Strategy facilitation

Need a Board-ready strategy in a month? Call Me.

I use Vision to Value (V2V) to facilitate strategy development and review for CEOs, Boards, and leadership teams. Most clients call when the old strategy has run out, the new one has been discussed for months, and everyone is using the same words to mean completely different things.

I read the data, talk to people inside and outside the organisation, and work out where decisions are stuck. I bring the people who know the work into those decisions while they can still influence them, with the Board involved from the beginning. The finished strategy needs named owners, deadlines, and enough money and people behind it to have a chance of happening.

Talk to me See how the work runs

I see strategy as a set of decisions about an unclear future.

Vision: What future are we working towards?
Mission: What do we do to secure that future?
Values: What behaviours and beliefs do we reward?
Big ambition: What do we need to achieve in the next phase?
Goals: How will we know whether we are on track?
Strategic pillars: How do we organise work and decide what wins when resources are scarce?
Core work: What do we deliver repeatedly?
Project work: What must change, and who owns it?

I connect ambition to the work people repeat, the work that must change, and the decisions about where money and attention go, because that is where strategy becomes usable.

How the work runs

How does the work run?

I read before we meet.

I usually start with the current strategy, annual report, risk register, and any staff, customer, or stakeholder research. I talk to people inside and outside the organisation to test what I've understood and work out where decisions are stuck.

The Board says what good looks like.

Board members set the acceptance criteria and stay involved from the beginning. One or more Board members attend the workshops and I check in with the Chair each week, because leaving the Board until the final presentation is how teams produce strategies trustees won't sign.

We make decisions in the room.

The workshops are designed as decision sequences, where each decision constrains the next one. Everyone's vote weighs the same regardless of title, while decisions reserved for the Board still go to the Board.

I don't assign homework. We leave with named owners and deadlines, and if the group gets stuck, I mediate until the people with the decision right can support a way forward.

V2V builds a strategy from the decisions your organisation needs to make.

What we have
- Customer or beneficiary needs
- Current strengths
- Constraints
- Possible futures
Informs the next stage.
How we win
- Expand what works
- Improve what underperforms
- Test new options
- Choose what matters
Narrows the next stage.
Why we win
- Strategy logic
- Theory of change
- Data and research
- Reasons to believe
Tests the next stage.
What we do
- Strategic choices
- Services or products
- Portfolio
- Enablers
Becomes the next stage.
How we deliver
- Capabilities and capacity
- Build, buy, borrow, or partner
- Roadmap and governance
- Measures and triggers

V2V starts with the organisation you have, makes the choices explicit, and shows what they mean for delivery, governance, and measures, although I only stay for implementation when we agree that work separately.

A decision workshop should end with decisions, owners, and deadlines.

01 What does good look like?
Define the outcome and acceptance criteria.
02 What is really holding us back?
Name the barriers people avoid in open meetings.
03 What can we learn from elsewhere?
Use research and outside examples to challenge assumptions.
04 What can work here?
Test options against capacity, culture, and constraints.
05 What do we stop, start, or continue?
Prioritise the work and make trade-offs.
06 What are we committing to?
Name owners, deadlines, and the next decision.

I design decision workshops as sequences because each decision narrows what the group must resolve next and leaves someone responsible for what happens afterwards.

Ways to start

What can you hire me to do?

A charity can start with a £750 offsite.

£750

The one-day session maps where the organisation is, where it wants to go, and what is getting in the way. It can be remote for up to 16 people. The fee excludes VAT, and an in-person client provides the venue and pays travel at cost.

A focused strategy sprint takes four to six weeks.

4 to 6 weeks

This works for a bounded strategy problem where the relevant data and research are already available and the main job is making decisions. Wider programmes take longer when they include extensive research, customer testing, implementation design, or a fixed Board timetable.

A full charity strategy engagement costs £10,000 to £28,000.

£10k to £28k

The current fixed-price options are £10,000, £15,000, and £28,000 excluding VAT, travel, and accommodation, with a 20% deposit. The right option depends on the depth of research, testing, and implementation design you need.

If you increase the scope or shorten the timetable, we agree what that does to the fee before the work changes.

Four overlapping circles show beneficiary need, likely funding, required capability, and assessment of progress converging on a proposed strategic priority. — I test each proposed priority against beneficiary need, likely funding, the capability required, and how progress could be assessed.

I normally need one week's notice. A full strategy engagement usually includes eight to twelve sessions. If you want implementation support afterwards, we scope and price that separately.

Strategy work in practice

What has this looked like in practice?

Percy Hedley Foundation developed an updated five-year strategy through eight workshops.

I reviewed the previous three-year strategy and its six pillars, then led the development of an updated five-year strategy as government reforms changed the conditions for education and adult social care. The work brought the people and technology strategies together with decisions about data and culture. I also developed a change management plan, a structure for organising delivery, and a framework for choosing priorities.

Rape Crisis South London developed its leadership culture alongside practical management training.

I worked with the full management cohort through nine workshops, using the situations they faced in their services to connect leadership culture with day-to-day management. We identified the current culture, the culture they wanted, and the changes needed in how people worked, how decisions were governed, and the systems supporting them. The programme ran alongside the wider organisational culture review so managers could lead the changes being asked of them.

Living Streets used a one-day leadership offsite to resolve choices about its vision and commercial work.

I helped the leadership team update its vision, define the scope of its strategy, and set clear boundaries between its commercial and nonprofit work. We clarified the ambition for the commercial side, the people it needed, and the culture that would support it. The session addressed decisions that had been difficult to make when they meant changing work people had committed to.

These are strategy-facilitation examples. My wider transformation work includes financial recovery, merger integration, organisation design, digital delivery, and AI products, which is why the case studies cover a broader mix of private, civil-society, and public-sector work.

Frequently asked questions

What else do people ask before they hire me?

Is implementation support included?

No. If you want support after the strategy work ends, we scope and price that separately.

How quickly can you start?

I normally need one week's notice, and I can often start the reading remotely while diaries catch up.

Who should hire someone else?

If you need business-as-usual delivery and nothing needs to change, hire someone else.

Tell me what your organisation needs to decide.

Use the contact form to describe the decision, the people involved, and the timetable you are working to.

Let's talk