Orchestrating Humans and Machines: The New Consulting Model

[MUSIC] Okay, so thanks for joining us, Staleander. I'm speaking with Linda Wei. Today, following the launch of GCS, they recently rebranded from Gras strategy. Linda was previously chief of staff for Gras UKR, as well as leading the transformation into GCS, and now serves as head of strategy operations for the thumb. >> Yeah, thanks for helping me. >> Awesome, awesome. Really pleased to have you on here today. So I was looking on Consonzi.uk and I saw that they noted, like, a comment to the thumbs, a comment to you guys. The name, GCS reflects a sharp focus on supporting infinite management teams and investors with CDD and Velligration Services. But I guess keen to re-learn the sand, what that means beneath the name change, like, operationally, how are you guys now different? So I think when we talk about a sharper focus, it really comes from a bit of corporate soul searching, so taking the time to reflect on who we serve best and what sets us apart in the market, and then really owning it through the rebrand. So for us, that's outer-led entrepreneurial businesses of critical inflection points. Those are like the moments where the business is scaling rapidly or maybe a transaction is on the horizon, and the end of stakes are high. And those are the types of businesses we resonate with, because we've been on that entrepreneurial journey ourselves, particularly this last year, the transformation into GCS. But it's not just about supporting founders, it's also supporting the investors who backed them, because they share that same DNA, right? Those investors are ambitious and visionary, and their backing businesses, they believe, can become category leaders. And so our role then is to sort of give them the clarity and insight to back that ambition, and sort of see the path to growth more clearly. And I think what we try to do in this rebrand is kind of tell the story of like, we're not just as wise as parachuting in with some data. Yeah. The others who genuinely understand those pain points, because we've lit them ourselves. We know how to navigate them, we know how to help founders and investors tell that story of overcoming those growing pains. And so I guess for me, the sharper focus is about focusing in on serving that full ecosystem of entrepreneurial growth, and making sure that sort of everything we do is tuned around helping investors and founders succeed together. So the rebrand launched as of, I think, September 30th, 2025. I don't know that you played like a really huge role in leading the transformation, at least to this side of the pond, because I'm aware that we've grown off previously, you had a US arm and a UK arm. But what's the about GCS's sort of new value proposition? So I think it's more sort of, as I said, like honing in on sort of what makes us distinctive, which has always been the case, but I think it's just better, more articulate narrative around that. So, you know, our value proposition, I think, is quite well summed up in our tagline, turning insight into advantage. I think a lot of consultants can give you analysis and data. We obviously do all of the rigor and evidence that you'd expect from a consultant. But I think the real question we see of our clients asking us, and it's a question that we think ourselves constantly throughout the projects, is what do you do with that insight, right? How does it actually give you an edge? I think that's where we stand out, because we don't just leave you with a shiny deck full of analysis. We help you turn those insights into a clear, commercially grounded advantage, whether that's winning investment committees support on a deal or shaping an equity story, or identifying the right growth levers post-investment, right? So I think that's the essence of our value proposition. It's like, yes, we've got that rigor and credibility, but it's also we've got this real focus on translation into action in the places that matter the most for growth investors, right? When partners, not just advisors, we make sure there are clients come away, not just informed, but with a biased action and a strategy they can actually execute. Nice, nice. I've been able to see a couple of case studies on your website, and previously on the GCF links in page. And we'll gladly provide a link for one or two of those in the episode description. Okay, so and regarding the functions and industries that use us targets, that's also sort of remain the same post-post rebrand, but of course now with that sort of like clearing our tip around why you guys do it, and what that entails. Yeah, I think so. I think again, traditionally, consultancies talk a lot about sectors, right? We are specialists in DMT or health care or life sciences, whatever. We've never taken that approach. We've all the sort of call themselves industry agnostic to some extent. I think it's because the lines of businesses we back don't always fit neatly into boxes. Like the real category leaders you see, the ones that are redefining markets, they usually, come from cross pollination, they're taking something proven in one sector, and it's only somewhere else to, you know, in a way that maybe sort of no one else has thought of before. So that's why it's sort of our approach has always been less about rigid sort of sector specialism, and more about focusing on the drivers of innovation, right? Technology, data, ESG, new models of customer engagement. We go really deep on those drivers, and then we apply that expertise to wherever it's most powerful, so whether that software services, build environments, sustainability, etc. Yeah, that rationale makes a lot of sense to me, and of course a very sort of hot topic is artificial intelligence, AI, machine learning, etc, etc. What role is that having in, I guess, the work that you provide or support your clients with? So I think AI is a really interesting topic, because AI is both something that, you know, we see investors taking lots of interest in, right? And businesses are trying to figure out how to make their products and services become even better with AI. But in a weird way, it's also, I think, changing the consulting industry itself a lot, like AI in some ways is both, is a bit of a double-edged sword. It's both a sort of a great bringer of opportunity, because it opens, opens possibilities that weren't even imaginable years ago. And yet it's also sort of rapidly changing the way in which we do things, and sort of the whole model, the business model of consulting. So some extent, I think, will be fundamentally changed by AI. And so it's kind of the balance of two, right? It's playing this sort of juggling out of, like, how do we get the benefit from AI, while also sort of like not becoming a victim of the onset of AI, and sort