29.4% of sales. Food cost per guest was $2.30, and the company’s cost of wholesale food ingredients averaged $0.95 per pound. Executive management believed the company had a significant opportunity to reduce food costs by 1% to 2% of sales—$1.0 to $2.0 million annually. Senior management then embarked on a comprehensive and determined initiative to achieve or exceed this goal. This report outlines the steps taken and the corporate impact of this endeavor. April 2010 Food Cost as % of Sales -29.4%$ Food Cost per Guest – $2.30Lbs. Used per Guest – 2.43 June 2013 Food Cost as % of Sales – 27.5%$ Food Cost per Guest – $2.47Lbs. Used per Guest – 2.13 Had this program not occurred and its numerous components not implemented, then by June of 2013, commodity price inflation would have driven these costs to: Food Cost as % of Sales – 33.58%$ Food Cost per Guest – $2.64 For each twelve-month period since its beginning in May of 2010, the program has saved or avoided costs of $883,000 from May 2010 through April 2011, $1,291,000 from May 2011 through April 2012, and $1,541,000 for May 2012 through April 2013. And for May and June of 2013, the amount is $590,000. The total estimated cost saved or avoided from May 2010 through June 2013 is $4,305,000. There are additional food cost programs to be implemented as the company enters Phase III of the Initiative.
Volunteers of America: Feasibility Study of Creating a Daily Fresh Meal Delivery Service for Charter Schools
Background Situation: The organization is looking to replace several of its smaller food operations with a larger regional service, specifically targeting charter schools. They see a significant need and opportunity in this market compared to commercial competitors. LMC was tasked with conducting a Feasibility Analysis, which included: Recommendations and Approvals: Business Plan Development: Final Approval and Implementation: Fine-Tuning:
The Kenner Airport Casino Truck Stop
(A family-owned company) Clients were four brothers, each in different businesses and professions, who jointly owned a residential trailer-park in Louisiana, having only modest financial returns. They engaged Liuzza Management Consulting, ”LMC,” for ideas on alternative uses. LMC did a feasibility study on possible alternative uses including a commercial land lease. Upon completing the study, LMC’s recommendation was that a video poker truck stop casino was the highest and best use of the property. Louisiana, a few years earlier, had legalized video poker gaming in bars, restaurants, and truck stops. Since Liuzza already had varied experiences in the video poker business and its complex regulatory process, LMC was engaged to spearhead bringing this project to fruition. The gaming regulations for a truck stop casino required the facility to include, in addition to fuel and related sales and ample parking for numerous. 18-wheelers, a restaurant, and a convenience food store. Since none of the brothers had the experience, time, or interest in overseeing this project in its construction or later operation, the first option that LMC recommend was a joint venture with an existing casino truck stop operator, who would contribute 50% of the capital, and receive 50% of the profits plus a management fee. Negotiations were held with two different parties, but neither could agree with the owners on the value of the real estate they the brothers contributed. So, the final arrangement was to find and contract with an existing licensed gaming operator to manage and fund the video poker operation for a percent of the gaming profits. And the owners would lease out the restaurant, C-store, and fuel portions to separate parties. One of the brothers would be responsible for overseeing the gaming operator and the long-term leasing of the other entities. LMC also sourced the design, permitting, engineering and construction of the new buildings and the other legal services required locally. The next phase was coordinating the complex licensing for the gaming operation and having each of the four owners approved for suitability by the Louisiana State Police. Amongst the elements of this transformational process that LMC spearheaded, working closely with and on behalf the owners, were: RESULT: a minimally profitable residential trailer park was transformed into a highly profitable video poker casino.
