The Problems No One Wants to Name

Culture doesn't collapse overnight. It erodes. And by the time the symptoms are obvious—turnover spikes, disengaged teams, leadership chaos—the real damage is already done. I help founders and PE-backed leaders name what's broken and fix it before it costs them everything.

Sound Familiar?

These are the problems founders and operators describe when they finally pick up the phone. Not HR jargon—real pain.

🔥

"We keep losing our best people."

Top performers are leaving and no one can explain why. Exit interviews say "better opportunity," but the real reasons—broken trust, no growth path, toxic leadership—go unsaid.

🧊

"Nobody says what they really think."

Meetings are quiet. Feedback is filtered. People nod along, then complain in the parking lot. Psychological safety has eroded and honest conversation has gone underground.

💣

"We merged and everything fell apart."

The deal closed, but the cultures never integrated. Now you have two tribes, conflicting norms, and leadership paralysis—while the board asks why synergies haven't materialized.

📉

"Our managers can't lead."

They were promoted because they were great individual contributors. Now they're drowning—avoiding hard conversations, micromanaging, or just disengaging entirely. And their teams are suffering.

🎭

"We have values on the wall but nobody follows them."

The culture deck looks great in onboarding. But actual behavior—how decisions get made, who gets promoted, what gets tolerated—tells a completely different story.

"We're growing fast and breaking things."

What worked at 20 people is cracking at 100. Roles are unclear, communication is chaotic, and the founder is still making every decision. The culture that got you here won't get you there.

When Founders Call Me

These are the inflection points where culture becomes the bottleneck—or the breakthrough.

01

Post-Acquisition Integration

Two companies, two cultures, one deadline. I help PE sponsors and portfolio company leaders align teams, retain key talent, and build a unified culture that accelerates value creation—not destroys it.

02

Founder-Led Growth Crisis

The company scaled faster than the leadership. I step in as fractional CHRO to build the people infrastructure—leadership development, performance systems, and accountability frameworks—before things break irreversibly.

03

Toxic Leadership Recovery

Someone senior is destroying the culture and everyone knows it—except (maybe) the founder. I surface the truth through diagnostics and coaching, then help rebuild trust from the ground up.

04

Pre-Sale Culture Due Diligence

Buyers are kicking the tires and the people risk is real. I run a culture health diagnostic so you know exactly what's strong, what's fragile, and what could blow up the deal if it's not addressed.

05

Engagement & Retention Freefall

Surveys are tanking, Glassdoor reviews are brutal, and HR can't explain what's happening. I diagnose the root causes—not just the symptoms—and build a recovery roadmap that leadership actually follows through on.

The Cost of Doing Nothing

Culture problems don't sit still. They compound. Here's what ignoring them actually costs.

$15K+
Average cost per employee replaced (and rising with seniority)
67%
Of M&A deals fail to achieve expected synergies—culture is the #1 reason
34%
Lower productivity in teams with low psychological safety
5x
More likely to lose top talent when leadership trust is broken

You Don't Need Another HR Vendor.
You Need Someone Who Gets It.

25 years inside Fortune 500s, PE-backed companies, and founder-led startups taught me one thing: culture is either your biggest asset or your biggest liability. Let's figure out which one yours is.

Take the Culture Health Scorecard

Let's Talk

Ready to name what's really going on? Reach out and let's have an honest conversation.

info@unorthodoxhr.com