When the business is changing faster than the plan
Some moments ask more of a business than the day job has space for. Growth has flatlined and the approach that built the business isn't producing what it used to. An acquisition has happened and the strategic logic of the new portfolio hasn't been worked through. A founder is stepping back and the strategy is still living in their head. The next round of investment is on the horizon. The category is shifting under the business in ways the current model isn't built for. Or, most commonly of all, the business is operating successfully but a different version of it is visible and someone in the leadership team can see that a new trajectory is needed to get the business where it could be going.
These moments have a common requirement. The business needs to look and act more strategically coherent than it has had to before. It needs to make deliberate decisions about what to carry forward and what to leave behind. And it needs to do so while continuing to operate. The temptation is to commission a one-off strategy project, get a deck, and try to live by it through eighteen months of fast-moving change. We think such moments need more than this.
Use us if
Growth has outpaced the strategic framework that got you here.
A recent acquisition has reshaped the portfolio and the strategic logic of the new whole hasn't been worked through.
A founder is stepping back and the strategy is still partly living in their head.
An investment round is six to twelve months out and the strategic plan isn't yet tight enough.
The category is shifting and the business model is starting to look like the wrong shape for where the market is going.
The business is operating successfully but someone in the leadership team can see a more interesting version of it, and is looking for help building the case internally.
What we do
A transition is not a project. It's a journey, typically of 12-24 months, during which the business is moving from one shape to another while continuing to operate. We work as a sustained strategic partner through that period.
Sometimes a transition is forced. By an acquisition, a leadership change, flatlining performance, a strategic reset the business didn't ask for. The moment needs handling so it becomes an opportunity not turbulence: setting the agenda for what needs deciding, making decisions about what to carry forward and what to leave behind and creating a space for strategic planning while the rest of the team runs the business.
Sometimes a transition needs to happen without an external driver. A different version of the business is visible but the current model is working well enough that nothing creates the urgency to act. The work here is about helping the leadership team see the gap, identify sources of inertia holding the current model in place and build the case for change before its absence becomes the reason it never happens.
The shape of the partnership in both cases is more like a coach than a consultancy: sustained, accountable and present when it matters most.
How it works
Most transitions take twelve to twenty-four months. We typically open with a foundation engagement, stakeholder interviews, market and competitive review, narrative development that produces the working plan and identifies the decisions the business needs to make. From there we work as an ongoing strategic partner through the transition itself, adapting as the business changes and external circumstances shift.
What we bring
25 years of brand strategy and senior leadership experience, including MD-level roles in growth businesses. The ability to hold strategic conversations at board and investor level. And the willingness to stay close to the business as the transition unfolds rather than dropping in and out at quarterly intervals.
Free transition guide
Get our working paper exploring how businesses can recognise the transitions they need to make before circumstances force them.
A 2024 Bain study found only 12% of business transformations achieve their original ambition. That figure measures the transformations that were attempted. The larger story is the ones that should have happened and didn't.
Our ‘Before you have to’ working paper is about both. The transitions that get attempted and frequently fail, and the transitions that never happen, despite being needed.
Inside:
A short diagnostic to locate your business. Forced transition, chosen transition, or neither
A method for handling forced transitions well in the first ninety days
A method for building the internal case for chosen transitions
A working framework for surfacing strategic inertia in your own business
Reflections drawing on the work of Donald Sull and Marshall Goldsmith