of, there is some speculation, there is some sort of small concern at least that consulting can become monetized, doesn't it, some extent? I don't think that is fully true, but I think that consulting and operations, a lot of, you know, the things that we do, they can't fully be taken over by AI, but it will require a mindset shift in how we think about consulting and operations in the future. Yeah, yeah, no, I appreciate that. We've had many discussions about the consulting pyramid, shifting, changing into almost like an unknown shape. Some people have speculated that it might become a diamond of sorts, but, you know, maybe it's too late to say, but one thing that sort of remains sort of clear to us is that the firms that are going to consider those that can sort of get the message of AI and use it to their advantage and for the bunch of their clients, but, yeah, for sure, it's there's a balancing act here. Like, what if you sort of utilize and implement AI so well that consulting becomes redundant, whether that'll actually happen? I don't really know. Yeah, I think so. Like, for example, with ops, right? Ops is definitely sort of one that I've heard about a lot of discussion about. I think a lot of people assume that ops is one of those jobs that will just get automated away, right? As my say, it's global work. Machines can do it better, all of that stuff. And to some extent, I agree with that in the sense of many of those repetitive transactional tasks will become more autonomous. Like, you know, your CRM instead, sort of someone needing to be hired to update that maybe your CRM will update itself, right? Maybe your workflows will self-monitor and self-heal. You won't need as many people as you're buried in the mechanics of just running those systems. But I think the key thing to remember is that businesses are ultimately about people. And people aren't naturally very good at change. And so that's why I don't think, for example, operations will disappear. I think actually, in a sense, operators will become even more important because the role we shift from doing the manual work of like running the operations to actually guiding teams through change, right? And sort of how AI tools and those human teams work together, you're making sure that these like human AI decisions are more high in quality, and you're ensuring that the business sort of keeps operating at scale, right? So it's kind of less about domain expertise and more about sort of conducting the orchestra of like humans and machines together. - I like that analogy. Conducting the orchestra of humans and machines together. Wonderful, wonderful. And I suppose linking this to GCS, so did, I suppose it probably did to some extent, but I guess what have rolled it AI have in your position as sort of an op-sign transformation, lead during that rebrand, what have rolled it AI had in allowing you to, yeah, successfully evolve the brand from graph to GCS. You know what, if I could go back in my time as chief of staff, I think one of the things I do differently would be like to lean into AI like much earlier. So because I think when I started as chief of staff, generative AI was thus starting to come into the scene, right? And I think internally in our firm, and I think across the industry as well, there was a lot of hesitation because people weren't, weren't really sure what it was didn't really know the extent of its capabilities. I think there was a lot of concern as well about privacy and security and all of those bits, right? I think looking back, so we kind of, I think, took a middle route, we weren't probably sort of at the frontier of that, but we also weren't ligards by any means, we were sort of on the first wave of that. I think we could have, you know, looking back now, I think we could have embraced it even faster than we did. And maybe taking a bit more risk experimented, a bit more fit and sort of started getting people along that journey more quickly. I think a big part of that bringing people along the journey is also just investing in internal calms and training and buildings or champions of change within the organization and helping people like feel more confident about adopting these new ways of working. So AI, I think there is, it has led to change for sure, the consulting operations that we sort of run, you know, if you look back five years ago versus now, there are definitely sort of changes in the way that we do things, the workflows are different. And AI has played a role in that, but I think bigger piece has been about sort of bringing people along that journey and sort of making sure that people are comfortable with it, that they understand the change and that they can actually, you know, because AI is constantly evolving, right? You kind of, it's not just one product that you're using. It's like, you know, people have to constantly make decisions about do I trust this output or not? Do I trust this like generated, you know, analysis or not? I think there's, there's a bit of like training people to have more of that kind of like openness and also good judgment. I think it requires now a lot more judgment from human partners than it did before, right? You know, if you were an analyst sort of five years ago, you would just do the task that was needed, that needed to be done. Neither there was less judgment than, on your part that you needed to do, especially at entry level. You know, what we find now is that associates, you know, working with sort of AI tools, AI workflows, they are making those judgments like on a day to day basis, right? They have to use discretion about, you know, about whether this is correct or not, whether, you know, this is a reliable source or not. And so a lot of that judgment, which was previously a very sort of senior, a more submit to senior level type of expertise, you're now seeing it kind of almost downshifted to even the very, this entry level roles. And then that will impact potentially at least the kind of skills which firms like Jesus look out for during their entry, entry hiring processes. For sure, it definitely changes sort of like the kind of skills that you're looking for and the skills that you would be helping team members develop during their career. So your head of strategy operations at GCSE, and we've had a few conversations that you've mentioned how. So I guess the role of an operations lead is quite unique for a consultancy. So I suppose key in to understand why graph now GCSE have one. And if there's anything particularly sort of unique or special about your role. - Yeah. So yeah, most consultancies, especially sort of smaller, who take consultancies won't have someone dedicated to business ops or sort of not the full spectrum of business ops, probably sort of finance HR legal potentially, but not sort of the