You don’t need to hold your whole business in your head.
In two weeks, you’ll have everything on one map, clarity on your next three strategic moves, and room to breathe.
For founders with more great work than one person can manage.
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Working with Cécile has had the biggest impact on my business this year.
Vicky Zhao Founder at the School of Human Intellect,
300k+ followers on YouTube
The problem is that everything feels important
You might be working on a dozen projects at once. Each one has exciting potential to grow the business but you have no idea yet which will pay off. Your days feel chaotic, and nothing ever gets finished.
Maybe you’ve been pouring your heart and soul into a venture for years and it’s not quite giving you back what you’d like it to. You know something has to change, but have no headspace left to work out what.
Maybe your new right-hand starts soon. You’d love to give them a confident view of where the business is going, except you can’t quite articulate it yourself.
Or maybe you’re flat out running on autopilot. It works. The plates keep spinning. But you haven’t had a quiet moment in months to check you’re spinning the right ones.
While all of that stays unresolved, you become less grounded, less strategic, and slowly bring a little less of your best self to work each day.
You’re too close to your business to see clearly, too excited about your ideas to prioritise them, and too busy to think properly.
It’s hard to get out of this on your own.
I’ll be your sparring partner
I spent fifteen years helping C-suite leaders in big companies shape strategic projects. Now I bring the same rigour and care to you and your business.
I’ll poke and prod to find what matters most to you. If you tell me everything is important, I’ll ask you to order it anyway. I’ll ask what your ego wants and what the numbers say, and make you look at both. If a project is only alive because you can’t bear to close it, I’ll say so. I’ll also push you to decide once the cards are in your hand, and not before.
Because your business is so important to you, parts of our work together might be emotionally charged. I create a space that is structured and grounding, so you can relax enough to let your head, heart and gut have a say.
Your best self will be back into the game, excited to make things happen again.
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Cécile is an exceptional thought partner, with a gift for seeing the big picture, asking insightful questions, and homing in on the most impactful areas.
Sara Campbell Founder at The Fire Inside, a group coaching programme for women
Most clients start with a Strategic Acceleration sprint.
Some then keep me on to bring their team on board, keep the momentum going and focused on what matters, and resolve problems as they show up. Clients have used this to shelve a project that was draining them, re-orient work that had become a dead end, and adjust their roadmap in the middle of a crisis.
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Strategic Acceleration
I dedicate a sizeable amount of my attention to your business over a two-week sprint.
We put your business, options and doubts onto one map, choose your next strategic moves, and turn them into a 90-day plan that starts with three actionable steps.
The process includes some prep work and two working sessions. See below for more detail.
Runs over two weeks.
From £2,500
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Strategic Partnership
I dedicate attention to you and your business on an ongoing basis.
I already know what you’re building, so I’ll notice potential problems you’re not noticing, see where your energy is leaking, stress-test new ideas, and help you resolve issues or make any difficult calls.
At its core, this looks like a monthly or a fortnightly catch-up. I can also provide async support in between if something big needs untangling.
Minimum three months.
From £1,000/month
Prices are for 1:1 work. You can include your team, although that’s shaped and priced separately.
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Just the amount of energy Cécile helped generate and the time saved alone already paid for the sessions.
Vicky Zhao Founder at the School of Human Intellect, 300k+ followers on YouTube
A Strategic Acceleration sprint from start to finish
Pre-work
Before we meet
You answer a short set of targeted questions about where your business is, what’s competing for your attention, and what you want the next stretch to deliver. By the time we meet, you’ve already started thinking strategically, and I’m ready to dive into your world.
Session 1
Your whole business, out of your head and onto one map
Every commitment, project, hope and fear comes out of your head and onto the board. Together, we work through them to find your real priorities, depending on how important, urgent — and alive — each one feels. I structure, facilitate and poke where needed. What to keep and what to ditch becomes obvious as we go.
Pause
I review, we both reflect
After session one, I go back over the board to capture what was missed, flag the decisions that matter, and sit with anything that doesn’t feel quite right. Your only job is to rest and let the decisions settle: what’s landing well, and what’s quietly off, will surface. We both return to our work together with fresh insights.
Session 2
We build your roadmap
We open session two with a tidy board and both our reflections. Anything that feels off gets said now, and folded into the foundations. Then, we build. Your priorities become a 90-day plan that you actually want to deliver. You leave energised, and committed to a plan that you actually believe in.
