General Manager

General Manager | Fire & Life Safety | Southern New England | Base: $150,000-$200,000 + Bonus + Equity Available | On-site

A PE-backed fire protection platform in Southern New England, running sprinkler, fire alarm and suppression under one roof, is hiring a General Manager to take ownership of all operations. The business is doing roughly $25M, growing around 30% a year organically, and has an active acquisition pipeline across the Northeast.

This is a confidential search. The platform name is not disclosed at this stage.

The Role

You own operations from sold job through to completion across all three business units, reporting directly to the founder and sitting on a deliberately flat leadership team. On-site, four to five days a week.

What you’re actually building here

• Ownership of operations across roughly six direct reports and an ~100 person team: sprinkler, fire alarm and suppression business unit managers, plus fleet, IT and dispatch
• A high-volume, small-ticket service operation run on data rather than instinct: data quality down to the field, clear top and bottom performers, and the judgement to know whether a gap is technology, training or people
• A hiring, training and coaching engine, the business’s single biggest challenge today
• Growing trust and autonomy over roughly six months as you take day-to-day operations off the founder
• A path to broader responsibility across acquired businesses once you have proven it in the core operation

Why Strong Operators Take This Seat

This is not a turnaround. The business has hit aggressive post-deal revenue and EBITDA targets, margins are among the strongest in its market, and you inherit a working machine. What it needs is a General Manager who sets the tone and builds the team that maintains it.

The leadership team is flat and puts the collective interest first. Autonomy is earned, not given: show you can run the existing operation and the remit grows with it.

The upside is real. A ground floor seat on a well-capitalised platform with plans for dozens of locations, equity available through the management incentive plan, and a natural path toward an executive seat as it scales.

The honest part: there is no playbook to inherit. The business is building the plane while flying it, and the bar is high from day one.

What the Role Requires

• Deep fire protection operations expertise: strong sprinkler knowledge (the core of the business) plus working knowledge of alarm and suppression, ideally from a service and inspection-led operation
• You have led a multi-trade service operation through managers, with a team of around 100 and hundreds of jobs a week
• Data-driven and financially literate: you run operations to a budget and can find the underperforming area quickly
• A proven builder of teams who has hired, trained and coached people to perform
• You have materially grown a service business, ideally under PE ownership
• A self-starter who brings solutions, not just problems
• Comfortable working alongside a unionised sprinkler field workforce
• Experience with a field service platform such as ServiceTrade is preferred
• Based within commuting distance of the role, or willing to relocate. On-site four to five days a week

What This Role Is Not For

• A big-company process manager who follows a corporate playbook and gravitates to large tickets over a high-volume service book
• An operator who runs the business on instinct rather than data
• Someone who needs every turn spelled out
• Someone focused on procurement savings over customer retention, people and service quality
• Someone who has run a business at the same size for years without growing it
• Anyone with a disdain for organised labour

Compensation

• Base salary $150,000-$200,000, depending on experience
• Target-based bonus, not discretionary
• Equity through the management incentive plan for the right candidate, vesting over time
• Relocation support available for the right candidate
• Comprehensive medical cover, new company vehicle and fuel card

Process

This is a confidential search managed exclusively by INC’D. All conversations are handled with full discretion, candidates sign an NDA before details are shared, and no identifying details are released until INC’D has personally qualified fit.

If you want the honest picture before deciding whether to proceed, including the parts that are difficult, that is exactly the conversation we have.

If this is worth a conversation, contact Nick or Cosmos directly.