You read the books and blogs, you listen to the gurus podcasts, you followed the instructions. But it doesn’t work quite like the books and the blogs and instructions say. Because the tech you need doesn’t exist yet, companies cannot be run from paper or a slide deck and the environment doesn’t follow accounting rules.
Based on more than 25 years of failures, misunderstandings and disappointments I know your case is different from the books and blogs and podcasts. But not that different.
I advise at the intersection of Technology, Human Systems and Environment.
I develop products and concepts to show what I do. You can follow the development in near real time via my tech notes, blog and essays.
Technology
Technology is only useful when it changes what an organisation can do. I work across geospatial technology, data and product development. From making new concepts tangible to turning complex technology into products people actually use.
“Your prospects don’t give a shit about your technology, they want their problem solved”
CYNTHIA is my brainstorming space to map and model environmental landscape risk (growing & sourcing) to commodity supply chains (trading. manufacturing) to products (retail). Producer to consumer, farm to table.
Human Systems
Organisations are human systems, messy systems. I work on the structures, culture, communication and ways of working that allow organisations to move from startup to scaleup, from consultancy to product, and from good intentions to effective execution.
“That’s what I said, but that’s not what I meant”
BERT is shift left enterprise readiness. You are a small company, a startup, 3 founders in a garage and suddenly you hit bullseye.
Environment
Environmental risk doesn’t care about organisational boundaries. I work on how geospatial technology can help translate environmental landscape risk to commodity supply chains, connecting what happens in the landscape to the companies, products and decisions downstream.
“When is the last time you saw a dashboard make a decision?”
WALTER is a Environmental Supply Chain Risk Radar, in the spirit of Thoughtworks Tech Radar.
Business Type
Startup
You have a product, some customers and perhaps some funding. Now you need to turn a good idea into an organisation that can actually deliver.
I can help with the uncomfortable questions: what to build, who to hire, how to organise the team, what to automate, what not to build and when you need to stop behaving like three people in a garage.
Scaleup
The processes that worked at 8 people break at 20. The architecture that worked at 10 customers breaks at 100. The founders who did everything themselves become the bottleneck.
I help scale the technology, product and organisation without losing the things that made the company work in the first place.
Consultancy
You sell expertise. But the whizzkid discovered github, Python and AI and built a tool. Your fellow consultants discovered the tool and are using it in their project proposals. The tool creates happy clients.
What to do? Invest in the tool? Hire more engineers? How to manage development and maintenance cost? What’s the return on investment?
I help consultancy businesses make the transition from project → platform → product: identifying what can be standardised, what should remain bespoke, and how software, data and repeatable processes can lower cost and increase margins.
Enterprise
You are a sustainability manager, an innovation manager or responsible for reporting on environmental KPIs at the financial department. You need reliable data for reporting, decision making and planning. But the data isn’t there, the data is unclear, on a consultant’s laptop or on again another platform or screen from one of your service provider
What to do?
I can help with your data and supplier strategy in the environmental commodity supply chain risk field.
Investors
Considering a stake, an acquisition or a partnership in a company in this space? I can help you look past the pitch deck.
- Tech due diligence
- Security scan
- Certification readiness
- Organisation review
- Culture assessment
- Bullshit assessment
- M&A: horizontal & vertical consolidation strategy for ESG service providers
Business Need
Growing
Growth is fun until suddenly everything becomes someone else’s problem.
- Who should we hire next: an engineer, salesperson, marketeer, product manager or consultant?
- When does a startup need management?
- When do you need HR, finance, legal or security expertise?
- Which processes should be introduced — and which should be left alone?
- How do you keep communication and culture from disappearing as the organisation grows?
I’ve been there. At Satelligence, for example, I helped grow the organisation from 6 to 50+ people while leading technology, product, operations and cross-functional teams.
Consultancy → product
Your consultants keep solving the same problem for different customers. Or your tech colleagues built cool tools and scripts. Or your flagship product is a sophisticated carbon emissions model. But it lives in Excel.
Maybe it’s time to start thinking like a product organisation.
I’ll help you work out what the product actually is, what should remain consultancy, how to structure the team around it, and how to move from selling hours towards building something repeatable.
ESG strategy
In-house, platform, service provider, or open data layers?
“We’ll build it ourselves, how hard can it be?”
Everyone selling you one of those four has an interest in the answer. The real trade-offs are cost, control, maintenance burden, lock-in, and whether the thing survives the person who built it walking out.
I help you decide what to build, what to buy, what to outsource and what is already free, and how to stitch it into something consistent and coherent you can actually report on.
M&A | Consolidation
The ESG market is full of interesting companies that do one part of the puzzle.
Data, satellite imagery, (Process Based) Modeling, Risk Analysis,. Supply-chain intelligence, consultancies, aggregators, “user friendly platforms with actionable insights”.
There is a lot of niche, a lot of overlap, a lot of confusion, a lot of waste but mostly: a lot of opportunity.
What would happen when you put them together?
At some point, vertical and horizontal consolidation will happen.
I can help investors and management teams assess technology, product, organisation and strategic fit.
Work with me
How that usually looks:
- Sparring session a single conversation. You talk, I ask uncomfortable questions;
- Diagnostic two to five days looking at the technology, the organisation or both, ending in a written answer or presentation;
- Interim role one to three days a week for a few months. C-level, advisor or product lead while you work out who to actually hire;
- Advisory retainer a standing weekly or monthly slot. Someone to call before the decision, not after;
- Due diligence fixed scope, fixed fee, for investors and management teams.
Not sure which one fits? That is what the first conversation is for.
Interested? Book a meeting to explore areas of collaboration or send me an email at arjen@thishollow.earth