I hop out of bed every morning...fired up and excited to get to work.

Why?

God has a plan.  I finally realized I'm along for the ride, but I need to be an active participant.

His plan put me in situations where I succeeded, failed, and learn some tough lessons.
Likely true for most of us.

After selling my startup I "fell" into the world of executive search.  And I loved it.  Still do (strange to say).

Then it happened.

God sent me down a path I didn't see coming.  An opportunity to join a startup as employee #4...at at time where I had found comfort running a small consultancy - and success.  

I didn't think I could learn, grow and frankly, find ways to be better at this point in my career.
Instrumentum is a special place, with an amazing team.  We are reinventing the surgical landscape.

Change is hard.  We are a dedicated bunch, committed to seeing this through.

As Chairman and Founder of Cruxible Partners, I get to watch an amazing group of talented "talent finders" grow that business as well.

Unfortunately, that's not how many people feel about their job, or their state in life.
Doesn't need to be that way.

Trust God, but don't be a passive participant in the journey.

Try a hobby.
Start a side hustle.
Meet new people (on LinkedIn, I've met some wonderful people who inspire and teach here).

If I can be this energized at this stage, so can you...

Pete Durand

MacGyver’d the hotel AC today.  

Taking video calls from the desk, AC blowing 40 degree air on my bald noggin unless I shut it off.  

Then sauna like temps. 

Improvised a little curtain. 

Problem solved.  

#macgyver

President, Instrumentum | Host of the Eating Crow Podcast | Chairman, Cruxible Partners

No alternative text description for this image

Most companies have a plan.  

We do. 

2025 was about laying a foundation after several acquisitions and heavy integration. 

A few lessons, a few scars, and a few wins.  

Looking back it’s about the people who joined the team more than anything.   Amazing people.  

We laid the foundation together. 
We built this plan together. 

2026 is off to a great start - we are firing on all cylinders, well ahead of plan.

It’s rare air.  

Grateful for our team who work tirelessly to care for our customers, travel nonstop and support each other. 

Many of us go through entire work life without experiencing this feeling. 

I freaking love my job and am blessed to know how lucky I am.  Heard the same energy from our team today 💪👍👏

Hope everyone finds an opportunity to be part of a fast growing company who isn’t afraid to dare, think big, stumble now and then, but get back up and go. 

It’s a blast. 

Jeff Eardley Dean E. Darby Hubbell Rachel Meador (Knorr) Austin Wratchford, FACHE Bradley Schoening, CFO, MBA, CPA Ken Maready Jennifer Del Real, MSHRM Candy Schlicklin

SPD is not a sexy investment conversation.

Until you see the numbers.

I'm presenting at LSI USA '26 next week in Dana Point, CA — and I'll be making the case that the most overlooked bottleneck in surgical growth isn't clinical. It's operational.

Health systems are adding ORs. Recruiting surgeons. Forecasting case volume.

And then hitting a wall they didn't see coming.

Tray capacity. Sterilization throughput. SPD.

Instrumentum removes that ceiling. Variable costs tied to volume. No massive capital outlay. No construction timeline.

The ASC market grew 33% year over year. That growth goes somewhere.

Make sure it's going to you.

See you in Dana Point.

"I'm so sorry, how can I help?" 

This response seems natural, but ACTUALLY helping tends to put us in a place of discomfort, and so we say it, but don't really mean it.

This hit me during my morning meditation.  The topic:  The Corporal Works of Mercy (Matthew 25:35-46): 

Feed the hungry
Give drink to the thirsty
Clothe the naked
Shelter the homeless
Visit the sick
Visit the imprisoned
Bury the dead

If I'm being honest, my batting average is low here.

Jesus wasn't pulling any punches.  How will we be judged by these works?

Time to reassess my priorities, which typically focus on "things of this world" and prayer, when action should the call of the day.

Visit the imprisoned?  

Pick any of the above; probably not at the top of most of our to-do lists.

Perhaps they should be?

Admitting there is a better way is difficult.




Southwest's new "That Was Wild" ad campaign does this with humor, humility and tremendous creativity.

