Welcome to The Heidrick & Struggles Leadership Podcast. Heidrick is the premier global provider of diversified solutions across senior-level executive search, leadership, assessment and development, team and organizational effectiveness, and culture shaping. Every day, we speak with leaders around the world about how they're meeting rising expectations and managing through volatile times, thinking about individual leaders, teams, organizations, and society. Thank you for joining the conversation.

Camilla Gilone: Hi, I'm Camilla Gilone, a principal in the London office and part of the Heidrick & Struggles global Industrial and Supply Chain and Operations Officer Practices. In today's podcast, I'm talking to Dino Koutrouki, chief executive officer of Pelsis, global manufacturer and distributor of innovative pest management solutions for professional and retail markets, a company backed by special investment manager Pamplona Capital Management.

Dino joined Pelsis as a chief executive officer in late 2025 to lead the next phase of its growth and transformation. Prior to this, he served as a CEO of Praesidiad Group, a global leader in integrated perimeter security systems backed by Carlyle Private Equity. Earlier in his career, Dino held the senior leadership role at Honeywell International and Marconi Communications, giving him deep experience across global, complex industrial environments.

Dino, welcome and thank you for taking the time to speak with us today.

Dino Koutrouki: Thank you very much, Camilla. Thanks for inviting me here in London. Thank you.

Camilla Gilone: It's great to have you here. Thank you. So, the first thing that I would like to ask you: Your leadership path spans a wide range of companies in different sectors and with different types of ownership. What core principles guided your approach to leadership throughout your journey?

Dino Koutrouki: Okay. Thank you for that question, Camilla. So, look, the first thing is, as a leader, you've got to enjoy your job. You get up really early in the morning, around 6 a.m. in my case, and before you end the day, it's not short of nine at night. So, you've got to really have that energy and enthusiasm that takes everybody with you.

The teams want to be with someone who believes in the business, believes in what they're doing. So, I put a lot of effort into the role. I make sure that I'm fully focused on the job. I want to succeed. I want the teams to succeed around me. But a lot of that is how I look after myself in terms of diet, fitness; I have a coach, have lots of feedback. We make sure that you're 100% ready for the physical side of being mentally alert for so long in the day and really lead from the front.

Camilla Gilone: And I think it's a very healthy suggestion and also approach to life in general. And looking back, what's one decision in your career that fundamentally changed your perspective as a chief executive officer and had an impact on your leadership style?

Dino Koutrouki: The hardest thing with becoming a CEO is getting the experience to be a CEO. Particularly in the UK and the US, where I spent a lot of my career in corporate management, there was always one guy or lady at the top and you were thinking, well, how do I get to that job? So, I always made it a very strong policy of mine in making sure that I was prepared to move location. So, I moved to Germany for three years, and I moved to Singapore for three years as well. And that was quite good as a leader, because for a start, you gain far more experience, different cultures, different ways of managing. But as a CEO, sometimes you have to be an outsider, you have to think about, well, I'm not in the culture that everybody else is around me because I'm going into a new company, and it taught me that outside perspective. So, I think that the biggest piece of advice is go to get the right experience, wherever that is, and challenge yourself in terms of that environment.

Camilla Gilone: And you've worked extensively in private equity-backed environments. What have you learned about stakeholder management in a PE environment?

Dino Koutrouki: I think I wouldn't have been a PE CEO if I hadn't spent so much time in a corporate environment, particularly in technology type companies like Honeywell and Marconi going back many years, because in those technology companies, you have to explain the idea, you have to explain the technology, and you have to explain it in terms that everybody understands.

You know, in PE companies, most of the shareholders and most of the board are financially trained. You know, that's their experience. And you have to give the message in a way that they understand. It's not always possible, but you just have to keep that communication and that dialog. Fundamentally, you have a plan, you have to say how the progress is against that plan, so the way that you do your reporting as well is quite important. If you just focus on historical information, that's probably not relevant. What's more relevant is what's going to change going forward. So, focus your reporting on growth initiatives, productivity initiatives, change management. That gets the PE company excited: they can see a path. They can see a way forward rather than the results last month were 10% down: what are you doing about it. So, really, it's about that communication of firstly understanding you're explaining something to financial investors, and secondly, what's the path forward—that's what they want to hear.

