Depending on your bonus culture, January may be when discretionary awards for 2025 are being decided, for others, this is when their “balanced scorecard” for 2026 is being reviewed and updated. Either way, now is the time when decisions will be made around where bonus monies (actual or potential) will be deployed. And for businesses…

January 21, 2026 Read more >

Boards focus on how culture enables strategy, shapes risk, drives leadership, and creates long-term value. Yet measuring culture is complex. Research by Russell Reynolds Associates shows that only 53% of board directors feel they have sufficient data to assess corporate culture, highlighting a persistent gap between intent and insight. Engagement surveys capture sentiment at a…

January 21, 2026 Read more >

A new year is a natural moment for reflection – and for reality checks. Too often, Boards enter the New Year believing strategy is aligned and culture is healthy, only to find the gaps emerge in execution. Research shows 82% of leaders believe teams are aligned with strategy, yet only 23% of employees agree. This…

December 16, 2025 Read more >

To some the title of this article might seem like a grammatical error. However, given our long history of working with both family and non-family companies, we would observe that in both types of business a similar question arises: “How do we successfully bring in much needed “new blood” without destabilising the existing team?” Interestingly,…

December 12, 2025 Read more >

There will be a number of factors as to why a business does or does not offer “variable pay” – a.k.a annual bonuses and/or long-term incentives. These can include cultural choices, size and affordability. Often, businesses will just choose an annual bonus OR a long term incentive – with the most common choice being for…

November 25, 2025 Read more >

Boards track pay packages, bonus schemes, and KPIs. But are you clear on how behaviour is reinforced day to day – in the informal, often unnoticed moments that shape culture and execution? Performance is often won or lost here. Research and experience consistently show that culture does not just “happen.” It emerges when behaviours are…

November 20, 2025 Read more >

“Subcultures don’t signal misalignment, they reveal where strength and nuance already exist. Culture work should meet them there.” In private equity, culture is being recognised as a value lever, a driver of performance, resilience, and growth. But there’s always a catch: most companies don’t have one culture, they have many subcultures. Subcultures exist around teams,…

October 29, 2025 Read more >

Private equity investors are increasingly recognising that the success of their investment thesis depends as much on culture as on operational performance. Recent discussions among PE boards and operating partners have highlighted that even the most detailed playbooks, growth targets, or process improvements can be undermined if culture and incentives are misaligned. Strategy sets the…

September 24, 2025 Read more >