At Instrumentum, we are constantly trying to find a better way.  The industry needs it, the old ways don't work.

And yes, it's wild 🙃

Joe Carbone

While everyone is automating, we're busy putting the “human” back into "human capital".

Eastward Partners is a retained Executive Search and Human Capital Consulting firm. 

Our business intelligence tool, ECHO provides human capital data and analytics insights on relevant themes across the entire human capital ecosystem for Private Equity firms and their portfolio companies. 

Our portfolio of work is focused on retained mandates for leadership positions - we are building capabilities for clients within the following areas of expertise:

Middle Market Private Equity Firms
Firm Level 
• Portfolio Operations/Value Creation
• Operating Partners
• Corporate Development
• Talent Partners

Portfolio Level ($20M - $500M+ revenue) 
• CEO/President | COO | CFO | Technology | GTM | HR
• Sector Focus: Industrials | Manufacturing | Health Services | Business Services | Software | Professional Services

Professional Services 
• Restructuring | Turnaround | Accounting Advisory | Financial Advisory | Valuations Advisory | Management Consulting
• Digital Strategy | Technology Strategy | Cyber Strategy/Security

Middle Market Investment Banks 
• Buy & Sell Side M&A
• Special Situations

Founder & CEO

Not upgrading leadership when needed is one of the most expensive decisions in private equity.
 
It feels conservative. It avoids disruption. It preserves continuity. But the cost is rarely measured correctly.
 
A weak leader does not just miss targets. They slow the entire system. High performers leave. Decisions bottleneck. Initiatives lose urgency. The organization learns to wait instead of act.
 
Over a three- to five-year hold, that drag compounds dramatically.
 
Sponsors often focus on the cost of replacing a leader: severance, search fees, transition risk. The larger cost is the opportunity never realized because the upgrade came too late.
 
In PE, the question is not just, “Can this leader do the job?”
 
It is, “What value are we leaving on the table by keeping them?”

#WeAreEastward #CareerCapital

While everyone is automating, we’re busy putting the “human” back into “human capital”.

Transformation is not for the faint of hearts but finding alignment has been and will always be the key to a successful outcome! 

There is nothing more satisfying than cheering on my colleagues and clients after the success of a meaningful search.

We are pleased to celebrate the appointment of Julia Afflick  to WorkWave, backed by EQT, Hg and TA Associates as VP, Professional Services as well as the impact she will bring to the team.
 
Congratulations to the team for a great outcome and for entrusting us with this important search.
 
(Eastward Search Team: Brian Ippolito, Callie Swift, Reagan Wren) 

#WeAreEastward

Most executive hiring failures don’t happen after a bad interview.
They happen long before the first candidate is ever contacted.

I’ve watched leadership teams spend months interviewing candidates, debating résumés, running stakeholder panels, and carefully evaluating “fit,” only to feel surprised when the hire underperforms a year later.

In reality, that outcome was usually predictable.

The issue isn’t the candidate pool or the interview process. It’s that organizations often begin a search without fully defining what success actually looks like.

A job opening creates urgency. The business needs help. Teams feel pressure. Leadership wants progress. So the search begins quickly, often anchored around a job description or a replacement profile based on the previous role holder.

But hiring decisions made under ambiguity rarely produce clarity later.
Executive hiring is not simply about finding talent. It’s about solving a business problem. If the problem isn’t clearly defined at the outset, even strong candidates walk into roles where expectations shift depending on who they speak with.

When expectations are unclear, performance becomes subjective.
And subjective performance evaluations almost always lead to disappointment.

Before launching a search, leadership teams should spend more time defining outcomes than reviewing résumés. The quality of that early thinking often determines the quality of the eventual hire.

#WeAreEastward

CEO hires get the headlines, while CFO hires determine the outcome.
 
In PE-backed companies, the CFO is the operating system of the asset. They control information flow, capital allocation discipline, forecasting accuracy, and board credibility.
 
A weak CFO does not cause immediate failure, they cause subtle distortion. Forecasts become less reliable, problems surface later than they should and decision quality deteriorates quietly.
 