HHH Trucking & Warehousing Company
The company was organized into three separate wholly-owned subsidiaries. HHH (a pseudo-name) was a formally successful business in three related areas of logistics: SITUATION: The business had been in decline for several years resulting in large losses, past due accounts payable, and loss of several key accounts. HHHwas about to be sued and evicted on its leased 100,000 ft. warehouse by the landlordon what was then almost one year of past due rent. The warehousing business, AAA, was unprofitable with no hope of improvement, and the landlord had to be dealt with. The FTL business, BBB, was also unprofitable, and its truck leases were in default. The only profits were coming from the very successful long-haul brokerage business, CCC, which benefited from its several loyal, capable, and dedicated team members. Liuzza Management Consulting (LMC) was engaged to help find a way to save the business and/or wind it down with the least possible financial and legal damage to the owner. LMC’s first activities were to communicate with all creditors to seek their restraint from further collection actions until it possibly could create a plan to minimize damage to all parties. Then HHH balance sheets were sent to all interested parties. Therefore, they would see that if HHH were forced into a Chapter 7 or 11 bankruptcy, all parties, except the lawyers, would lose any chance of receiving anything. LMC recommendations then were: Bankruptcy law prohibits any “insider-type” transaction of a sale of anything at a below-true value to an insider within the prior two years. Therefore, the owner’s only option was to purchase for cash and at fair market value. LMC produced a valuation for CCC, which was affordable to the existing owner. Although its going-concern value was higher than the owner could afford to pay based on a multiple of earnings, should the key employees depart, that value would decline significantly if they departed. That justified a lower valuation. The sale plan to the owner was structured so that the key employees would be granted minority equity interests should the bankruptcy lawyers approve the lower valuation and sale documents. Upon their approval, the deal was successfully consummated. OUTCOME: No creditors filed any suits, and ßAAA and BBB closed down, paying creditors whatever was possible with their remaining cash. LMC negotiated total rent forgiveness from the landlord. The HHH owner fortunately salvaged the best part of his company, CCC, becausethe bankruptcy that was threatened by some creditors was avoided by LMC’s strategies and actions.The owner of CCC was to pay fair market value in cash with the proceeds going into the company and being available to pay the then-existing creditors. A valuation was done by LMC, bankruptcy lawyers drafted the related documents, approved the lower valuation, and the deal was completed, and the key employees were retained.
A Deep-River Logistics Company
The company was an inland deep-river barge operator, (pseudo-name: AAA), founded 3 years prior by a well-connected and well-respected executive of a much larger logistics company. BACKGROUND: Year 1-fabulous success. Year 2 was good but declining, ending with a facility blowup of its major customer from which there was a very large account receivable that greatly impairing AAA’s working capital to remain current with its tug and barge subcontractors. In year 3, several towing and barge subcontractors began discontinuing services to AAA and several threatening lawsuits. However, during that year, despite these challenges, AAA was successful in gaining a new and potentially huge customer, (pseudo-name: HUGE), with signed Letter of Intent contracts conditioned upon AAA securing tow & barge suppliers as subcontractors. Therefore, if consummated, there would be new business for all parties concerned, including the subcontractors. However, the subcontractors, already carrying large AAA account receivables, demanded substantial payment on the existing receivables prior to agreeing to do the new HUGE business. The AAA owner had been negotiating working capital financing through loans or selling equity to cover this. Should AAA achieve this financing, it would enable all involved parties to recover and benefit from the HUGH business. All parties were hoping. But that working capital financing remained uncertain. And time was running out for AAA, and creditor lawsuits and bankruptcy threats were occurring. AAA needed solutions fast. AAA sought out Liuzza Management Consulting (LMC) to hopefully help create solutions to these challenges. LMC’s most immediate task was to convince all creditors to withhold legal action in order to buy time for AAA to acquire working capital or find other solutions. Liuzza met with each creditor individually. They all appreciated the fact that AAA had brought in appropriate help and expertise. To maintain that confidence, these visits needed to be promptly followed up with a plausible written Plan with at least some chance of success of providing the working capital or some other methodology to bring together sufficient resources to make this HUGE contract a reality. Of course, LMC could not assume that timely working capital financing would occur. Therefore, alternative approaches had to be developed, negotiated, and a written Plan presented to these creditors to avoid pending suits. LMC’s summary Plan recommendations were three different alternatives, all to be perused concurrently: Plan A. Find a way for the tugboat subcontractors, that could be involved and directly profit from the HUGH contract, to consider providing