What was still working six months after we left.

The call.

A new general manager, less than a week into the job, phones at the end of his first day. The only person who came to greet him was from HR, in the afternoon, for ten minutes. He says: "we have to tear it all up and create a project that takes this company to another level".

What we found.

The company had lost three quarters of its share of the growth market, with a competitor eating into its established market too. In the first month of writing the plan, it became clear that the IT systems had to change. Most of the leadership team was rebuilt within four months.

Six months later.

GNAK and the client worked days and long evenings together, "almost round the clock". One night, at one in the morning in a restaurant, the tension broke into five minutes of shouting, then a beer, then "right, let's crack on". The client became a close friend, and hired GNAK again.

The call.

An introduction at a lunch, then a call from HR: "we love what you're saying… we've got a tender closing in three days." The brief asked for training, because the managers were not equipped for the strategic workstreams.

What we found.

GNAK asked questions for an hour and a half. Most were answered with "I don't know, that's an uncomfortable question for us". The response GNAK sent on the Friday had nothing to do with training. The client dropped the training firms, sent GNAK's reply to the other bidders as the new angle, and GNAK won a unanimous vote from a panel of twelve. Then came a fresh-eyes report, presented to a CEO GNAK had never met. He said: "We really need to talk", and talked for three or four hours over lunch about a company at a standstill, disengaged teams and a strategy nobody understood. He called it "a huge shock to the system, one I didn't enjoy at all, but one that really woke me up."

Six months later.

Distrust between the CEO, the managers and the staff gave way to what Tristan calls "bold confidence". A timid leadership team began to argue for the strategy themselves. Managers formed a community where there had been none. The communications director now owns a new way of communicating, one that was not there before. The morning the posters went up, people said: "there's a transformation going on", and read it as a mea culpa from the top, "never seen in the whole history of the firm".

The call.

A newly appointed director had known of GNAK for ten years. The new job was "a huge challenge for his career". He was looking for a solid partner who knew the business, and he mentioned the agency the company usually worked with. There was an RFP. GNAK answered the same evening or the next day, and won.

What we found.

The function had been trying for a year to write its strategy and had not managed it. Its leader was exposed on two sides: to the group above, and to teams below who would follow only a plan they could trust. And, in Tristan's words, the problem was questions that had not been asked rather than answers to the ones that had.

What we found.

A rapid diagnostic showed no governance, no implementation plan and no activation plan.