For owners who want a better-run business

Most business owners are running the business. Very few are running it well — and there's usually a good reason for that.

I'm Scott. I'm an owner in two businesses, one manufacturing and one engineering, and I'm in them dealing with the same things you are.

I work with owner-managed businesses over 90 days to sort out the parts that are costing them money. It's consulting, I suppose, just done by someone who's still running businesses rather than someone who left it behind years ago.

Book a call 20 minutes. No pitch.

01 / THE PROBLEM

You probably know what you want. The how is the hard bit.

Most owners I talk to want one of two things. Either to step back a bit, because the business has taken over more of their life than they meant it to and it can't really run without them. Or to grow, and they'd have a go at it tomorrow if they knew which lever to pull first.

What it looks like day to day tends to be the same either way. Turnover's been roughly the same for three or four years and you can't see what breaks it, or you're flat out one month and quiet the next with no real idea what's coming.

And both get stuck in the same place. You're in it every day, so there's no time to work on it properly, and the noise of running the business makes good thinking about the business the hardest thing to do.

A lot of owners in this position have a look at getting some help, find that the people offering it either quote something ridiculous or have never actually run anything themselves, and decide to carry on as they are. Which is fair enough.

02 / WHAT THIS IS

90 days, six calls, your business

Every fortnight we get on a call and take one part of your business apart properly.

Where the money actually is. What you charge and why. The jobs only you can do. The processes that live in your head. The people conversations you've been avoiding.

You leave each call with one or two things to go and do. The next call starts with what happened when you did them.

It's not an off the shelf course. What you get is your business, your numbers, and someone to think it through with who's dealing with the same things. After each call I'll send you a written summary of what we worked out and what you're doing before the next one, so it isn't just a conversation that disappears the moment you hang up.

EVERY 2 WEEKSA focused working call.

1–2 ACTIONSClear things to do before the next call.

WRITTEN UPA summary so the thinking doesn't disappear.

03 / WHY ME

I own businesses. I don't run them day to day, and that's rather the point

I bought a manufacturing business this year, and I'm an owner in an engineering firm alongside it. Neither of them depends on me being there every day, because there are people running them. What I do is the commercial side — what the numbers are actually saying, where the margin is, what we're charging, which direction the business goes next.

That's the position most owners I talk to would like to be in and can't work out how to reach. It isn't luck and it isn't about being big. It's a set of fairly ordinary decisions about pricing, process and who does what, made in the right order.

Most business advice comes from people who ran something a decade ago, or who've never run anything. Mine comes out of businesses I own now. When we talk about a pricing decision, or a customer that's costing more than it brings in, it isn't a memory — it's something I'm looking at in my own numbers.

The other half of it is that I've spent the last couple of years going through company accounts in detail, dozens of them, working out which businesses are worth buying and which aren't and why. You get fairly quick at spotting where the money is leaking when that's what you do all day. Then I bought one, so I know what it looks like from the inside as well as on paper.

04 / GROWING BY BUYING

Some owners don't want to build the next stage. They'd rather buy it.

Acquiring a competitor, a supplier or a business in a neighbouring trade is a legitimate route to growth, and it's often more achievable than owners assume — particularly when you're not putting your own cash in.

Most never look at it because nobody's explained how it works.

It's what I do, so if that's the direction you want to go, it's part of the conversation. How to find businesses worth buying, what one is actually worth, and how a deal gets structured so it pays for itself.

Not everyone wants this and it isn't the main thing. It's there if you do.

05 / WHO IT'S FOR

The right fit matters

This works best if

You own the business and you're in it day to day
Turnover somewhere between £300k and £3m
Somewhere between 3 and 30 people
You've been going at least a couple of years
You know something needs to change and you're not looking for someone to tell you you're doing great

It probably isn't for you if

You're pre-revenue or still working out what the business is
You want someone to come in and do it for you
You're looking for funding or investors
You want a formal consultancy report

90 DAYS

£3,000

Or £1,200 a month across three months if that's easier on cashflow.

Book a call

06 / PRICE

Six calls, all remote, plus access to me between them for the things that come up.

If a pricing change or one process fix doesn't cover the cost of this within the 90 days, I'd be surprised. But I'm not going to make a guarantee about your business that I can't control.

07 / FAQ

A few sensible questions

Six calls of an hour or so across three months, plus whatever you spend actually doing the things. Realistically two or three hours a fortnight.

Yes. Video calls, and WhatsApp or email in between.

Tell me on call two or three and we'll change what we're doing, or you stop paying if you're on the monthly. I'd rather that than take money off someone who isn't getting anything from it.

No, and that's part of the point. I run and own businesses, and I take on a limited number of clients alongside that. Ten or twelve at a time.

Yes. It's what I do, and for some owners it's the fastest way to grow. It sits inside the 90 days rather than being a separate thing, so if it's the direction you want to take we'd spend the calls on that instead.

08 / BOOK A CALL

Book a call

Twenty minutes, no pitch. You tell me what's going on, I'll tell you whether I think I can help or not. If I can't, I'll say so.

Book a call