services for HUGH on regular credit (30 day) terms. This was LMC’s best but “longshot” proposal to, “somehow,” get them to pool their efforts to fund the deal, effectively providing AAA its needed working capital while making no demands on their past-due receivables until a later date after the HUGH shipments have begun. They would, therefore, gain considerable new business and be paid DIRECTLY by HUGH—not by AAA. They would deal with the AAA past-due amounts later. Thus enabling everyone involved, the debtor and creditors, to be considerably better off. This approach to gain their agreement would be to convince HUGH that once shipments began, instead of making all payments directly to AAA, HUGE would pay the tug and barge providers their portion of the fees directly, with the balance being paid directly to AAA, who would pay the other support providers their fees. The owner convinced HUGE to add this subcontractor payment term the contract. This method of avoiding a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, that defers all current debt to buy time to somehow find an interim source of working capital (in this case by commencing the HUGH deliveries, enabled by the subcontractors awaiting payment for the 30-day terms on the new business, thereby funding the working capital to generate new profits, thus saving the company. AAA could then begin retiring all the prior deferred past-due debt payments. This is generally referred to as an “Out-of-Court Settlement.” Plan B. Bring in a certain large industry partner to provide all the tugs and barges as a partner or provider of tug and barge components. Plan C. AAA-owned barges were in storage upriver and the storage fees were also past due. AAA owner felt strongly that, once A. or B. above were agreed upon, the storage company owner would have no problem releasing his barges for immediate use because the outlook for collecting their AAA account receivable would be greatly improved. This funding, or some alternative funding, is necessary to supply the needed barges for execution of alternative A above. LMC was responsible for negotiating A and B concurrently, implementing whichever one could be signed and implemented first. The owner continued working on C. Those providers, who participated in the Plan A for HUGE deliveries, would be paid timely on the new business (30 days), and they would delay requiring any payments on their past-due receivables for six months after commencement of the new contract. The remaining of the ten creditors not participating in Plan A would receive payments directly from AAA after the same six months. In essence, the participating Plan A providers would be the source of the critically-needed initial working capital to fund execution of the HUGE contract by extending additional credit, based upon HUGE’s commitment to pay them directly. This would be a win/win for them because their new income would be secured by HUGE, and, without this new contract for AAA, many feared they might never be paid their old receivables. The same would be the case should Plan B be executed, of which Plan A participants were not aware. AAA’s largest subcontractor, (pseudo-name: PPP), which was holding AAA’s largest accounts payable, and with whom LMC was negotiating payment, was also a direct competitor and an unsuccessful bidder on the HUGE contract. After a few phone calls in which Liuzza conveyed his Plan A and Plan B ideas, he met with the senior executives at their home office in the Midwest and suggested that they consider being a participant in Plan A, or in Plan B as a major operating partner. A letter of Intent
Resurrected the World’s First Drive-In Chain–The Pig Stand
The Pig Stand founded in Dallas TX in 1921, the world’s first drive-up food service operation, was an enclosed shack with flip-up windows exposing serving counters and accommodate only drive-up customers. It was the world’s first drive-up restaurant chain. It cooked only pork products served with sauce. It later grew to over 100 units nationally. By 2006 it had declined down to 8 sit-down restaurants in southeast Texas. Unable to pay its debts, in 2005 it filed Chapter 11 Bankruptcy with its then-current owner as trustee and continuing CEO. By March of 2006, it was unable to file the required Plan of Reorganization, and the judge declared that if an outside experienced competent replacement could not be engaged within 30 days, that he would immediately convert it to a chapter 7 immediately forced liquidation. Vincent Liuzza was approached by the U.S. Trustee in San Antonio and agreed to assume full responsibility as Chapter 11 Trustee that month. This avoided the pending Chapter 7 auction of the assets and resurrected the possibility of a more orderly managed sale of assets for going-concern value where possible through a Chapter 11 Plan of Reorganization, which also preserved the brand. Liuzza began immediately visiting each of the 8 locations in San Antonio, Lytle, Seguin, Houston, Galveston, and Beaumont and time with each General Manager, the office employees, and the owner and establishing ongoing communications with each. Weekly group meetings with all GMs focused on improving costs, employee morale, and customer satisfaction. As Trustee, he dealt with all major secured and unsecured creditors to convince them to back off and allow time for him to hopefully avoid Chapter 7 liquidation, in order to negotiate appropriate realistic settlements. They agreed, and the court approved the Plan of Reorganization in the following September, producing an improved outlook for settlements for all, and enabling three restaurants to continue operating.
