David Kavanaugh

I’ve spent 30 years taking on large, complex initiatives and seeing them through — integrations, restructurings, operational turnarounds, cost programs, cross-functional buildouts — at organizations ranging from $300M to $2.5B. That work started in turnarounds and M&A advisory at Arthur Andersen and PwC, where I spent 15 years advising clients across media, entertainment, and K–12 education on transactions and performance improvement. It eventually brought me inside one of those clients — Harcourt, which became Houghton Mifflin Harcourt — where I spent 13 years in roles that grew from leading a post-acquisition integration to running the company’s largest division, and ultimately to a seat on the executive team reporting to the CEO, overseeing 10 enterprise-wide transformation initiatives. Since then I’ve continued that work independently through Parliament Advisory Partners, taking on interim CEO and Chief Transformation Officer roles alongside advisory engagements across K-12 education and publishing. Currently VP of Enterprise PMO at Great Minds. The through-line across all of it has been the same: — Understand the problem — the symptoms, the root cause, the impact — Get the right people in the room to agree on the facts and identify alternatives — Develop the recommendation and required actions — Drive execution with the team until the outcome is real At this point in my career I’m less interested in title or trajectory than in work that matters. I want to be in rooms where the stakes are real, with people I can help develop, leaving the organization in better shape than I found it. One more thing that doesn’t fit neatly into a LinkedIn profile but feels relevant: our son Jack is a cancer survivor. His Make-A-Wish experience is part of why our family relocated to Bozeman, Montana seven years ago. I wrote about his journey in a children’s book, Dinky Donkey Doo: A Brave Boy, His Loyal Companion, and a Journey of Hope,”, published in 2024. Jack is thriving as a 9th grade English teacher, lacrosse and wrestling coach and dorm parent at a prep school, making who makes an impact every day in the classroom, in the dorms, and on the field. That experience shapes how I think about mission-driven work and why it matters.