Sponsors often realize the issue only after a series of small misses accumulates into a large one. 
 
The right CFO creates leverage, clean data, clear signals, faster decisions and credible narratives to the board and lenders.
 
In many deals, the CFO is the difference between a smooth hold and a chaotic one.
 
Equity value is built on financial clarity, clarity starts with the right CFO.

#WeAreEastward

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times; do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life. 

Congratulations to all parties involved - I know how important of a search this was and through alignment, efficient communication, and a lot of teamwork, we came to a successful outcome. 

#WeAreEastward

We are pleased to celebrate the appointment of Chris Meers to Chief Executive Officer of General Trucking, an Advantage Capital backed company. 
 
Congratulations to the team for a great outcome and for entrusting us with this important search.
 
(Eastward Search Team: Brett Vecchio, Kristi Clay (Kamesch), Reagan Wren) 

#WeAreEastward

Some of the most costly PE hires are not failures. They are adequate.
 
They hit plan. They manage teams. They avoid disasters. And they fail to create leverage.
 
These executives maintain the business instead of transforming it. Over time, opportunity cost dwarfs operational stability.
 
This regret lingers because nothing is obviously wrong. The firm waits. Optionality shrinks.
 
Adequate hires feel safe. They are rarely optimal.
 
In PE, value is created by leaders who change trajectory, not preserve it. Clarity at the hiring stage is what separates the two.

#WeAreEastward #CareerCapial

Add-on integration is where PE-backed leadership teams are truly tested.
 
Integration is not a process problem. It is a decision density problem.
 
Every integration forces trade-offs: systems, talent, culture, capital allocation. Someone must decide which legacy wins and which loses. Delay feels polite. It is expensive.
 
Many CEOs struggle here not because they lack intelligence, but because they default to consensus. In integration, consensus slows momentum and preserves duplication.
 
Strong integration requires discomfort. Leaders must disappoint people quickly to protect value longer-term.
 
PE firms underestimate how judgment-intensive this phase is. They model synergies but fail to assess whether leadership can make irreversible calls under pressure.
 
When add-ons disappoint, the issue is rarely synergy logic. It is leadership hesitation in moments that mattered.

#WeAreEastward #CareerCapital

Investment committees are disciplined environments.
 
Revenue projections are challenged. Multiple expansion assumptions are debated. Debt structures are modeled under stress.
 
But one conversation is often too polite to have openly: can this team actually execute the plan?
 
Instead, the discussion becomes indirect. “They seem strong.” “Good track records.” “Solid references.”
 
Rarely does someone say, “I’m not convinced they can deliver what this model assumes.”
 
That silence is expensive.
 
The model assumes speed, discipline, and judgment. If the leadership team cannot operate at that level, the entire return profile is fiction.
 
IC debates are rigorous on paper. They need to be just as rigorous on people.

#WeAreEastward #CarrerCapital

“Fit” is one of the most common reasons organizations give for hiring or rejecting a candidate.

It’s also one of the least defined.

When teams say someone is a “great fit,” they often mean the person feels familiar or communicates comfortably. When they say someone isn’t a fit, it may simply mean expectations were never clearly articulated.

True fit is not personality alignment. It is expectation alignment.

Does this leader match the company’s appetite for change?
Do they operate at the speed leadership actually wants?
Are they wired for stabilization or transformation?

Without calibration, stakeholders unconsciously define fit differently. One executive evaluates strategic thinking. Another evaluates operational detail. Another evaluates cultural comfort.

The result is inconsistent feedback and prolonged decision-making.
Fit becomes clearer when success criteria are explicit. When outcomes are defined, evaluation becomes objective rather than intuitive.

Hiring improves when organizations move from asking, “Do we like this person?” to asking, “Can this person deliver the outcomes we agreed matter most?”

#WeAreEastward

taplio

The Battle

Pete Durand

Joe Carbone

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance ScorePete Durand's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreJoe Carbone's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Pete Durand

Joe Carbone

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Pete Durand's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreJoe Carbone's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScorePete Durand's LinkedIn Performance