Strategic Clarity Case Study: From Scattered Priorities to Laser Focus

Size: $85M Revenue

Industry: Service 

Problem: The leadership team was juggling too many initiatives with no clear strategic direction. Every department had its own priorities, and the result was constant firefighting, scattered resources, and missed opportunities. Despite steady revenue, profit was sliding year over year — and Return on Invested Capital (ROIC) had dropped to 3%, far below the 15% industry average.

Solution: We worked with the executive team to create a focused Strategy Blueprint — identifying the core strategic problem, defining the ideal customer and market focus, and making tough calls about what to stop doing. Initiatives were narrowed from 42 to just 5 high-impact, financially-linked priorities. We tied every initiative to measurable success metrics and installed a quarterly strategy review cadence to keep the team aligned and accountable.

Results:

• ROIC improved from 3% to 16.1% in 18 months

• Annual profit margin up 4.5 percentage points

• 70% reduction in simultaneous initiatives, freeing resources for high-ROI projects

• Leadership alignment score (internal survey) jumped from 62% to 91%

Scattered Priorities Were Sinking Performance

When we first looked under the hood, the picture was clear — profitability and returns were in freefall. The company’s Return on Invested Capital (ROIC) had dropped to just 3%, far below the 15% industry average.

The culprit wasn’t lack of effort — it was lack of focus. With more than 40 initiatives running at once, the leadership team was spread across too many priorities. Meetings were packed with status updates and firefighting instead of real strategic decisions. Every department was chasing its own goals, but no one could answer the question: “What matters most?”

Making the Hard Calls on What to Stop Doing

The turning point came when we introduced Coltivar’s Strategy Blueprint. This isn’t a brainstorming exercise — it’s a disciplined framework that forces clarity. We guided the team through defining their ideal customer, narrowing their market focus, and pinpointing the single biggest strategic problem to solve.

Then came the tough part: deciding what to stop doing. Together, we cut the initiative list from 42 down to 5 high-impact priorities, each tied directly to a measurable financial outcome. Every remaining initiative had an owner, a budget, and a clear success measure.

Margin Growth That Sticks

Profitability turned a corner once the company narrowed its focus and aligned resources with the highest-impact initiatives. With a clear market focus, bids became more targeted, project execution tightened, and overhead was brought under control.

The result: margins climbed from 6% to 10.5% — a 4.5-point increase — creating room to reinvest in people, systems, and future growth without the chaos that had previously plagued the business.

This shift wasn’t about a one-time cost cut or quick win. It was the result of disciplined decision-making quarter after quarter. Projects that didn’t meet margin thresholds were either re-priced or declined. Teams were equipped with better forecasting tools to catch overruns before they happened, and leaders began reviewing performance data weekly instead of waiting for month-end reports.

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