Antonio Morales Shares the Secrets to a Successful Business Transformation

Antonio Morales has spent his career helping global companies transform their profit margins by streamlining organizational operations, enabling strategic investments, and providing guidance in driving strategic performance, growth, and cash flows. A financially disciplined organization is key to the business success, and Antonio’s track record for effective financial planning is a testimony to his ability when transforming a good business into a great one.

At Parker Hannifin as Global Controller for Energy Products, he led the consolidation of several acquisitions, unifying different business models and implementing operational efficiencies and synergies across plants in the Americas and Europe. As divisional CFO of oil and gas at Element Six, he enhanced the forecasting capabilities and their procurement program. Morales’ tenure was just as fruitful at Baker Hughes, where he led a team focusing on commercial contract improvements that, ultimately, transformed Latin America into a very profitable and cost-effective region.

These achievements—among many more during his time at companies that spanned the healthcare, logistics, and technology industries—required key considerations at the onset of developing a financial plan dependent on individual business goals and targets, Morales says.

“Your first assumption is that there’s no silver bullet since there’s usually a number of aspects you can pursue to transform profitably,” he says. “Second, you need to quickly understand whether you’re facing an operational transformation or a strategic one, picking the right direction early on. Third, understand that how you invest matters, since it changes the DNA of your organization.”

A pivotal factor influencing a successful business transformation lies in their leaders’ ability to see the business through a future-forward lens and shape it in the best organization it can be.

“Only a few times you’re thrown into a situation where outside economic situations, like a recession, could impact its profitability,” Morales says. “However, companies are in the driver seat when driving improvements irrespective of the economic environment. As a management team, you must anticipate the potential headwinds and leverage your strengths to capture market opportunities.”

In 2022, he brought that perspective to Sensormatic Solutions, the leading global retail solutions portfolio of Johnson Controls. As its CFO, he and his colleagues enhanced the organization’s pricing capabilities, optimized its geographic footprint, identified organizational efficiencies in its structure, and simplified its processes. Currently, he’s focused on enhancing customer relationships and satisfaction while making the company more profitable.  

“There’s a misconception that you must sacrifice one for the other, but the reality is that the two go hand-in-hand. A business will continue to grow and run efficiently when your customers are delighted with your products and services,” he says.

Having the right team in place is critical to identifying and implementing the most effective path forward. For Morales, who spent his career working with professionals all over the world, the top teams are always the diverse ones.

“There are a number of positives that come out of diverse teams, and one is new perspective,” he says. “To solve problems you need creative solutions, which happens when you’re surrounded by people from different backgrounds, cultures, races, and gender. Those perspectives inform decisions that lead to profit or losses, so they are key for enriching the decision-making process.”

While Morales’ global work experience played a role in shaping his ideas about diversity, his journey as a father of five has been equally as impactful.

“My wife is the product of Slovenian and German immigrants. My daughters are the combination of my Mexican heritage and my wife’s ethnicities,” he says. “And I have three adopted sons. The oldest is from China, my middle son is from Ethiopia, and my youngest is from Houston.

“It was amazing to watch my kids grow up in a diverse environment together,” he continued. “They never thought twice about their differences. In fact, their differences weren’t tied to external appearance; but, instead, centered on their approach to life or even their individual thought processes. That really impacted my business leadership style and reinforced that it’s important to look at the story behind a person which can clue you in on what motivates and drives them forward.”

While retail has seen its fair share of challenges and opportunities over the past few years, Morales is excited to see what the future will look like for the industry moving forward. He’s particularly interested in the ways we will meet the needs of the next generation of shoppers.

“It’s a very dynamic and exciting time,” he says. “The new generation of customers are much more conscious buyers, particularly around the impact to the environment. There’s significant more information available at their fingertips due to digital resources so it’s important to understand the shifting of consumer sentiments when it comes to sustainability, and the desire for a personalized shopping experience.”