Camilla Gilone: What excites you most about leading a global pest control and innovation driven company like Pelsis, at this point of its evolution. And where do you see Pelsis’s opportunity, and what are the talent challenges related to that?

Dino Koutrouki: I never would have thought that I would get into a sector such as pest control. You know.

Camilla Gilone: An interesting one.

Dino Koutrouki: Interesting, yeah. I was really surprised when I got the approach and I did the diligence about the sector and the role. Firstly, I think of how many similarities it had to my previous experience. So, it's a very regulated sector. Secondly, it's always growing. There's always some sort of pests. There's always a market. It's future proofed. And, you know, I've been into some technology companies where you almost feel it's a product looking for a customer. There's no shortage of customers in pest control. You know, it's a very strong market. 

In terms of the industry, what's really interesting about it is two things. Firstly, the regulations are becoming stronger on things like chemicals and the way that you use chemicals. Some of these chemicals are very harsh. And that's interesting in terms of the effects of the environment and the effect on the ecology of soil ecosystems and the like. So that's been very challenging for the industry, which is quite traditional in its approach.

And then secondly, the whole digital approach, digitization. When I heard about digitization and pest control, I thought, what on earth is that? I wasn't quite sure what they were talking about, but there's a few interesting areas. I mean, obviously there's labor saving devices. You know, the number of call-outs are reduced if you have a more efficient way of tracking down pests.

But I think things like identification of species that shouldn't be here in the UK and in Europe, that's becoming very interesting. And that's done through digital cameras and looking at the amount of insects that are being caught on a particular board. That's revolutionizing the way that pest control is approached. And we're starting to see, you know, if there's concentrations in a particular area, what the root causes of an infestation are.

And, in things like food hygiene, plants, that can be very important because the cause might not be seen: there might be some old food underneath a cupboard or something like that. So that digital approach is really generating a lot of interest today. It's not really well-established, but I can see with Pelsis, you know, we're well positioned to take that forward and to be thought leaders in that market as well.

Camilla Gilone: And from a talent perspective, it's going to be more digital native talent that you are willing to attract to policies at this point in time.

Dino Koutrouki: Yeah. So, the digital side of things also applies to our go to market. So typically, a lot of pest control is only done by professional pest controllers, but what we're seeing is more and more residential homeowners wanting to protect their homes against various pests. So, the channel is moving away from traditional distribution warehouses to e-commerce. And so, we've hired a lot of e-commerce people, particularly with expertise in just how the vagaries of Amazon work, for example, because it's very challenging with Amazon to stay competitive. So yeah, we've hired in that area. And then in terms of our digital pest control solutions, you know, we've obviously moved from mechanical engineering type disciplines to very much digital AI-type environments. And to be honest, we've had to outsource some of that because we haven't got the internal knowledge and expertise to do that.

Camilla Gilone: At the moment.

Dino Koutrouki: At the moment, yes. That's right.

Camilla Gilone: And stepping into a chief executive role often requires rapid alignment. How do you manage stakeholder management and stakeholder alignment across owners, leadership teams, employees, while also shaping the culture during a major transition?

Dino Koutrouki: Yeah. So, when you join a company, everybody's looking at you. You know, normally there's been a reason for a change. Normally either someone hasn't performed or the board want to go in a new direction or someone's retired and there's going to be a change in direction as a result of the new leadership of the business. And I find the last thing you want to do is hesitate in that environment. You need to give confidence and assurance that you have a plan, you know what you're doing. You have to be humble you have to listen to what people are saying. You have to listen to what the team are saying. 

All the answers for the problems if there are any of a company are within the company; the people themselves will know the answers. My philosophy is to act fairly fast, to engage with the teams. At Pelsis, we held a very big workshop within the first two weeks that I was in business to get all the ideas on the table, maybe ideas that in the past managers were a bit hesitant about going forward with or there was a reason why they weren’t taken forward in the past. But I have an open book. You then listen to all those ideas. You come up with a plan with the team, and then I find it's best if you replay that plan back to them. So, what do you think? Ask for feedback. And then you’ll decide. And this is the way you're going to go forward.