Historic Fairgrounds Racetrack: Liuzza’s Role in its Chapter 11 Bankruptcy
The Louisiana Horsemen’s and Benevolence Association (an organization of racehorse owners) had sued the Fairgrounds Racetrack in New Orleans for failure to pay the horsemen most of their legal share of video poker proceeds of the Fair Grounds-owned off-track video poker casinos over a 10-year period. The Louisiana Supreme Court awarded the Horsemen a $90,000,000 judgment against the Fairgrounds, which immediately made them the major creditor with a first lien on all the unmortgaged assets the Fairgrounds owned. The Horsemen then demanded payment. The Fairgrounds immediately retained the region’s best bankruptcy lawyer, filed Chapter 11, and subsequently, in bankruptcy terms, is referred to as the “Debtor.” The Horsemen’s corporate law firm (pseudo-name: ABC), which managed the successful lawsuit, hired a bankruptcy law firm, (pseudo-name: DEF) to represent the Horsemen. Several months later the Horsemen’s corporate law firm, ABC, became somewhat concerned about the quality of representation the Horsemen were receiving from DEF. They engaged Liuzza Management Consulting, Inc. to assess the performance of DEF. Over the several months of the engagement, Liuzza generally identified several concerns about DEF’s performance and reported them to ABC. Vincent Liuzza had a concern that the entire value of the Fair Grounds Racetrack entity would likely be less than the amount of the $90,000,000 judgment. If so, then if all the Race Track’s assets would be sold in the bankruptcy process, then that would be the maximum amount that the Horsemen could receive. Therefore, it would be important to have an idea of the total present value of the Racetrack entity, including its off-track betting parlors, many of which included video poker gaming machines. In a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, for the Debtor to retain ownership of the company, it would need to present a deal to all its creditors that they could approve. If not, then the company’s individual assets (or the entire company) would be sold in a courtroom-supervised auction. Liuzza then recommended to the Horsemen’s bankruptcy lawyers that they should get, at least, an informed “guess” on the value of the racetrack as a going concern. The Horsemen’s corporate attorneys declined. Liuzza then did his own valuation of the Racetrack entity, which he concluded was a range of $40,000,000 to $50,000,000. Since this is less than the amount of the judgment, the Horsemen would likely be entitled to receive total ownership of the entire Racetrack and its several off-site betting and video poker casinos in return for settling the $90,000,000 debt. Being of the opinion that the Debtor’s bankruptcy law firm was far more sophisticated and resourceful than the Horsemen’s bankruptcy law firm, Liuzza was concerned, based upon his actual experience in bankruptcy Debtor asset auctions, that these Debtor lawyers would attempt to use all their legal “tricks” to The reason for this is to enable the present owner, or its favored third party, to be legally able to purchase the company at rock-bottom prices, because there would be no other serious bidders. This, of course, would effectively mean that the current Fairgrounds owners would be legally able to buy the Horsemen’s $90,000,000 claim receivable in the auction for a small fraction of that amount because there would likely be no other bidders. Therefore, having sharp lawyers, they would have retired their $90,000,000 payable for maybe $20,000,000 or $30,000,000, while still remaining owners of the Fairgrounds! Liuzza then recommended that the Horsemen propose to the court that they settle the entire case in return for complete and unimpaired ownership of the race track. That would enable the Horsemen to take total ownership and then do a national and well-publicized orderly-managed auction, selling to the highest bidder, thus maximizing the Horsemen’s recovery. Alternatively, they could propose to the court that the Horsemen manage the auction process, write the auction rules, and auction the entire entity through the court process and receive the total proceeds up to $90,000,000, with the unsecured creditors receiving any excess. The Horsemen and both their law firms rejected that idea, and the court declared that the assets be sold, and that the Debtor (the Race Track) would be entitled to set