Value Creation is a hard requirement in 2026

Good afternoon,

Mario Peshev here, founder of DevriX and a tech value creation advisor.

In the fast-paced world of private equity, it’s tempting to focus solely on the immediate P&L, cutting costs, and chasing swift revenue gains.

And while those are undoubtedly crucial, different levers for capturing and expanding value are heavily incorporated in successful portfolio companies we work with.

Shareholder value in 2026 beyond financial engineering

The governance aspect of maximizing value is an undervalued asset, because strong foundation is what value systems are build on.

How is governance coming into play?

1. Minimizing risk & maximizing opportunity. Clear reporting lines, well-defined decision-making processes, and robust audit mechanisms enable quicker identification of market shifts and operational bottlenecks, allowing your teams to pivot and capitalize on new opportunities with agility.

2. Attracting and retaining top talent. High-performing individuals thrive in environments with clear expectations, fair processes, and opportunities for growth. Strong governance signals a commitment to transparency and meritocracy, making your portfolio companies more attractive to A-players.

3. Enhancing investor confidence. When you eventually exit, sophisticated buyers scrutinize more than just revenue figures. They want to see a well-oiled machine, managed by a competent, accountable leadership team operating under sound principles. Strong governance is a major de-risker and therefore, a value enhancer.

4. Streamlining integration. Especially critical in Private Equity, a consistent governance framework across your portfolio makes M&A integrations smoother and faster. It provides a common language and set of expectations, reducing post-acquisition friction and accelerating synergies.

Revenue-oriented PE leaders can imagine the impact of clearly defined KPIs, reporting structures, and accountability matrices on sales conversion rates or customer success retention. Consider how a streamlined board approval process can accelerate a critical investment or market expansion.

This is operational efficiency at its core.

Balancing oversight vs. empowerment

This is where many organizations fail to incorporate value creation beyond the GTM principles of growth. The instinct can be to either micromanage or, conversely, to be too hands-off. Neither approach cultivates high performance.

To simplify the framework, here’s a model that establishes several easy to follow principles to improve value creation outside of the demand generation stack that marketing-driven leaders already know.

1. Strategic oversight from the top

Boards and senior leadership should focus on setting the vision, defining the strategic guardrails, allocating capital, and assessing overall performance against long-term goals. They guide the ship, setting the course and ensuring resources are aligned.

Example: A PE firm's operating partner, sitting on the board, defines the 3-year strategic objectives for marketing spend across the portfolio, empowering the individual CMOs to design the campaigns themselves.

2. Empowered operational execution below

Once the strategy is set, operational teams need the autonomy and resources to execute. Micromanagement kills innovation, slows down decision-making, and demoralizes employees. Trust in your leaders to deliver within the established framework.

3. RevOps angle

Provide your RevOps leaders with clear revenue targets and growth metrics, then allow them to choose the CRMs, marketing automation tools, and sales enablement strategies that best fit their teams and market.

Regular, structured check-ins replace constant interference.

4. Defined escalation paths

Not everything goes to plan.

A well-governed company has clear processes for when an operational decision needs strategic input or when a risk needs to be escalated to the board for guidance.

This prevents "runaway trains" without creating bottlenecks.

This balance is a continuous recalibration. It requires active listening, clear communication, and a willingness to adjust.

Building a culture of accountability and continuous improvement

I spent much of the past 2 weeks in quarterly feedback sessions, with 25+ meetings in-house plus some scorecard reviews and follow-up action plans.

Accountability came up in most of the conversations. This is no accident - “Own accountability” is a core value at DevriX, along with “Never stop learning” and “Evolve and adapt”, two more out of five.

Because governance is deeply intertwined with culture. The best frameworks are useless if the people operating within them don't embrace the principles of accountability and a drive for continuous improvement.

Based on 5+ years of incorporating these two principles in-house and over a dozen PE portfolio companies we’ve worked with stressing on these two principles:

1. Transparency is a key advantage. High-performing companies share metrics (good and bad), explain decisions, and foster an environment where uncomfortable truths can be voiced without fear of reprisal. This builds trust and ensures problems are addressed early.

2. Clear ownership & KPIs. Every individual, team, and department knows what they are responsible for and how their performance will be measured. Ambiguity is the enemy of accountability. Implement a "single source of truth" for critical metrics. Ensure that sales, marketing, and customer success are all using the same definitions for "qualified lead," "churn," and "customer lifetime value." This aligns everyone and exposes discrepancies quickly.

3. Regular performance reviews (beyond annual). This isn't just about HR - this is why I’ve spent a quarter of January on these alone. Regularly scheduled operational reviews, strategic alignment meetings, and post-mortem analyses of projects develop a culture of learning and adaptation.
   
   One of our portfolio companies in SaaS implemented weekly "Revenue Huddles" where Marketing, Sales, and CS leads would present their metrics, discuss blockers, and commit to actions for the following week. This rapid feedback loop and peer accountability dramatically improved pipeline velocity.

4. Celebrating wins & learning from failures. This may sound like a cliche, but in the era of AI, most systems are not mature enough and many experiments fail. Acknowledge success to reinforce positive behaviors, but more importantly, create a safe space to analyze failures as learning opportunities, not reasons for blame. This speeds up evolution across both engineering and non-technical teams.

Final question:

What's one aspect of governance you've seen deliver the most immediate impact in a growing company?

(I read every reply and often feature them in future discussions)

Mario Peshev

Aktis has first biotech IPO of 2026. Aktis Oncology raised $318M to advance its miniprotein radiopharmaceutical cancer pipeline and support a discovery partnership with Eli Lilly.

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Working with me

🌐 Scaling $30M - $100M+ mid-market companies with value creation through RevOps, data engineering, and WordPress. DevriX provides full RevOps consulting + delivery with GTM enablement for PE-backed portfolio companies, traditional tech, healthcare, finance, and professional service businesses pacing toward revenue growth initiatives. Our standard retainers between $10K and $60K include revenue lifecycle services for marketing and sales leaders, FP&A for financial teams, pipeline enrichment through websites and dozens of lead sources, automations and delivery integrations, CRO and ongoing testing, product delivery and platform integration solutions, and more through our consulting solutions.

🚀 1:1 Consulting. At Growth Shuttle, I run two popular plans: Async Advisory ($3,500/mo) for $3M - $30M founders and executive teams and the smaller Strategic Growth Circle ($997/mo) for $100K - $500K entrepreneurs, agency founders, scale ups. My fractional executive plan is also available here.

📈 Building US LLCs from Europe. I help European and Asian founders scale faster through doola and their “Business in a Box” model. Also suitable for US citizens (given their bookkeeping solution), but in very high demand across Europe.

📊 Post-Merger Integration. I support M&A initiatives through Flippa’s marketplace. Working closely on PMI initiatives for PE companies and fast-growing startups integrating new companies within their portfolios, enabling data pipelines, and securing more deals through my personal network.