Welcome to the “30 Issues” page, where we analyze the decline of BearingPoint Inc., one of the most renowned professional services organizations. This chapter of the book carefully and thoughtfully unpacks, explains and prioritizes the 30 issues the author believes directly led to the ultimate demise of BearingPoint Incorporated.

30 Issues

Decline Analysis of BearingPoint Inc.

Decline Analysis

This section provides a comprehensive overview of the decline analysis, detailing the critical issues that led to BearingPoint’s protracted decline following its celebrated IPO. The analysis categorizes each issue to highlight its impact:

Catastrophic (C)

1. The Structure of the Initial Public Offering (IPO) – KPMG LLP and Cisco Got all the Money
2. Greed, Egos, Arrogance and Ignorance
3. Lack of Proper Oversight from our Board of Directors
4. Executive Leadership had No Experience Leading a Publicly Traded Company
5. Not Prepared to be a Public Company
6. Arthur Anderson and Arthur Anderson Business Consulting
7. Sarbanes Oxley (SOX)
8. Business Model Post IPO – Partnership vs. Corporation
9. Too Much Employee Ownership
10. Not Securing a UK Practice of KPMG
11. Global Expansion and Acquisitions
12. OneGlobe Financial System Implementation – One Globe
13. Approach to Restating Financial Reports

Significant (S)

14. The Business Environment Changed and We Did Not
15. Timing and Economic Downturns
16. Debt
17. The Cisco 4000 Initiative
18. Unrealistic Expectations
19. Internal Politics, Corporate Culture and Employee Morale
20. Lack of Recurring Revenue
21. We Were Unable to Grow the Business
22. There was Never Wide-Spread Interest to Own our Stock

Interesting (I)

23. Poor Investment Decisions – “Go Big or Go Home”
24. Restructuring Charges
25. Legal Over-Reach
26. Fraud, Corruption and Unethical Behaviour
27. Litigation
28. Poor Delivery and Write-Offs

Foundational (F)

29. Attrition – Voluntary Turnover
30. Auditors

Event Categorization

Issues are prioritized based on their overall impact. Addressing the higher-priority issues might have mitigated some downstream problems or reduced their severity. This abridged overview summarizes key events and their consequences.

This categorization helps to understand how these issues contributed to the company’s decline over eight years from the IPO in February 2001.

Catastrophic (C): Issues directly connected to the demise.
Significant (S): Issues that had an impact but were manageable.
Interesting (I): Unique to BearingPoint but with less impact.
Foundational (F): Common to all organizations.

Issue Priority	Impact	Description
1	C	The Structure of the Initial Public Offering (IPO) – KPMG and Cisco Got all the Money
2	C	Greed, Egos, Arrogance, and Ignorance
3	C	Lack of Proper Oversight from our Board of Directors
4	C	Executive Leadership had No Experience Leading a Publicly Traded Company
5	C	Not Prepared to be a Public Company
6	C	Arthur Andersen and Arthur Andersen Business Consulting
7	C	Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX)
8	C	Business Model Post IPO (Partnership vs. Corporation)
9	C	Too Much Ownership
10	C	Not Securing the UK Consulting Practice of KPMG
11	C	Global Expansion and Acquisitions
12	C	OneGlobe Financial System Implementation
13	C	Approach to Restating Financial Reports
14	C	The Business Environment Changed and We Did Not
15	S	Timing and Economic Downturns
16	S	Debt
17	S	The Cisco 4000 Initiative
18	S	Unrealistic Expectations
19	S	Internal Politics, Corporate Culture and Employee Morale
20	S	Lack of Recurring Revenue
21	S	We Were Unable to Grow the Business
22	S	There Was Never Widespread Interest to Own Our Stock
23	I	Poor Investment Decisions – “Go Big or Go Home”
24	I	Restructuring Charges
25	I	Legal Over-Reach
26	I	Fraud, Corruption and Unethical Behavior
27	I	Litigation
28	I	Poor Delivery and Write-Offs
29	F	Attrition – Voluntary Turnover
30	F	Auditors

For a more in-depth decline analysis and detailed examination of each issue, refer to the full content of our book.