At Raw Selection, we interview hundreds of Presidents and General Managers every year and run retained searches across private equity-backed residential services companies including HVAC, plumbing, electrical, fire & life safety and other essential services businesses.

One pattern appears again and again.

Presidents and General Managers are the most frequently replaced leadership positions in these companies.

The reason is not a lack of experience.

Private equity firms often hire individuals who have spent years in the industry but who have never actually understood the financial and operational levers required to run a private equity-backed services platform.

In a market where experienced operators are scarce, companies feel pressure to hire quickly when they find someone with relevant experience. But when hiring standards slip, performance problems usually appear within the first 12–18 months.

The result is leadership turnover, stalled growth, and a reset of the operating plan.

Through interviewing thousands of candidates and completing searches across the sector, clear patterns emerge around what separates strong Presidents and General Managers from those who struggle in private equity environments.

Below are the characteristics the best private equity firms consistently look for when hiring P&L leaders in residential services platforms.

1. Full P&L Responsibility

The first non-negotiable requirement is full profit and loss ownership.

A President or General Manager must have real accountability for both revenue and profitability. This does not mean they simply oversee operations while financial decisions are made elsewhere. It means they understand the financial performance of their business unit and are responsible for its outcomes.

In some organizations, financial control is centralized at headquarters. That structure can make it appear as though a regional leader has P&L ownership when in reality they are operating more as a senior operations manager.

Private equity firms must look beyond job titles and confirm whether the candidate truly had visibility into and responsibility for the financial performance of their region or division.

The best General Managers can clearly explain how operational decisions affect profitability.

They understand the numbers behind their business.

2. Revenue Growth: The “Why” Behind It

Revenue growth alone is not enough.

Private equity investors are not interested in growth that simply mirrors the overall market. If the sector grows by five percent annually, a leader whose region grew five percent has not necessarily created value.

What matters is above-market growth and, more importantly, the operator’s ability to explain exactly how it happened.

Strong Presidents and General Managers can describe the specific initiatives that drove growth. They may talk about marketing strategies implemented in their region, improvements in sales processes, expansion into new customer segments, or operational changes that improved lead conversion.

They understand the cause behind the results.

This is critical because private equity firms hire leaders who can replicate success, not just benefit from favourable market conditions.

3. EBITDA Growth and Value Creation

In private equity environments, EBITDA is a central measure of value creation.

Some operators coming from family-owned or non-PE environments may have less familiarity with EBITDA specifically. That alone is not necessarily a disqualifier if they have strong financial awareness through gross margin and operational profitability.

However, the best candidates understand how operational decisions affect EBITDA.

They can explain why certain initiatives were prioritized over others. They understand which actions generate the highest return on investment and how those actions ultimately drive profitability.

When interviewing candidates, private equity firms should listen for structured thinking around financial outcomes rather than vague references to “improving performance.”

The difference between the two is significant.

4. Deep Understanding of Gross Margin

In residential services businesses, gross margin is one of the most important operational metrics.

A President or General Manager who does not understand the drivers of gross margin will struggle to improve profitability.

The best operators know exactly what affects gross margin: technician productivity, pricing strategy, job costing accuracy, service mix, and operational efficiency. They can explain how they manage these variables and how they use margin data to guide decision-making.

Gross margin tells the story of operational discipline.

And great operators read that story clearly.

5. Constraint-Focused Leadership

Every services business has dozens of potential improvement opportunities.

The best leaders know how to identify the few that matter most.

Top Presidents and General Managers are constraint-focused. They evaluate operational data, identify the biggest barriers to growth or profitability, and prioritize solving those problems first.

This ability to prioritize is essential.

Without it, leaders become reactive executors rather than strategic operators. They simply follow instructions from headquarters instead of bringing insights from the field that influence company-wide decisions.

Private equity firms should look for candidates who can clearly articulate the constraints they identified in their previous roles and how they addressed them.

6. Increasing Average Ticket Size

Another critical lever for organic growth is increasing average ticket value.

Residential services companies often achieve significant profitability improvements simply by expanding the value of each customer interaction. This might involve additional services, improved diagnostic processes, technician training, or better sales scripting.

The best operators understand how to drive this metric.

More importantly, they can explain why their initiatives worked and how those improvements were implemented across their teams.

7. Mastery of Conversion Ratios and Sales Metrics

Organic growth in service businesses is driven by measurable ratios.

Leads convert to appointments.

Appointments convert to jobs.

Jobs convert to revenue.

High-performing General Managers understand these ratios and track them closely.

They know their marketing conversion rates, sales close rates, and technician performance metrics. They understand what good performance looks like and how to diagnose problems when results decline.

This data-driven mindset separates disciplined operators from those who rely purely on intuition.

8. Setting and Managing KPIs Across the Organization

The best Presidents and General Managers build organizations that run on clear performance indicators.

They understand which metrics matter for each role in the business—from service managers and dispatch teams to technicians and sales staff.

Even if the KPIs were initially designed at headquarters, strong leaders can explain why those metrics exist and how they influence behaviour across the organization.

Weak operators often view reporting requirements as unnecessary bureaucracy.

Strong operators view them as tools for improvement.

9. Expanding Services to Increase Revenue Per Customer

Many residential services platforms grow by expanding into adjacent services.

HVAC companies move into plumbing.

Plumbing businesses add electrical services.

Other service companies expand their offerings to capture additional revenue from the same customer base.

This strategy increases average revenue per visit and improves route efficiency by maximizing technician time on site.

Experienced Presidents and General Managers understand the operational playbook required to launch these services. They know the staffing requirements, operational challenges, and financial implications of expanding the service offering.

That experience becomes incredibly valuable during private equity buy-and-build strategies.

10. Hiring and Developing Great Technicians

Ultimately, service businesses succeed or fail based on the quality of their technicians and frontline employees.

Great Presidents and General Managers understand how to recruit, train, and retain these individuals.

They build systems and playbooks that standardize the customer experience. They design compensation structures that attract high-quality technicians while protecting margins. They develop processes that ensure consistency in service delivery.

The best leaders elevate the performance of everyone around them.

Strong systems turn good technicians into great ones.

11. Measuring Customer Satisfaction Through Public Feedback

Residential services businesses have a unique advantage when assessing leadership performance: real-time customer feedback.

Online review platforms, particularly Google reviews, provide immediate visibility into customer satisfaction at the branch level.

A consistently strong rating often indicates effective hiring, training, and service delivery processes. It reflects the quality of the leadership overseeing that operation.

While reviews alone should never determine hiring decisions, they can provide valuable supporting insight into how a leader’s branch performs from the customer’s perspective.

Hiring the Right P&L Leaders in a Competitive Market

Hiring Presidents and General Managers in residential services is difficult.

Private equity investment in the sector has accelerated dramatically, creating intense competition for experienced operators. As a result, many firms rush hiring decisions and later discover the individual was not equipped to operate within a private equity environment.

The companies that consistently make successful hires take a different approach.

They look beyond job titles and evaluate whether candidates truly understand the financial, operational, and strategic levers that drive value in services businesses.

They look for operators who understand numbers, lead teams effectively, and know how to grow both revenue and profitability.

Those leaders are rare.

But when private equity firms find them, they transform platforms.