Ivars's story: 8 months, +33% measurable results
An anonymized client story: how the owner of a 22-person manufacturing company rebuilt his strategy in eight months, implemented AI and recovered 12 hours per week.
Ivars (name changed) came to me in spring 2024. A manufacturing company, 22 employees, revenue around €1.8M, profit stagnant for the second year in a row, and he himself was working 60+ hours a week.
Classic scenario: the business has grown to the point of operational overload, where the owner has become the narrowest bottleneck in the entire system.
Starting point — DeepDive
Three 45-minute sessions. We walked through the 7 areas of life. It became clear that the problem wasn't the strategy — it was that Ivars personally made 80% of decisions. The team waited for his approval even on small things.
After the DeepDive, for the first time in two years, I realized the problem wasn't in the business — it was in my head, about what I was unable to let go of.
First 3 months — the system
- Introduced a weekly strategic review with the team (45 min).
- Defined 5 KPIs tracked automatically.
- Delegation matrix — who is responsible for what.
- Ivars stopped answering operational questions on WhatsApp.
Months 4–8 — AI and marketing
In the second phase we implemented AI in customer support (handling typical questions 24/7) and rebuilt marketing around a single niche — premium product segment customers.
Results after 8 months
- +33% profit (not revenue — profit).
- -12 hours/week in Ivars's personal workload.
- 2 new hires in the middle management layer.
- Customer NPS grew from 42 to 68.
Ivars continues the ARETE partnership into a second year. Not because I need it — but because he wants to keep growing inside the system rather than going back to chaos.
Want a similar result?
Start with a free 30-min business diagnostic — we'll see if we're a fit.
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