Conclusion
You set off with clarity and momentum
Within a week of session 2, I send you the full board in its final form, plus a strategic, action-oriented Executive Summary, including anything new I’ve spotted since we last spoke. You pin it above your desk and use it to guide your work over the next 90 days. Within days, the project that was taking up your headspace is rescoped, and you’ve taken your first three actions on the one that matters most.
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What happened? Pure magic.
If you or your team need to make strategic decisions and exit with a detailed trail map, Cécile is an amazing map‑making partner.
Michael Sklar Tech Entrepreneur & Start-Up Investor
Lecturer in entrepreneurship at Rice University
I’m on your team
I work at your pace, on your side of the table, and with an extra dose of care.
I lead our sessions with reason and intuition. I spot anything that makes you come alive, and also know when to stress-test anything you feel uneasy about.
Between our sessions, your business still holds prime real estate in my mind. I keep thinking about the risks and opportunities you’re facing, and bring any important new idea back to you.
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The amount of care and focus Cécile provided was a luxury.
Vicky Zhao Founder at the School of Human Intellect,
300k+ followers on YouTube
As we work together, you’ll feel crystal clear on the direction you want to go in, energised about the future you’ve designed, and committed to making it happen.
By hiring me, you’re saying out loud that you want things to feel different in your business — and if I decide to work with you, it’s because I know I can help you, and I want to see you succeed.
All you have to do is bring your best brain, your whole self, and an open mind.
Let’s get this going, shall we?
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This is for you if…
- You’re a founder who sets the direction, alone or with your team
- You already have paying clients for some of what you offer
- You have a good sense of the problem you’re trying to solve
- You’re happy to use your head and heart to decide
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This is not for you if…
- You have no idea what you want your business to become
- You’re looking for me to tell you that your business will succeed
- You need a full business plan complete with financial modelling
- You work for an organisation where you don’t call the shots
Frequently Asked Questions
I run my business alone. Is this for me?
It can be, yes.
Most of my early clients ran their business alone — the work is the same. If you have a portfolio of live projects and you’d like me to help you think them through, book a call. I’d love to see if and how I can help.
Do you work with bigger companies too?
Yes.
I spent seven years as the go-to sparring partner for the C-suite at National Energy System Operator, as they were defining their business plans.
Right now my focus is on founders and start-ups, which is what this page is about. If you’re in a larger organisation, have a look at my LinkedIn profile and recommendations — and book a call. I still take on fractional or team work when it’s the right fit.
Do you do strategy?
Not the kind with market maps, competitor decks and SWOT analyses, though I did plenty of that for fifteen years.
I’m not offering pure strategy work, but what I do is definitely strategic. Partly because we are resolving the problems that are currently preventing you from getting on with your work. Partly because I will always invite you to make decisions that are in service of your business now and in the future.
How is this different from working with a consultant or a coach?
Consultants, coaches and even AI will each do part of what you need. What’s missing is someone who holds it all together: the problem, the options, the decision and the next steps.
Strategy consultants will give you seriously good analyses and a recommended way forward — but when it comes to deciding, they’ll ask only your head. Coaches will bring your heart into the conversation as they help you figure out what the solution looks like — but they’ll leave you without the practical details of how to get it done. And AI will give you as many opinions as you prompt it to, and leave you less grounded than when you started.
I don’t need a full sprint. Do you run shorter sessions?
I do, they just need to be really well scoped beforehand.
If you’ve got one specific, well-defined question, one session could be enough, as long as you’re happy to do some pre-work so I come ready to address the nagging issue within your wider context.
I want to include my team in this process. Is that possible?
Yes, you can.
Some clients bring one or two team members to the Strategic Acceleration sprint (or to part of it) while others prefer to bring them up to speed once they’re clear on their vision.
Either way, it takes more time and a different kind of facilitation, so it’s priced separately. But it is possible, and I’m happy to chat about it.
Can you deliver some of my strategic projects for me?
The short answer to this is ‘no’.
I’ve shaped and delivered strategic projects long enough to know that they have to be ‘done’ by the people who own them: you and your team, because that’s what makes it stick.
