Most restructuring programs are announced with confidence and delivered with disappointment. The difference between restructurings that create lasting value and those that simply reduce headcount usually comes down to one factor: whether the CFO plays a leading role — or just a supporting one.
Anubhav Mittal has led restructuring programs at multiple points in his career — at ADM's Nutrition and Pet Solutions platforms, and at Kellogg Company, where he oversaw a major global restructuring initiative from design through execution. In each case, the starting point was the same: a clear-eyed diagnosis of where the business was actually losing value, rather than where it appeared to be.
The Diagnosis Phase: Where Most Programs Go Wrong
The most common failure mode in restructuring is insufficient diagnostic rigor at the front end. Organizations under pressure tend to move quickly to solutions — workforce reductions, facility consolidations, business unit exits — before they have fully understood what is actually driving underperformance. This misdiagnosis produces cost cuts that feel significant in the short term but fail to address structural issues, leaving the business in a worse competitive position a year or two later.
Mittal's approach begins with separating cyclical underperformance from structural underperformance. Cyclical problems — volume declines driven by market conditions, short-term margin compression from input cost inflation — generally require liquidity management and operational resilience rather than structural change. Structural problems — misaligned cost bases, under-resourced competitive capabilities, portfolio mismatches — require more fundamental action. Getting this distinction right is the foundation of an effective restructuring plan.
The Execution Phase: Building Credibility While Managing Risk
Once the diagnosis is complete, the CFO's role shifts to designing the program in a way that is both ambitious and executable. This means sequencing initiatives carefully — addressing the highest-value, lowest-disruption opportunities first — and building the governance infrastructure to track progress against commitments. In Mittal's experience, restructuring programs fail most often not in their design but in their execution: accountability drifts, savings targets get recategorized, and the program loses momentum as other priorities emerge.
The solution is to treat restructuring as a program management discipline, not a one-time event. That means assigning clear ownership for each workstream, building a reporting rhythm that makes progress visible to senior leadership, and establishing a culture of honesty about what is working and what is not. The CFO is often the only executive with both the credibility and the data access to hold this together across functions and geographies.
Value Capture: The Step That Most Programs Skip
The final phase of restructuring — and the one that distinguishes successful programs from unsuccessful ones — is value capture. It is not enough to reduce costs; the organization must demonstrate that those savings have translated into improved financial performance. This sounds obvious, but it is routinely underemphasized. Savings identified in a restructuring plan often get consumed by reinvestment decisions elsewhere, or fail to flow through to the P&L because the tracking mechanisms are inadequate.
Mittal's approach to value capture is rooted in finance discipline: clear baseline measurement, consistent tracking of actuals against targets, and an explicit link between restructuring savings and business unit financial outcomes. When this discipline is applied rigorously, restructuring becomes not just a cost story but a value creation narrative — one that resonates with investors, boards, and operating teams alike. For further reading on related topics, his perspective on CFO roles in strategic partnerships explores how financial leadership extends well beyond cost management.
Conclusion
The best restructurings Mittal has observed — and the ones he has led — share a common characteristic: the CFO was not a passive recorder of decisions made elsewhere, but an active architect of the program from diagnosis through value capture. That is the standard to which finance leaders should hold themselves when their organizations face the need for structural change. Those interested in his broader philosophy on finance leadership can also explore his thinking on working capital as a strategic lever.