A short, honest self-assessment and what happens if you tick more boxes than you’d like.
If you’re reading this, something’s probably nagging at you. Maybe it’s a growth plateau you can’t quite explain. Maybe it’s a system held together with spreadsheets and good intentions. Maybe it’s just a feeling that the business has outgrown the way you’re running it.
That nagging feeling is usually the right instinct. The harder question is what to do about it and whether “bring in a growth consultant” is a sensible next step, or an expensive way of avoiding a decision you already know you need to make.
So before you reach out to any consultant (me included), it’s worth running yourself through a proper self-assessment. Below is a quick checklist you can work through honestly to help you decide if you are ready for the next step. No sales pitch, no jargon, just the questions that actually predict whether working with someone like me will be worth your time and money.
Start with where you actually are
Growth consultancy isn’t a one-size-fits-all service, and the right fit depends heavily on your stage. Be honest with yourself here — not where you’d like to be, but where you are today.
- You're a sole trader or small business owner who's brilliant at the work itself, but time-poor and system-light. Growth is being held back by how things run, not by demand.
- You're a growing SME — you've proven the model, you have a team, and now the cracks are showing in customer experience, operations, or your digital presence as you try to scale.
- You're a larger or more established organisation facing a specific change, new systems, restructuring, a transformation programme, and you need someone who's actually delivered this before, not just advised on it from a slide deck.
- You've tried to fix the problem internally already, and it hasn't stuck.
If none of these sounds like you, if you’re pre-revenue, or if the issue is really about raising finance, or if you just want someone to validate an idea, a growth consultant probably isn’t your next call. That’s a different conversation, and a good consultant should tell you that upfront.
Get honest about the growth challenge itself.
This is where most people either talk themselves into help they don’t need, or talk themselves out of help they do. Think carefully about these answers.
- You can describe the symptom clearly (falling conversion, stalled revenue, an overwhelmed team), but you're not confident you understand the cause.
- Decisions are being made on instinct rather than evidence, because nobody's had the time to step back and look properly.
- You've bought tools or software in the last two years that aren't being used properly, or at all.
- Growth has started to feel more like chaos than success. More customers, more orders, more staff, but also more firefighting.
- You know the business needs to change, but you don't have the internal capacity or objectivity to design that change yourself.
Three or more of these, and you’re in genuine growth-consultancy territory. It isn’t about being unable to run your business; it’s about recognising that “run the business” and “redesign the business” are two different jobs, and doing both at once is exhausting and slow.
Be clear on what “transformation” would actually mean for you
“Transformation” gets used loosely. Before you commit to it, be specific about what you’re actually asking for.
- You need a clear strategy and a practical plan to execute it, not just another document that sits in a drawer.
- Technology is part of the problem (or should be part of the solution), but you want someone who understands the human side of change, not just the systems.
- You want someone who will work alongside your team, not disappear for six weeks and return with a report.
- You're ready to be involved. Real transformation needs buy-in from you and your people, a consultant can't do it to you, only for you.
- You'd rather have honest, sometimes uncomfortable input instead of someone who tells you what you want to hear.
If you’re nodding along here, that’s a good sign. If any of these make you uneasy, particularly the one about being involved. It’s worth asking why before you commit.
What it means if you’ve ticked more boxes than not
If you’ve recognised your business across most of these, here’s what working with a specialist growth consultant should actually look like and what it looks like when you work with me.
I don’t hand over a report and disappear. Most consultants give you a document and move on. I stay until it works. That means being embedded alongside you and your team, not observing from a distance.
I’ve done the job, not just advised on it. I’ve built a business from scratch, closed one, started again, led product and transformation teams, and scaled an e-commerce platform. When engaging with your strategy, I am drawing upon the experience of having actually sat in your position or a very similar one.
I work at whatever scale you’re at. Whether it’s solving specific growth challenges or improving overall operations, I focus on delivering tangible results that enable you to see progress and achieve sustainability.
I care about the technical and the human. Systems and strategy matter, but the hardest part of change is almost always people. I work on both because fixing one without the other doesn’t last.
Who I work best with
Based on the checklist above, the businesses I get the best results with tend to fall into three groups:
Sole traders and small business owners who are excellent at their craft but need the tools, systems, and strategy to grow without burning out.
Growing SMEs who’ve built something real and now need to professionalise through stronger operations, a sharper customer experience, and a digital presence that matches their ambition.
Organisations navigating change, digital transformation, new systems, restructuring and need someone who’s led this kind of programme before and knows how to keep people and performance moving together.
If you’re still not sure
That’s completely normal, and it’s not a reason to wait. The honest next step isn’t a proposal or a sales call, it’s a conversation about where you actually are and where you want to be. No pressure, no pitch.