the auction rules and manage the auction process. This could enable the present owner, the Debtor, to buy back its company for less than the true market value suggested by a fair and well-publicized auction price (for example maybe $10,000,000 or $20,000,000), which would then be all that the Horsemen could receive. Of course, the Debtor then proposed to the court that it be entitled to manage the entire auction process, and set all the auction terms, and the court promptly agreed because there was no effective objection from the creditor lawyers. When Liuzza read the Debtor’s proposed terms of auction, he strongly advised ABC that they should vehemently object to those terms. But ABC and DEF appeared uninterested in Liuzza’s recommendation. To Liuzza, it appeared that they did not understand the consequences of not following his recommendation. Therefore, he insisted that both ABC and DEF meet with him for lunch to ensure that each understood, and together they, hopefully, would have a chance to change their minds. It was a good lunch meeting. And once they understood his arguments, they agreed. DEF then filed a motion to remove the most egregious terms in the Debtor’s proposed auction rules, and the court agreed. The auction occurred. Churchill Downs was the buyer for $40,000,000, and the Horsemen netted $32,000,000 after administrative and attorney fees were deducted. Nothing was left for the unsecured creditors. N.B. The consultant had the determination and the skill, fortunately, to change, at the last minute, the minds of his resisting client. As seen in other cases here, some clients continue to resist sound advice, possibly with very good reasons. Nevertheless, sometimes this results in a total loss of all their equity. Examples are Piccadilly Cafeterias, and The Deep-River Logistics Company.
Piccadilly Spectacular Turnaround / Disaster
In 2009, Piccadilly Cafeterias, the nation’s largest cafeteria chain with over 100 units, owned by a large California private equity firm (pseudo-name: AAA), was floundering. The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) engaged Liuzza Management Consulting (LMC) to attempt to negotiate settlements with several landlords in three states on closed or underperforming restaurants. LMC achieved those objectives within three months. In 2011 LMC was then asked to advise and help implement food cost reductions across the system of fifteen states. This was achieved over a two-year period with spectacular results. LMC principal Vincent Liuzza began that effort by his chairing a private off-site full-day meeting of a majority of the unit’s long-term General Managers—with no corporate executives being allowed—except the Vice President of Operations, who was not allowed to speak—but only to take notes! The GMs were extremely vocal, venting years of frustrations on operations, marketing,maintenance, staffing, communications, etc. This flow of information was used to structure LMC’s Food Cost Control Plan. However, the CFO was realistic and very much aware of the fact that, even though a consultant analyses the company and makes appropriate recommendations, the incumbent personnel must deal with and make some necessary changes to their past habits, culture, policies, modus operandi, etc., in order to implement there commended changes to properly implement the Plan. Therefore, throughout the ensuing two years, the CFO had Liuzza representing him in the weekly operations meetings amongst the VPs and department heads. Liuzza was described as an “embedded” consultant as opposed to one who merely analyses, makes recommendations, and then departs. This turned out to be very helpful, and the results were incredibly successful over a three-year time frame. The CFO then declared that Piccadilly’s food costs in fiscal 2013 were the lowest in its history. See Piccadilly’s “Example of a Completed Engagement” elsewhere on this website. Next, LMC was asked to advise on dealing with its two primary lenders. The company was in default to its largest, but only partially secured, New York investment bank lender, pseudo-name BBB. And its primary, but fully secured, West Coast banker, pseudo-name CCC, was expressing serious concerns. At that time, almost one-third of the company’s locations, spread over 15 states, were operating unprofitably. Therefore, LMC’s recommendation was that the high interest and debt service in its loan agreement