And then the role of the CEO becomes more of a salesperson because you have to sell the idea to the board, to the employees. You have to do the communications and you really have to move quickly because during that period of transition, you don't want that to last too long. You don't want people internally focused. You want them focused on growing markets, developing new products.

So, at Pelsis, we did that very quick. Within three months we had a new plan. We socialized it to the board. We got approval, and we socialized it to the teams. And I think we’re in a very good position going forward. And then it's about constant communication, affirmation, how we're doing against that plan.

Camilla Gilone: So, Dino, you mentioned that you are like an open book. It would be very interesting to understand how you face in your day-to-day working life different ideas from your talent team, different points of view? How do you approach them?

Dino Koutrouki: Yeah, so early in my career I had had another coach, actually. And, he said to me, believe it or not, Dino, everybody's different and everybody has a different perspective. And a lot of stress in leadership is where you as a leader are trying to make someone think like you think. And that just is not possible.

So how do you be open and accept ideas? Firstly, you know, one of our core values is to be inclusive and when I'm in meetings, I'll see that some people talk and some people don't talk. And it's quite important to ask the ones that don't talk what their views are, because they've obviously got ideas, but they might be a bit hesitant about saying them.

Camilla Gilone: So, make it feel like everybody is included.

Dino Koutrouki: Yeah, make everybody have a perspective. Make everybody feel included. Everybody should feel comfortable about saying what they feel. Once you have the opinions of everybody, then it's more about can you distill it down to some core data and facts rather than opinions? What is the actual problem and how are we going to address that problem? And once you get down to that, it takes all the emotion out. And going through a few of those cycles in terms of problem-solving shows people that it's not about who says it or the style in which they say or present it, it's about the issue that matters. And the best performing teams I've been in are pretty much where everybody congregates around the data and they congregate around the facts, and they leave all the emotion and the personalities out of it.

Camilla Gilone: So keeping a human touch.

Dino Koutrouki: And you've got to think about cultures as well. I'm in a global business; not everybody speaks English well, and they don't feel comfortable about saying things, you know, in an open forum with sophisticated English speakers. So, you've got to be quite mindful of that. You know, we do things like town halls and the like: we do them in written form, and people ask questions in the language that they understand because we want everybody to be included. So, I think getting all the data on the table, taking the emotion out of it.

Camilla Gilone: And economic volatility and geopolitical uncertainty continue to test the leadership teams. How do you foster resilience and adaptability, both in yourself and across the leadership team?

Dino Koutrouki: Yeah, I mean, the first thing is there is a lot of economic volatility at the moment in the world. And it's been like that it seems for quite a few years. So, it's become a bit normal that you know, trade is being disrupted, politics are changing constantly. As a leader, you don't get a pass in terms of managing a business; when this happens, you have to do the best you can. I think the strength and convictions in the plan that you have to come across at this time—the last thing you want to do is constantly change and you have to appear to the teams that you have the confidence that the plan is going to work, that you have confidence in the teams, you have confidence in the strategy. So, the resilience comes through delivery of that plan and making sure that you celebrate the successes when you have them. You can't have that doom and gloom philosophy at work. Everyone's got to have enjoyment in succeeding. And it's particularly satisfying when you come through these times of adversity.

You should also remember that during tough times in economic markets, that's when the most opportunities are, either through acquisition or through maybe your competitors not doing quite as well as you are. So, you've always got to be watching not just the effects on your company but on the market and on the competition as well and look for opportunities.

So, I think it's becoming a bit more normal in terms of the economic backgrounds that we work under, but it can also be quite invigorating, really, to get through this.

Camilla Gilone: It's all about looking at the positive side, the opportunistic side, right. So, from your perspective, Dino, what is the single biggest leadership challenge facing CEOs today, and how are you personally navigating it?

Dino Koutrouki: Okay, so maybe I'll answer the question from a PE perspective. Most PE companies are smaller companies, they are made up of maybe a few bolt on acquisitions. So, they haven't got a singular culture—there are many cultures. The systems are not great but the idea behind them is good. So, like Pelsis, we have great technology, we have a great market we operate in, made up of a few small companies. The most important challenge is maintaining and upgrading and the people, and that's what we look at the most, because the difference between a successful company and a company that's failed is always down to the people who operate that company. So, the biggest challenge for me is firstly attracting the right talent to the organization. Secondly, keeping them, making sure they're motivated, making sure that we have the right incentives in place, the right culture, the right challenges, career progression. So, I'm always looking for ways of just making people feel better about where they work.

