DETERMINANTS OF SUCCESSFUL

Corporate turnaround and recovery management in South Africa has received muchattention from both the Government and the private sector in recent years. Thefailure of a significant number of firms has resulted in the current trend to savecompanies, rather than to liquidate them.The purpose of this study was to ascertain the factors that made a South Africanbusiness turnaround successful with specific reference to the impact of organisationsize on those efforts.A combined quantitative and qualitative study revealed that the chief causes ofdecline, the strategies required and key success factors across SMEs and large firmswere different. Additionally it showed that the impact of some of these factors on thefirm depended on the size of the company. Of these there were six decline factors(Management/Owner of the business, Inertia and Intransigence, the ExternalEnvironment, Lack of Resources and Funding, Insufficient Strategic Planning,Emotional Attachment to the Business), three strategies (Replacement ofManagement, Revenue Generating/Growth, Improved Sales and Marketing) and onesuccess factor (Calibre and Motivation of people).Five indigenous, South African factors were highlighted as key. These were thelabour laws, the lack of turnaround legislation, the lack of turnaround financing,the lack of skills and Black Economic Empowerment (BEE). Of these, only BEEwas considered to be unimportant