with BBB, Piccadilly, without serious debt restructuring and ability to exit the underperforming locations, would be forced into either a Chapter 11 reorganization or Chapter 7 liquidation. LMC’s recommended solution was immediate drafting a plan for a “Pre-Packaged” Chapter 11. Its detailed and comprehensive drafting of that Plan could likely be completed within 90 days. In the meantime, the pressures from secured and unsecured creditors would be increasing. The Plan would call for legally canceling the leases on and closing all the unprofitable units, which would make the company immediately profitable and enable the company to retire the balance of the unsecured deferred debt to be deferred over an affordable term. And AAA would retain full ownership! Once exiting Bankruptcy and having disposed of all the non-productive locations, the company’s annual cash flow (EBITDA) was estimated to be immediately above $4,000,000, resulting in an Enterprise Valuation of $20,000,000 to $30,000,000. Explanation of the Benefits & Mechanics of the Proposed Pre-Packaged Chapter 11 Plan. In an ordinary Chapter 11 proceeding, the company files a Petition to enter a Chapter 11, which puts a hold on all pre-existing financial obligations. Then it must design and file its proposed Plan of Reorganization, which usually takes many months. That Plan must ultimately be approved by all its secured creditors and a majority of its unsecured creditors. These numerous negotiations usually also take months of time and consume very large legal fees. Eventually, if the Plan is successfully approved, certain debts are restructured or eliminated, and the restructured company returns to normal business. But if the Plan is not successfully negotiated with creditors and approved by the court, the company’s assets are auctioned to the highest bidder. The beauty of the Pre-Packaged Plan is that the Chapter 11 petition is not even filed with the court until it is presented to and accepted by the, usually few, major secured creditors, whom, because the Plan provides will be paid in full, all officially agree to and sign the Plan before the Chapter 11 petition is filed with the court. Therefore, the Plan is almost automatically approved by the court in an extremely short period of time. To the degree that unsecured creditors are to be paid in full, even if on longer terms, their approval is automatic, and the Plan is approved. Therefore, enormous legal and other fees are greatly reduced, and the stress on the company, its employees, and its customers is minimized. As in all Chapter 11 bankruptcies, the Pre-Packaged Plan would call for legally cancelling the leases on and closing all the unprofitable units, making the company immediately profitable, retiring the balance of the deferred debt over an affordable term, and AAA retaining full ownership. Once exiting Bankruptcy and having disposed of all the non-productive locations, the new Piccadilly’s cash flow (EBITDA) was estimated to be immediately above $4,000,000, resulting in a valuation of $20,000,000 to $30,000,000. LMC strongly emphasized the urgency of developing and filing such a Plan, thereby retaining control of the future course of the company as opposed to delaying action and “hoping” that neither major creditor will act first, thereby AAA risking everything. The CFO sent the LMC Pre-Packaged Plan to the company’s lawyer, who was a former bankruptcy judge, who agreed with its feasibility and agreed to draft and file the Plan as proposed. His firm agreed, in writing, to the exact fee that LMC estimated, $500,000, covering all pre-and post-filing legal fees. His law firm did exactly that and presented its detailed written document to the company. This Plan, approved by the former bankruptcy judge’s firm, likely would have produced a transformational result for the Piccadilly owner, AAA. However, one year later, after
Sizzler Family Steakhouses of Louisiana
