Season of Strength: What PE-Backed Manufacturers Can Be Grateful for This Year, And the Leaders Who Made It Possible

Private equity-backed manufacturers are closing out one of the most challenging and quietly transformative years in recent memory. Between supply chain instability, workforce disruption, digitization pressures, and shifting regulatory landscapes, many portfolio companies could have easily stalled. Instead, a surprising number finished the year stronger, more resilient, and better positioned for growth.

This is not luck. It’s leadership.

This Thanksgiving, as PE firms take stock of performance, value creation, and the road ahead, it’s worth reflecting on the specific strengths that emerged, and the kinds of executives who made them possible. Because while market cycles come and go, the capacity to build resilient, future-ready manufacturing organizations is a human one. And this year, that truth became impossible to ignore.

Below, we explore the five areas PE-backed manufacturers can be legitimately grateful for and the leadership capabilities worth investing in as we head into 2026.

Stabilizing Supply Chains Thanks to Leaders Who Rebuilt for Resilience

Many manufacturers began this year with lingering bottlenecks, unpredictable freight costs, and supplier interruptions that threatened year-end delivery commitments. Today, much of that chaos has subsided.

But it didn’t happen on its own. It happened because operations-focused executives rebuilt supply chains around resiliency instead of convenience.

Forward-thinking CEOs, COOs, and Chief Supply Chain Officers shifted strategies from lowest cost to lowest risk. They diversified vendors, redesigned production flows, deepened nearshoring programs, and strengthened forecasting discipline. These are the same themes we emphasized in our recent blog, Breaking the Supply Chain Spiral, where we outlined why logistics fluency is now a defining trait of top manufacturing leaders.

PE firms can be grateful this year not for “fixed” supply chains, but for resilient ones built by executives who understand risk mathematically, strategically, and operationally.

A Workforce That Showed Up Guided by Leaders Who Know How to Engage People

Labor shortages, generational turnover, and rising automation anxiety could have hollowed out plant floors this year. Instead, many manufacturers reported lower attrition, higher engagement, and more stable shift continuity.

That’s leadership maturity.

High-performing executives invested in clearer communication, cross-training programs, frontline mobility pathways, and engagement models that respect the realities of industrial work. These are precisely the leadership characteristics we explored in When Automation Meets Attrition.

This year, PE firms can be grateful for executives who recognize that efficiency and human capital are not opposing forces. They are interconnected levers of productivity, and they require leaders who understand how to balance both without burning out their teams.

Meaningful Progress Toward Digital Transformation Driven by Leaders Fluent in Data, Not Just Buzzwords

For years, “Industry 4.0” has been an aspiration, a conference topic, or worse, a budget line without outcomes. But in 2024 and 2025, something shifted: digital pilots began turning into digital profits.

And the executives behind that shift deserve the spotlight.

Manufacturers who saw real ROI were led by CEOs, CTOs, and COOs who didn’t get distracted by shiny tools. Instead, they focused on cleaning the data foundation, aligning digitization to business goals, and building cross-functional ownership. This was the core argument in our recent blog From Data-Poor to Digitally Fluent.

PE firms can be grateful for executives who are not just technologists, but translators. Leaders who can connect machine data to margin expansion, connect automation to throughput, and connect analytics to EBITDA.

Those leaders moved digitization from PowerPoint to the plant floor. That’s worth gratitude.

Greater Operational Agility Built by Leaders Who Thrive Under Pressure

This year was marked by:

• fluctuating energy prices
• shifting global trade conditions
• increased input-cost volatility
• regulatory uncertainty

And yet, many PE-backed manufacturers remained flexible, adaptable, and surprisingly quick to pivot.

This agility was not the product of a stable environment; it was the product of executives recruited for flexibility, not rigidity.

Leaders who understand scenario planning, cross-functional decision-making, and dynamic resource allocation helped companies avoid margin erosion and identify real-time opportunities. We explored this in The Talent Bottleneck in Energy-Intensive Manufacturing, highlighting why agility is a measurable executive competency, not a personality trait.

This year, PE firms can be grateful for executives who performed rather than panicked in volatility.

A Renewed Focus on Leadership Quality and the Results That Followed

Perhaps the biggest shift of all this year: PE firms got clearer about what great manufacturing leadership actually looks like.

They didn’t settle for vague traits like “strategic thinking” or “culture fit.” They demanded evidence of operational creativity, resilience, industrial fluency, and executional discipline. They pushed past the buzzwords, as we explored in Beyond the Buzzwords.

As a result, many portfolio companies saw noticeable gains in:

• throughput
• working capital efficiency
• front-line engagement
• plant performance
• digital traction

This Thanksgiving, PE firms can be grateful for something often overlooked: the discipline to hire better leaders and the confidence to expect more from them.

It’s tempting to attribute this year’s positive outcomes to market normalization. But anyone who works inside industrial manufacturing knows the truth:

Strength didn’t come from conditions improving. Strength came from leadership improving.

PE-backed manufacturers accelerated because the right executives—placed with intention, clarity, and rigor—knew how to turn complexity into performance.

If You Want More of This Next Year, Start With Your Next Executive Hire

The gratitude we celebrate this Thanksgiving isn’t sentimental: it’s strategic. It’s a recognition that manufacturing outcomes change fastest when leadership quality changes first.

And if you're planning value creation initiatives, operational improvements, or leadership upgrades in 2026, now is the time to act.

Speak with Kersten Talent Capital, and let’s build the leadership team that turns your next year into your strongest yet.