But that doesn’t mean I disappear once our initial sprint is over. I can support you as you turn your vision into reality for example by running sessions for you and your team to check that the work you’re doing is still aligned to each other and the roadmap, resolve any hurdles as they come up, and re-energise the work.
In a way, I keep you moving but I don’t move ‘for’ you.
Do you use AI and if so, how?
Yes.
Only very deliberately.
I use Claude (Anthropic’s AI) to accelerate and augment specific parts of my work. I don’t ever let it replace my experience or gut feel, and never ask it to produce any client-facing documents.
In my work with you, this might look like me using Claude to get up to speed fast on an unfamiliar industry, to brainstorm a way forward when we feel stuck, or, if you’re happy for me to record our sessions, to check afterwards that we haven’t missed anything important. Of course, whenever I use AI, I use the right safeguards so your information never trains the model.
But I’m the human who thinks and cares about your business. Not Claude.
How do we start working together?
It begins with a short discovery call.
It’s just a chance to talk through where you are and if/how I can help best. There’s zero pressure to do anything off the back of it.
If it feels like we’re a good fit and you book one or more sessions with me, I’ll send a little pre-work your way so we can dive in straight away when we meet.
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I highly, highly recommend working with Cécile. Working with her gave me so much clarity and forward momentum. I still feel the benefits months later.
Charlotte Grysolle Coach and breathwork facilitator, runs retreats,
has worked with teams at Google and L’Oréal
Still got a question? Book a call and ask me directly, or just email hello [at] cecilemarion.org and I’ll get back to you.
Here’s what some of my clients say
I was already clear on the direction I wanted my business to go, and had multiple viable paths to reach the destination. But after 30 days of cranking, I wasn’t moving fast enough.
My gut instantly told me Cécile could help. She’d worked with execs to refine and communicate their transformation projects. Equally important, my ego trusted her to lead on this part of the trail.
What happened? Two sessions. Pure magic.
If you or your team need to make strategic decisions and exit with a detailed trail map, Cécile is an amazing map-making partner.
Lecturer in entrepreneurship at Rice University
Working with Cécile has had the biggest impact on my business this year.
She cleared up my mental clutter, mapped vague wants and hopes into a realistic plan, and built momentum towards my goals. The amount of care and focus Cécile provided was a luxury.
Just the amount of energy she helped generate and the time saved alone already paid for the sessions.
Cécile is that thought partner who is both strategic and practical - a rare combination in this world! If you have a goal and a lot to juggle to get to that goal, Cécile will help you see an exciting path that was hiding in plain sight.
300k+ followers on YouTube
After years of working on projects related to the vision I have for my career, I finally had the time and space to focus on building something big. The two days I spent with Cécile were invaluable. She helped me get the ideas out of my head and turn them into a plan I felt excited to deliver.
Cécile is an exceptional thought partner, with a gift for seeing the big picture, asking insightful questions, and honing in on the most impactful areas, drawing upon both years of experience and an intuitive sense of where the conversation needs to go. She helped bring strategy and structure back into my highly-intuitive process, effectively serving as the head to my heart.
I highly recommend you work with her if you’ve got a big vision and need help bringing it to life!
I just left my 12-year corporate career to go fully self employed when I reached out to Cécile. I had so many business ideas I wanted to pursue and was really struggling to decide what to prioritise.
In our Strategic Acceleration workshops, Cécile helped me create a vision that ties everything together, as well as a solid plan to make it happen.
If you are someone with lots of big ideas and you need help to make them happen, I highly, highly recommend working with Cécile. Working with her gave me so much clarity and forward momentum.
I still feel the benefits months later and look at the roadmap we built together every single day.
has worked with teams at Google and L’Oréal
Working with Cécile has made a tremendous difference for my business.
As someone working in the creative industry, focus and structure can often feel hard to find. I’d been thinking for months about launching a new platform for photographing changemakers, and in just two sessions Cécile helped me gather the clarity and momentum I needed to do just that.
First we identified the threads that mattered most for my business. Then we sketched out clear goals, a timeline, and actionable priorities that felt both achievable and exciting. Months later, everything we set out in those sessions has come to fruition — even better than planned.
Cécile has a rare ability to meet you where you are and guide you to where you need to be, all while making the journey feel both inspired and grounded. With warmth and sharp intelligence, she helped me find clarity without ever feeling boxed in. I cannot recommend her enough.