Peter Hajdu's career is a masterclass in strategic problem-solving and transformational leadership. From his early days as a McKinsey consultant to running billion-dollar industrial operations at Dura-Line, a leading global manufacturer and distributor, Hajdu has built his reputation on tackling the most challenging assignments—often the ones others preferred to avoid. Now, as CEO of All Interests Aligned (AIA), he's applying that same appetite for complex challenges to what he sees as one of Europe's most pressing economic issues: the succession crisis facing thousands of small and medium-sized enterprises.
Hajdu's approach to business was forged in the crucible of management consulting. "What I learned in the early years of my career at McKinsey was how to approach problems," he says. "It's all about structuring problems and focusing on solutions."
But perhaps more importantly, his diverse consulting experience across industries—from chemicals and airlines to banking and consumer goods—taught him a fundamental truth that would shape his career: "Independent of industries, companies face very similar issues. The core of the problems tend to be the same, which is always around generating the right value, working with the right people, having the right procedures and decision capabilities."
This cross-industry perspective became Hajdu's secret weapon as he moved from consulting into operational roles. During his decade at Cisco, he deliberately sought out the most transformational positions, often in emerging markets with scarce resources. "I was always trying to seek out a position where I had the freedom to leave my own fingerprint on the organization," he recalls.
Hajdu's experience in emerging markets proved particularly formative. Working in environments with dramatic volatility taught him skills that he now sees as directly applicable to the SME space. "The characteristics of emerging markets, in many ways, are similar to SMEs," he notes. "There is dramatic volatility. When it goes well, it goes super well. When it's down, it's going to be super down."
This volatility forced him to build organizations and systems that could thrive in uncertainty—exactly the kind of adaptability that SME operators need. "You have to build organizations, incentive systems, delivery models, operations, financials, KPIs, and do everything according to that," he explains. "I have lived in that world. I'm very thankful for that."
At Cisco, Hajdu developed an unconventional business model that became the most productive globally in terms of headcount productivity. This success led to increasingly senior roles, culminating in his leadership of Central and Eastern Europe—a multi-hundred-million-dollar operation.
The transition to CEO at Dura-Line represented the culmination of Hajdu's strategic career planning. As leader of the billion-dollar industrial organization, he orchestrated a massive transformation. "It went from being a product-centric, operations-focused organization to a customer-centric, solution-oriented company with incredible focus on customer intimacy," he says, noting that the company serves infrastructure needs for the world's largest hyperscalers and telecom companies.
But even at the height of his corporate success, Hajdu was already contemplating his next move. "I realized that yet another change was required in my career, and I was trying to be more entrepreneurial now, and even more focused on what I would call value creation."
Hajdu's transition to AIA was a mission-driven decision. "I do believe that we can't allow the succession crisis to become such a big problem that potentially thousands of companies go down and lose their value," he notes. The statistics are sobering. Across Europe, countless family-owned businesses lack clear succession plans, with owners approaching retirement but having no clear exit strategy. Many of these companies provide essential services to their communities and employ significant numbers of people. Without intervention, they risk closing permanently when their founders retire.
"This model is a very pure model focused on sustainable value creation," Hajdu says. "We know that this is why we exist. We would like to create value and then repeat it indefinitely."
In a crowded field of search funds and acquisition platforms, Hajdu believes AIA's differentiation lies in several key areas. First, the calibre and commitment of investors: "The investors are entrepreneurs who are not only providing committed capital, but unlike many other vehicles, they also provide their own network and experience, which is unmatched in many ways. We have core investors, but we also have associates or co-investors, which is a much broader set of people with incredible depth of experience around us," Hajdu notes.
The second differentiator lies in AIA's approach to selecting operating partners. Unlike traditional search funds that often target recent MBA graduates, AIA seeks more seasoned professionals. "Their background and experience tends to be different from the traditional search fund operating partners, because they come with more experience and broader experience than typically other search funds," Hajdu says.
This focus on experienced operators reflects a fundamental belief that SME transformation requires battle-tested leadership. The companies AIA targets often face complex operational and strategic challenges that benefit from leaders who have navigated similar situations before. "Every single operating partner, potentially a future CEO, is going to have to drive a transformational agenda when they take over the organization," Hajdu notes.
The third key difference is the unprecedented alignment of interests across all stakeholders. "The interests of every single participant—the investor, AIA management, the future operating partner, and all the people associated—are aligned," he notes. This alignment goes beyond typical private equity structures, where interests can sometimes diverge between different stakeholder groups.
Finally, AIA's team brings a unique combination of strategic thinking and operational execution. "Our team also has gathered a broad set of experience," Hajdu says, referencing not just his own background but the collective expertise of the AIA leadership. "As our team grows, we'll make sure that it expands in such a way that this experience is going to be captured, and it is going to be utilized for the benefit of the operating partners."
This comprehensive support structure—combining committed capital, experienced investors, seasoned operators, and aligned interests—creates what Hajdu sees as a sustainable competitive advantage in the European management buy-in (MBI) market.
