From Private Equity to CEO and Back Again: What Eight Years in the Arena Taught Me
From Private Equity to CEO and Back Again: What Eight Years in the Arena Taught Me
By Heidi Duckworth, Imbiba Operating Partner
Private equity is a world of forecasts, frameworks, incentives, value-creation and of course, finding and backing great management teams. Fresh out of Harvard Business School, I sat on boards, approved budgets, and said things like “Can I see your sensitivity analysis?” without much sensitivity myself I now realise.
And then, after 7 years … I stepped away. With two small children at home, I decided to take a break to spend some time with them.
But that break didn’t last long and within a couple of years, I had swapped the comfort of well-catered investment committee meetings for climbing walls. In 2014, I founded Rock Up, the UK’s largest chain of indoor fun climbing centres, and became a CEO. The experience was exhilarating, exhausting, relentless, rewarding and quite possibly the steepest learning curve of my career. I thought I understood how to run a business. But let’s be honest: it’s one thing to advise a CEO, and quite another to be one.
Now, having sold Rock Up in 2022, to a French private equity-backed group, I find myself returning to the investing world at Imbiba. Same spreadsheets. Same committees. But this time, with a new appreciation for what it really takes to build and scale a company—especially through unpredictable times like a global pandemic.
Here’s what I wish I’d understood a bit better before I became a CEO:
Building a good workplace culture is hard.
I underestimated how much time, effort and resource goes into creating a team culture that sticks - and that people want to stick with. It’s not just about hiring “great people” (although that is always a good place to start)—it’s about retaining them, listening to them, and supporting them especially when times are tough. In hindsight, I was impatient as to why it took so long to get this right, but it’s hard. Really hard.
There is no “small stuff”.
The temperature in your centres. The booking experience. Whether your staff wear shorts or trousers. It all matters, because your customers think it does. It’s easy to overlook operational minutiae when you’re reading a board pack. But, in reality, things like how clean the toilets are, how staff greet customers, or the background music playing in a venue can make or break a brand.
Cash flow can be an emotional experience.
In private equity, we talk a lot about cash. But when you’re running a business, cash isn’t theoretical or just on a spreadsheet—it’s the thing that keeps you up at night. I can still vividly remember the sleepless nights spent deciding which bills to pay, checking daily bank balances and figuring out how to make payroll when revenue had completely disappeared during the covid pandemic.
The board/CEO relationship really matters.
I now look back on my time as a board member with a mix of gratitude and humility. The best investors I worked with as a CEO were the ones who listened first, advised second, and understood that context matters. It’s a lonely place being a CEO of a startup and so having understanding, supportive, mentors in your Chair and Board is really valuable.
Coming back to PE, I can see things differently now.
I ask founders different questions. I look for different signs. I pay closer attention to what’s not on the dashboard. I understand why a founder might delay a pricing change, or why ops teams push back on "simple" tech integrations. And I have a lot more respect for the quiet, unglamorous work that drives performance. My time as an operator didn’t just change how I think. It changed how I listen.
Now at Imbiba, where we invest in growth businesses in the UK leisure, hospitality, education and healthcare sectors, I have the opportunity to apply these hard-won lessons in a way that feels both personal and purposeful. I’m not just reviewing business plans and meeting management teams—I’m engaging with founders as someone who’s been in their shoes. The challenges they face aren’t theoretical to me; they’re deeply familiar. That perspective helps me ask more relevant questions and hopefully offer more grounded support. It’s a privilege to partner with businesses at such a pivotal stage, and I’m genuinely excited to support founders not just with capital, but with the kind of insight and partnership I once needed myself.