You should know how this ends before it starts.
I work with leaders whose teams are being asked to do something beyond what they’ve done before. The company may have outgrown the ways of working that made it successful. An AI pilot worked, but leaders still have to decide what changes for the people doing the work. Or decisions keep coming back to the CEO because the problem crosses teams.
Before we begin, we agree on what we’re trying to accomplish, how we’ll work together, what it will cost, how long we’re committing for, and what should be different when we’re done.
Who I work with
We both need a good reason to say yes
You need to be confident I can help. I need to believe my experience can help you find a way forward, and that your people will have a real part in shaping what changes. After all, they know the difference between how work is supposed to happen and what it actually takes to get it done.
I work best with leaders who believe their teams can produce breakthrough results and are willing to rethink how work gets done.
If all you want is an outside voice to endorse a decision you’ve already made, I’m the wrong person to call.
How the work runs
The work builds what your people can do
I’ve been on the hook for outcomes myself, including running global operations at Akamai.
I often work at several levels in the same engagement: with the C-suite on a consequential choice, across functions with the VPs, directors and managers responsible for it, and alongside the people who know what actually happens when the plan meets a customer. What I learn in each place changes the questions I ask in the others.
For executive advisory, you work directly with me. When we’re changing how an organization operates, there’s usually one leader accountable for the work and a project manager who keeps it moving. Other people join focused working sessions for a few hours a week while continuing their regular jobs.
We use that time to work through decisions, try practical changes in the work people already do, and build on what works. Each step connects to the larger result we’re after, and your people learn approaches they can keep using.
When specialist skills or extra hands would help, we agree on that first. I bring in people I’ve worked with and trust only when they’re needed.
At Ruckus Networks, one leader described what happened when his team developed its own measures:
“As a leader, I found it incredibly enabling for the team to work through the exercises to fully understand in their bones the goals of the organization and what they contribute to it. The thought exercise generated significant buy-in to our strategy, because the team wasn’t just told something, but rather developed their own insights…”
Damien Holloway, then Vice President, Global Customer Services & Support, Ruckus Networks Business at CommScope
Ways to work together
Start with what’s in front of you
Executive advisory. When a CEO, senior leader or PE operating partner needs experienced judgment on consequential choices: where to focus, how to scale, what to measure, or what to do when decisions keep crossing teams. With one company expanding internationally, I work remotely with the CEO and leaders across the business. Leadership settles what each team is there to do and the boundaries it works within. The teams write their own rules for the work inside those boundaries, and everyone holds to a few shared measures. Decisions stop coming back up the chain, because people can answer “what should I do now?” without asking. Some advisory relationships last a few months; others continue for years as new challenges arise.
The ServiceDNA™ Diagnostic. When you want a clearer picture of how your organization is working and where to focus next. In thirty days, we examine how work actually happens, where people face unnecessary effort, and which priorities deserve attention first. At a global software company, leadership had ten initiatives competing for attention across regions and functions. The Diagnostic pointed to two, and leaders chose where to begin rather than spreading effort evenly across every team. Leadership then brought me in to help put those priorities into practice. One was rethinking how a complex support operation measured success. Within three months, the time for people to reach a key proficiency milestone fell from 141 days to 50, a 65% reduction.
Read the story →
Focused engagements. A defined piece of work with a clear finish, without an ongoing relationship. That might mean preparing for a leadership offsite by working with the leader and individual managers beforehand, mentoring a management team taking on greater responsibility, or helping restart an initiative that hasn’t taken hold. At a legal services firm, two attempts to build a knowledge-sharing program had failed. A Diagnostic helped uncover what was getting in the way, and the firm brought me back to coach a pilot team. The team started with one piece of work, setting up a new company for a client, and followed it across the four businesses the firm had merged. They uncovered a step none of them knew existed and built a better way to handle it. That became the pattern for the rest of the firm, and the original team went on to mentor the next one. Read the legal services story →
Occasionally, a situation calls for me to take direct operating responsibility for a defined period. I do that selectively, with a plan for who will take over.
Private equity. I work with PE operating partners and portfolio leadership on operating challenges. The Diagnostic can also provide a consistent starting picture across portfolio companies, with the findings interpreted in each company’s context.
Other ways to work together
Speaking and board roles. I speak at conferences and run facilitated workshops for teams. I serve on DevRev’s board of advisors, advise Support Driven and TSANet, and have informally advised two companies from startup through IPO.
Licensing. Consulting firms and software companies can license the ServiceDNA Diagnostic to use with their own clients.
You don’t need to decide which of these fits before we talk. Bring the decision you’re facing or the change you’re trying to make. We’ll work out whether I can help and what makes sense as a first step.
The terms
We agree the scope and the fee before we start
The agreement is short and written in plain language. A defined piece of work, such as the Diagnostic, has a fixed fee. Advisory runs on a monthly fee, with the aims agreed up front and the priorities shifting as the work does. Anything beyond that, we scope and price separately. My consulting engagements carry a money-back guarantee, and no client has ever invoked it.
I work on site or remotely, wherever the work and the people are.
I name clients only with their permission, and the named case studies on this site were approved by them. I take no referral fees, and I’ll tell you when a relationship of mine bears on a recommendation, including my advisory role at DevRev.
How it ends
Your people run it after I leave
The people who will use the measures and practices help shape them, so they understand why they work and what to change when the business changes. At the legal services firm above, an internal owner and a council of employees now run the program without outside help.
Clients who come back bring new challenges they’ve chosen, and none has needed me for the same thing twice.
The work is finished when your people run it without me.