Why This Works When Other Approaches Don’t
This is part operational review, part decision-support, part strategic thinking space. But above all, it’s a chance for the CEO to restore decision-making bandwidth with someone who understands what it’s like when operating rhythms get disrupted and has no stake in internal politics.
Most advisors work from the outside looking in. I work from the position of someone who’s been in the seat making decisions with incomplete information while everyone expects certainty. Whether you’re scaling rapidly and systems can’t keep pace, or managing through market pressure that’s testing your resilience, I understand the operational reality you’re navigating.
Having scaled businesses and led through both growth complexity and performance challenges, I recognise the patterns that consume leadership capacity unnecessarily. This experience helps me quickly identify what’s actually affecting your decision-making bandwidth and what’s just noise.
Your existing advisors bring valuable functional expertise, but they often have specific agendas or areas of focus. Your FD focuses on financial performance, your COO on operational delivery, your board on governance and strategic direction. All critical, but none positioned to help you think through the full breadth of operational complexity that affects your leadership capacity.
My role is to act as a trusted, neutral sounding board. Someone with operational depth, commercial range, and no internal agenda. Someone who’s been in the chair, understands the pressure of disrupted operating rhythms, and can help you focus on what actually restores clarity and control.
Trevor came strongly recommended by a former colleague. Harwood parachuted him into a business in which the leadership team, previously reporting to family owners for over 40 years, were struggling to adapt and move at the pace required by an institutional investor whilst dealing with a softness in demand arising from the 2022-3 UK cost of living crisis. Trevor’s deep operational skill set, and strong people management capabilities resulted in him identifying the root cause of multiple internal challenges (poor control of direct and indirect costs coupled with lack of focus on working capital and cash management) and draw up a short-term plan – which the whole management team supported – to deliver an improvement in near term results. Trevor identified weaknesses in the leadership team and has proved very helpful, by way of example, in sourcing a very experienced Interim CFO to strengthen financial control. Trevor is a strong communicator – it was a pleasure working with him, and he kept us updated on progress at every stage. We have no hesitation in recommending you seek Trevor’s leadership and support with any change management/turnaround project – indeed, he’s now considered Harwood’s ‘go-to’ operator for this work across the whole group portfolio.
Jerry Wilson – Partner – Harwood Capital