Today we introduce SoftBoulders, a consulting firm for organizations that have identified a problem and would like to spend some time describing it professionally.
Our name reflects the essential balance of the practice. The boulder represents conviction, permanence, and a substantial presence in the conference room. The softness provides the flexibility to revise that conviction after speaking with whoever approved the budget.
A firm foundation. Several optional frameworks.
We believe good consulting begins with listening. Great consulting follows that listening with a diagram the client can recognize as their own situation, now divided into four quadrants. Exceptional consulting gives the quadrants names and schedules a workshop to determine which one requires a working group.
Our practice brings this discipline to brand strategy, digital experiences, and the everyday organizational instinct to turn a manageable decision into a program. We ask difficult questions, such as whether the brief is clear and whether the scope could be slightly larger.
Build companies with a straight face.
The firm will develop a portfolio of businesses with distinctive propositions, complete identities, and unusually confident leadership. Each engagement will be presented with the seriousness its management team has requested, regardless of whether its management team should have been encouraged.
This journal will document those projects: the brief, our response, and the strategic reasoning that survived the final presentation. We will also publish observations from the consulting practice whenever a meeting, dashboard, or methodology demonstrates the need for further billable thought.
Begin with a discovery session.
At launch, our most valuable asset is a willingness to examine things until they require a framework. A rock becomes a platform. A delay becomes an alignment opportunity. A short email becomes an executive narrative with supporting materials.
We look forward to working with clients who share our commitment to solid thinking and flexible conclusions. For everyone else, we offer a discovery session to determine whether that commitment can be developed in phases.
SoftBoulders is open for business. The agenda is attached. The attachment will follow.
