Four areas of work
Most engagements span more than one area, with priorities set at the start. Work is delivered as a Diagnostic, a Project or a monthly retainer.
See packages →Sales
Target customers, pricing, the sales process and the pipeline. Winning work in a way that does not depend on one person's network.
Operations
How work moves from enquiry to invoice: processes, hand-offs, delivery and the tools that support them.
People
Roles, decision rights, the hiring plan, and support for first-time managers.
Finance
Margin, cash and forecast in one view, with a monthly review that leads to decisions.
Sales
Who to sell to, what to charge, and a sales process that does not depend on one person.
Ideal customer
Which companies the business wins, keeps and makes money on, defined by signals that can be checked before the first conversation.
Positioning and offer
Who the company is for, what it is worth to them, and why that is credible. Capability turned into named offers with a scope, a price and a start date.
Pricing and scoping
A model the team can apply without the owner: how work is sized, what it must earn, when to decline, and how to raise prices without losing accounts.
Sales process and forecast
Stages with clear criteria, qualification, proposals and close, documented so a new hire can learn it. A forecast that can be checked against a defined pipeline.
Demand
A second source of work besides personal networks: referrals and partners made deliberate, one or two channels chosen for the buyer, and marketing measured on qualified pipeline. Direction and review only; execution stays with the client's team or an agency.
Operations
How work moves from enquiry to invoice, and how much margin is left at the end.
Process review
How work actually flows: where it waits, where it is redone, where it depends on one person, and what each step costs. The result is a short list of what to fix, in order. The method can be run once or taught to the team for any process in the company.
Process design
For any part of the business that needs one: client onboarding, scoping and estimating, change requests, invoicing and collections, hiring. Written at the level of detail people will follow, with a named owner.
Delivery
How work enters, moves and finishes. The quality bar, the review points, and the hand-offs to sales on one side and finance on the other, where most margin is lost.
Capacity and margin
Utilisation, cost to serve, and which engagements are losing money, in a form that supports a pricing or staffing decision.
Systems and tools
Which CRM, project, time and finance tools the company needs, how they fit together, and what each must record for the numbers to be reliable. Selection and specification; configuration by the client's team or a vendor.
People
The structure and the managers the company needs next.
Hiring plan
Which roles, in what order, against what the pipeline supports, and an interview process that holds up when the team is busy.
Org design
Who decides what, which roles report where, and how flat the company can stay before it starts to cost.
First-time managers
People promoted into roles nobody trained them for: what the job now is, how to run a one-to-one, a review and a difficult conversation.
Leadership roles
What the people at the top should still be doing at this size, what should have been handed over, and whether the next hire is a second-in-command or a better process. Ongoing support for the leadership team between planning cycles.
Finance
The numbers the business is run on, and a cadence that turns them into decisions.
What to measure
Revenue, pipeline, utilisation, margin and cash in one view, each with an agreed definition and an owner. Specification of the dashboard; the client's team or tools build it.
Review cadence
The weekly, monthly and quarterly meetings that turn numbers into decisions, with an agenda short enough to survive. Fitted to the company, not installed from a franchise.
Planning
An annual plan that fits on a page, and quarterly priorities with owners.
Board and investor reporting
What to report, how often and in what form, so a board meeting takes a morning to prepare.
Outside the scope
Software development, product work and other technical work, including engineering staffing and subcontracting. Where something needs building, the client's team or a chosen vendor builds it to an agreed specification.
Because of an ownership interest in a development company, the practice sets the process for selecting a development vendor and takes no part in the choice.
What is holding the business back?
Describe it in a few lines. A proposed approach and next steps follow within one business day.