We Help You
Drive Higher
Biz Growth By Bringing Together
Four Critical
Success Elements
Have you reached the point where you are:
❌ At a growth plateau, and are not sure where your next customer will come from
❌ Focusing on products that should be scaling, rather than the new growth areas
❌ Overworked, spread too thin and doing too many disjointed repetitive meetings
❌ Wake up with hundreds of smaller tasks and nobody good to delegate them to
❌ Unclear who is in leading, accountable or capable of delivering your plans
❌ Don't feel you are spending your time on the things you are best at
Has Your Growth Stalled?
Don't Struggle Alone
🔷 Outline a top-to-bottom strategy with refocused realistic execution plans
🔷 Scale an appropriate go-to-market approach and commercial org structure
🔷 Radically stream-line business operating rhythms and executive sync-ups
🔷 Align the leadership team and org with clear swim-lanes and accountability
🔷 Stop the irrelevant busy work, and countless big expensive group meetings
🔷 Shift wider company focus and mindset towards fewer but bigger business goals
Achieve Results In Under 4 Weeks
From the very start of engagements our focus is on how to make a direct immediate impact and within 4 to 12 weeks to transform your business trajectory:
Solutions To Fit Your Situation
Our Four Types of Consulting Projects
Strategy
& OKRs
Projects
Strategy Prioritization
Articulate your business strategy simply, and get true understanding and commitment to it from leadership.
OKR System Reboot
Execution is hard but does not need to be complex. Streamline your OKR plan, process and communication.
Product &
Go To Market
(Revenue)
Projects
Product Plan Alignment
Improve the clarity in your product roadmap so that both the technical and commerical sides of your org can align on the same focus areas and markets.
Commercial
GTM Redesign
Focus on the customers and channels that have the highest return. Simplify team structures and sales process to dial-up the size and speed of revenue results.
Operations
& Organization
Projects
Business
Cadence Evolution
Having a structured efficient cadence is key for an executive team. Learn proven approaches and how to run them flexibly without bureaucracy in fewer meetings!
Operational Streamlining
Consolidate initiatives and kill-off misc projects and legacy processes to be left with the ones that are designed to fit your business stage and matter to results..
People &
Culture
Projects
Executive Matrix Management
Create a strong high-functioning executive team capable of hitting big goals, adapting to change and creating a culture everyone wants to work in.
Mobilization
& Communication
Get guidance and build together your engagement gameplan that plays to your leadership strengths and complements you with extra comms support you need.
I provide consulting as a
Senior Partner at Highliner
We are experienced operators that partner with visionary leaders.
Who Is Highliner
We create pragmatic strategic and operational solutions for your business. Operations is not just about systems and processes. It’s also how people interact with these systems and processes.
What Does Highliner Do
We collaborate with your team to give them the tools, systems and operational processes that enable growth.
How Does Highliner Work
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Do you coach CEOs?Potentially. My core approach is to focus my coaching efforts and build deep partnerships with the second-in-command in organizations. These second in command executives -- usually COOs, CROs, CFOs or CoS -- face unique challenges of how to help the CEO shape the strategy, and act as their senior operational partner to integrate business execution on a week-to-week basis. Sometimes CEOs do not have a COO or equivalent and are themselves more operational. In these cases it can make sense for me to support them as CEO in an on-going coaching relationship. Often one of the ways I help these typically scale-up CEOs is to help them find the right COO/CoS type solution to fit their vision, organization and personal style.
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What CXOs do you coach?In about 50% of businesses there is not a COO, but instead a senior commercially orientated executives – i.e. CBO [Business], CRO [Revenue], CCO [Commercial], CCO [Customer] or 'Strategic' CFO. In these businesses many of the classic COO responsibilities fall on this commercial leader including how to integrate the go-to-market strategy across commercial functions and align with product management teams. I have decades of extensive experience in this area and so these executives find my coaching very helpful. I do not coach CTOs, CPOs or CHROs as coaching these roles require deeper technical knowledge.
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Do you coach junior CoS and aspiring COOs?Junior CoS and aspiring operational leaders are usually found in business organizations with less than 70 people. In my experience the more limited complexity of operational challenges they face and limited personal development budget they have does not usually lend itself well to individual 121 coaching. For people at this stage of their career, I typically suggest that they join a free ops community, go to peer meet-ups and do group / online training courses. Plus get the core 'must read' set of books. I would be happy to recommend some of these courses, books and communities to you if this is your situation.
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My company has less than 30 people. Will you coach me?No. I coach executives of larger companies where there is complexity due to scale. I do make some rare exceptions for companies of 30 to 100 people depending on the potential of the individual and business. However I do have a large network of other coaches who might be a great fit for executives in the ‘zero-to-one’ stage, so it's worth reaching out.
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How many clients do you work with at any given time?10 to 12 executives is my sweet spot, and usually 60% of these are COOs, 30% are CEOs/CROs and 10% are senior CoS (note: most CoS in Europe are in more junior positions than the US). This scope ensures I can focus on these individuals in a responsive manner, and gives me time to support my larger company consulting engagements.
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How much does coaching cost?As a coach, I work on a monthly retainer that varies depending on whether we meet weekly, fortnightly, or monthly. Usually regular sessions are 60-90 minutes long. Also included are regular in-real-life catch-ups and of course unlimited whatsapps! I do not share my rates online, but they have never been a challenge for the high-growth companies I work with.
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What if I want to see if there is a good fit?I fully agree that 'fit' is critical to build any trusted partnership. What's more I only want to work with clients where their is mutual respect and trust. The best (and only) way to get a feel for fit is just to jump on a call and chat. So let’s have a free no commitment discovery call! You should also know I never work on a minimum commitment basis -- so if you ever feel you are not getting a good RoI you can leave at any time. That’s how confident I am in the value I provide! Over the last decade, no COO has left within six months of starting, and most stay for 18–36 months or longer!
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Do you follow a standard coaching program?Yes and no. I have a standard set of topics and structures to follow which is flexible enough to cover from aspiring COOs to more experienced executives. However no two senior operators' situations are identical and so I have found blindly following standard structured programs just doesn't work for the complex multi-dimensional challenges leaders face. Instead my approach is to work on parsing through your short-medium-long term goals, to customize my program so that it fits you. This often starts with the immediate business operating challenges you are facing, and evolves into softer more people-orientated elements of your role. Ultimately the trusted relationship we build almost always ends up with me becoming a career confidante.
Frequently Asked Questions
Imagine running a business with a team that handles the day-to-day operations and you can focus on the high value decisions.
There Is A Better Way
✅ Focus on the priorities that matter, and say 'no' to the small stuff
✅ Free you up from constant executive-led sales and operations
✅ Implement systems that build repeatable and scalable revenue
✅ Set-up an operating model that streamlines your syncs & meetings
✅ Align and focus leaders to company goals, not mainly their own
✅ Help you hire operators like CoS & COOs to give you leverage
Adopt Proven Solutions