My father and two of his brothers had been owners of Liuzza’s Restaurant, a very successful neighborhood restaurant in mid-city New Orleans founded by their parents in 1939. A few years after they had sold it, they decided to re-enter the restaurant business through becoming a Louisiana-based franchisee of California-based Sizzler Family Steakhouses. The first unit was initially very successful and grew rapidly. That eventually led to several unsuccessful locations and outgrowing their organization’s management capabilities. At that time, I was a successful commodity futures broker and office manager for ContiCommodity Services, the nation’s largest commodity futures broker. As the family’s Sizzler business turned from very positive to very negative and the family’s personal guarantees at risk, I left my position at Conti to become Interim CEO of the Sizzler franchisee company with 5 profitable restaurants and 6 unprofitable ones. Although operations quality was improved, it was not enough to overcome the losses of the poorly located restaurants, which we were unable to sell or lease to others. The only option for those negatively performing restaurants was to create a new restaurant concept more suitable to those locations. I brought in outside expertise to assist in creating our Cuco’s Mexican restaurant concept. Outside minority capital was raised from professional investors to remodel one building and for initial working capital. The assets were placed in a new entity, Cuco’s, Inc. We remodeled the building, created new operating systems, and hired and trained staff for the new concept. Initial opening revenue was very high and grew from there. All this resulted in converting our worst location, losing over $100,000 annually to making a profit of $150,000 annually. We followed up with two more similar negative locations and had results almost as good. With that success record, two regional stock brokerage firms were interested in taking the Cuco’s public in a national initial public offering. This was the first successful Initial Public Offering with a NASDAQ listing of a Louisiana company in 10 years. Truly, a Transformational result.
Tony Buzan, Author, Lecturer, and Inventor of MindMapping
Tony Buzan invented MindMapping, and he is widely considered one of the world’s leading experts on using the brain, learning, and thinking skills. He has written 85 books that have sold over 5 million copies worldwide. MindMapping is a tool to enhance creative thinking of individuals and groups. I use MindMaps, with all my clients in multiple ways: teaching them this tool to analyze problems and opportunities either for individual thinking or group analysis. It is the quickest and most productive method to begin developing any idea or topic, evolving its components, often many of which had not been thought of before, and then converting them into an outline. I, Vincent Liuzza, met Tony at a Young Presidents Organization (YPO, the world’s largest organization of CEOs) seminar in Key Largo, Florida on the general topic of improving the effectiveness of CEOs. His sub-topics on MindMapping included improving the use of both sides of our brain, the left (linear thinking) and the right (creative and analytical). He was the most demanded creative-thinking expert by YPO chapters world-wide. Over the next several years we met several times at various venues, and he became interested in my management consulting practice. He felt that he needed outside objective input on how he could manage his speaking, creating, and publishing organization more efficiently, more profitably, and with less stress. He, I, and his assistant scheduled a day-long session on his next trip to the U.S. The following month we held that meeting in Washington DC, where his publisher had an event scheduled for announcing his latest book. Our planned day-long meeting lasted only a half-day. Finding his solution was quick and easy. Just as I personally employ MindMapping in understanding and assisting all my clients, I also assure that my clients are aware of and employ “personality profiling” tools (my favorite is the DiSC method) amongst their key management team. I quickly discovered that Tony’s personal assistant was the complete opposite personality to the one that he needed and that best complemented his personalty strengths. Her personality strengths and weaknesses were the same as his. He was open and outgoing, and weak on detail and follow-up. And so was she. He needed an assistant who was detail-oriented, follow-up focused, and more personally organized. He quickly made the change. Six months later he reported back to me that his productivity increased 25%. Upon the publishing of his next book, he sent me a copy with a note on the inside front cover recognizing my consulting help. See below. And, then a year later, he further reinforced his thanks with the notes in his subsequent book!