Drawing from his technology background, Hajdu sees significant opportunities to apply digital tools to traditionally low-tech industries. "We believe that the lower tech the industry that you invest in, when you start leveraging some technology, the marginal benefit becomes very big," he says.
The principle is elegantly simple yet powerful: while high-tech companies often struggle to find new technological advantages, traditional industries offer vast untapped potential for digital transformation. At Dura-Line, Hajdu demonstrated this philosophy in action, transforming a plastic pipe manufacturing business into a comprehensive infrastructure solutions provider.
"We deployed software to provide more services," he says. "One was around digital education, how the pipe should be installed, and it was a very popular model used by some of the largest hyperscalers in theworld. And the other one was around underground network design, how to leverage it, how to utilize and optimize the physical product that you would buy."
This approach—taking a physical product and wrapping it with digital services—illustrates how AIA's operating partners can unlock value in seemingly mature industries. The transformation [at Dura-Line] was about reimagining the entire value proposition from a customer-centric perspective. It is also widely applicable in other contexts.
Hajdu's vision for AIA extends this philosophy across multiple sectors. "We are looking into businesses that are easy to understand," he notes, "and often they would be brick and mortar businesses. You could use a few powerful tools to create value." The strategy is to target companies where the application of basic digital tools—customer relationship management systems, data analytics, e-commerce platforms, or automation technologies—can yield disproportionate returns.
This technological pragmatism reflects Hajdu's broader business philosophy: focus on sustainable, scalable improvements rather than revolutionary disruption. For SME operators, this approach offers a clear roadmap for value creation without requiring deep technical expertise or massive capital investment.
Hajdu's immediate priorities are clear and measurable: "It's to get the first high-quality operating partners through the door, and to make sure that we close the first few deals." Beyond these near-term goals, his vision is ambitious: to make AIA "the premier management buy-in platform in, potentially, the globe, but for sure in Europe, with the highest number and highest quality dealflow."
But for Hajdu, success isn't just about financial returns. "My definition of success is that this becomes a premier vehicle for some of the most talented entrepreneurs who would like to contribute to the positive solution of the succession crisis," he notes. "We are the choice of many people who would like to leave a corporate career, who would like to become entrepreneurs. It's a valid choice for them that they just didn't have before."
Throughout the conversation, one theme emerges consistently: Hajdu's focus on enabling others. "I am a people-focused person, and my ethos is around enabling success, enabling the growth of people," he notes. "I've never really tried to build organizations that are dependent on me in the long run. I think that's a characteristic of a weak leader."
This philosophy represents a fundamental departure from traditional command-and-control leadership models. Instead of building systems that require his constant oversight, Hajdu focuses on creating organizations that can thrive independently. "Seeing these entrepreneurs succeed with us would be a big satisfaction for me, and that part is not negligible. It's an important piece. I look at this as a partnership of success."
The approach stems from hard-won experience across different organizational contexts. At Cisco, Hajdu learned that sustainable success required building local capabilities rather than imposing centralized solutions. "While my peers had vast amounts of resources, well-established organizations and processes at hand, I had none of that. I'm incredibly thankful for that, because I had to figure it out myself."
This experience taught him that the most resilient organizations are those where people at every level can think strategically and act decisively. "That is core to our existence. Whatever business we are in, what is core to that, and how can you preserve and develop that core?" he asks. The answer, he believes, lies in empowering people to understand and contribute to that purpose.
At AIA, this philosophy translates into a unique approach to supporting operating partners. Rather than micromanaging from above, the focus is on providing the tools, resources, and guidance that enable entrepreneurs to succeed independently. "We have a unique approach of finding the right talent who's going to find the right business, and then creating value together with them," he notes.
The emphasis on "together" is crucial. Hajdu sees AIA not as a capital provider that happens to offer some support, but as a true partner in transformation. This partnership model extends to how AIA works with portfolio companies post-acquisition. The goal is to combine the speed and agility that smaller companies naturally possess with the professional management practices and scalability insights that larger organizations have perfected.
"I would like to take what is good in large organizations, which is basically the ability to scale and the ability to engage properly with customers, the professional approach of customer intimacy and operations and financials," he says. "And leave behind the things that I think smaller companies enjoy an advantage of, which is speed and velocity, the ability to focus, the ability to implement quicker."
This balanced approach—preserving entrepreneurial agility while introducing professional management discipline—requires leaders who can adapt their style to different contexts and stakeholders. It's a philosophy that reflects Hajdu's own evolution from consultant to operator to enabler of other entrepreneurs. As Hajdu settles into his role at AIA, he's bringing the same systematic, problem-solving approach that served him well at McKinsey, Cisco and Dura-Line. But now, instead of transforming divisions of global corporations, he's focused on preserving and enhancing the entrepreneurial fabric of Europe itself.
"Solving [the succession crisis] properly will contribute positively to the economic competitiveness and longevity of the continent," he concludes. It's a mission that combines Hajdu’s passion for value creation with his belief in the power of experienced leadership to drive positive change. For European business owners contemplating succession and experienced executives seeking entrepreneurial opportunities, Peter Hajdu represents a new kind of leader—one who sees succession not as an ending, but as a transformation waiting to happen.