We've also got to be mindful of AI. I think that's the answer most CEOs would talk about what they are afraid of most, what are they thinking the biggest challenge is. Actually, it hasn't really affected us that much. We’re using AI for analytics, but you know, some of the messaging that we're seeing about wholesale redundancies in the industries like high tech and software, we don't see that here. There's always going to be a need for people making things and people selling things. But I think we've always going to be mindful of do we know the full extent of where AI is going to take us, and that's something in our strategic planning in this cycle that we're doing at the moment; we're spending a lot of time understanding just what does AI mean for our sector and our business. So, the fear of the unknown in that sense is what we're thinking about there. But practically, our business is about people and maintaining the right talent that we have.

Camilla Gilone: Good. That's the goal number one. So, Dino, we're coming to almost an end here; what advice would you give to executives that today are interested in pursuing a career in a private equity-backed environment, particularly in the industrial sector?

Dino Koutrouki: So, my career was not the normal career in that I started in a big company, went into a tiny company, with less than 30 people, then got an exit in that company, and then as a result of that exit, ended up in a big company again. So, I got all the experience of big company processes, working with top talent, and big company thought in terms of how to approach markets. But in a small company, none of those things exist. So, the challenge is about communication. You can make statements in big companies and teams of people will go away and do things for you. In a small company, it's really basic: how do you get a customer to pay you? How do you get better terms from a supplier? And it's all right saying they should be a better payer or they should pay on time, but practically, the people want to know, well, how do you do that?

So, my advice is, in a big company, you make statements and teams follow those instructions and you see the results. In a small company, you have to show people how, and that's what happens in private equity. The biggest phrase I use in interviews is: how hands on are you? And I have to say, most people don't understand what that means. They always say, yes, we're hands on, but in private equity it means do you follow through to the end of the process? So, when you give someone a request to do something, do you make sure that's happened? That's not in everybody's DNA.

So, my advice to anyone wanting to go into private equity is hands on really means doing it to the conclusion and not delegating. That's probably something that comes over many years. The other thing in private equity is the pace is very fast compared to a corporate environment. And there are not a lot of resources as in a bigger company to do that, so you have to really know more than just one discipline, say finance or marketing—you have to know several disciplines because you have to fill in those gaps, whether it's a program that's going wrong, so you have to step in as a project manager, or if the cash is not doing so well, and you have to step in and help the CFO. You know, these are the sort of things that you do on a daily basis. So, you have to have quite a lot of rounded experience.

Camilla Gilone: So, would you say a best-in-class background from a big corporation, together with the right mindset and ability to really get your hands dirty, is the way to go in order to be successful?

Dino Koutrouki: Yeah, I would say don't lose sight of your principles. So, the principles you get in a big company are great. You know, the processes are great. The best practice is well-trained in bigger companies, but in smaller environments with less robust systems, you have to be prepared to innovate, to be curious, to wonder about how to do things in a different way, and that tends to come with more experience. So, my advice is: Wait a little bit in your career until you're ready to jump into that environment. But then, it's very rewarding when you get a business that maybe hasn't been doing so well in a fragmented market, and you take that and you give a vision to the teams. It's not about getting an exit, it's about leaving a sustainable business on a firmer platform than when you joined. That's the challenge.

Camilla Gilone: Dino, thank you for making the time to speak with us today. It was very valuable to listen to your story and your lessons.

Dino Koutrouki: Thank you very much Camilla and thanks very much for inviting me.

Thanks for listening to The Heidrick & Struggles Leadership Podcast. To make sure you don't miss the next conversation, please subscribe to our channel on your preferred podcast app. And if you're listening via LinkedIn or YouTube, why not share this with your connections? Until next time.

About the interviewer

Camilla Gilone (cgilone@heidrick.com) is a principal in the global Supply Chain & Operations Officers Practice; she is based in the London office.