full remit, including sort of rev-offs and sort of tech stack and all of that. So oftentimes, partners will juggle client work with internal responsibilities. And then you kind of get these like more siloed back office functions. I think my role is quite unusual because I own the entire operational backbone. So finance HR legal rev-offs have sat. And I also do that while leading select client projects. So this kind of dual remit, I think quite rare, but we've found that it's very, very powerful. And the reason is is because it keeps operations very tightly coupled to reality. The worst thing in ops is when you deliver change, no one wants. So you might implement a shiny new system or process, but it doesn't actually help people do the work more efficiently. So by being on live projects, I'm able to sort of see the pain points first hand, and I can test improvements in real time. So for example, earlier this year, I was leading a CDD on a tech business. And we actually use that project as a test run for several new processes. And some of them work brilliantly, right? Like each one's maybe making us 10 or 20% more efficient than before. But then some others needed some tweaks before it worked. And because I was sort of leading that project, I was running sort of it hands on. I could see immediately how those changes landed with the team, how it landed with the deliverables, and then kind of be able to scale them across the firm. So a lot of the changes then that we made to processes and systems in our project ultimately became best practices within the firm. So yes, this role of mine is not just arts, and it's not just delivery. It's what I think of it as is this live sandbox from improvement and as where sort of strategy and execution constantly inform one another. Yeah, I'm trying to have a think about my networking contacts. And nobody immediately springs to mind that is sort of like a head of operations while also working on client projects. So that's a pretty good point. And it's so rare. It's yeah, it's like I haven't come across anything like it before either. But I do think there's like a real advantage in bridging the tube because like from a personal angle, I think it makes me a lot more practical and future focused as a consultant. So having led that full-scale transformation at GCS, I'm now very aware of what it takes to implement change and also as an operator, what happens when early decisions that you make, or these strategic decisions that you make don't actually scale. So like a typical strategy consultant, you hand over some analysis and a plan based on that analysis. But you know, I've noticed myself thinking much more about what goes beyond that into sort of change management, like operational readiness, sequencing, team capacity, data quality, like there's all of these practical factors that ultimately sort of decide whether a strategy lands or not, right? There's also this lens of resilience and future proofing. This is very much born from operator's scars, right? As an operator because you see the long tail of decisions, you know, some things you can push out and iterate on later, but others you absolutely need to get right from day one. Otherwise they become painful to the bottlenecks as the business grows, right? So I'm always, you know, thinking will the system still work when the company doubles or triples in size. And I think that's like a lens that a consultant who purely works in strategy who hasn't been through the pain of transformation and operations doesn't always immediately think of when they're doing strategy. Yeah, so we've covered GCS operations for all the evil consultancies and how AI is changing the consulting landscape and sort of certain use cases at GCS but seeing out a bit and I guess just talking about you Linda. What's one thing you do differently and one thing you do the same if you if your journey at GCS restarted. Yeah, so I think what I would do differently as I sort of said before right I think I lean into like the adoption of AI and new tools. Yeah, much earlier. Yeah, sort of looking back I think we could have embraced those technologies even faster than we did and sort of take on a bit more risk and experimented more. I think what I keep the same is absolutely that bias for action like shipping quickly even if it's imperfect sometimes and sort of building trust along the way because people like seeing progress they don't want to just hear promises. So it's a very visible momentum makes a huge difference for the team. Yeah, visible momentum. Good, good. And for founders listening, you've been with GCS from from day one given given the rebrand is any. Is there a right time to bring an operator is there is a wrong time like if you become you know, let's say when you when you were graph that you have a chief of staff six months earlier would it would have been that you didn't even have much to do or maybe the business wasn't ready for for sector role. There are there is a point like if you are a startup of like three people you probably don't need an operator because you you can kind of coordinate between yourselves. So I do think there is probably a point very early in the growth journey of businesses where they don't need a specific person in that operator role. So it's usually be probably one of the co founders early early sort of employees kind of taking it on as a part of their rematch. But I think the right time to bring in an operator. I think that's the signs of that are usually quite clear. For example, if the founder is firefighting daily instead of focusing on the long term vision of like product and growth. If there is no clear owner for the backbone of like finance legal HR rebolds. I think probably most telling me if the business starts to feel like it's slowing down from the insolent. So for example, decisions get bottlenecked and or restalls. And you realize it's not the market that's holding you back. It's actually just bandwidth right. It's like trying to get on the motorway, but you're still stuck in second gear is like it's just not quite happening. I think that's the point where an operator becomes a real force multiplier. The right person coming in at that point, freeze the founder with a bounding team to get back to the vision. Also making sure that the company has the systems and the data and the person says to scale without too much chaos. Yeah, well, we have a number of sort of consultancy founders that sort of message me saying, you know, they've checked out the podcast and they've listened and yeah, some of them are at that like sub sub five employee stage. And I know they've been considering about bringing on an operator and maybe these words that you've left them with have sort of made them think, well, maybe I don't need to do that just yet. And just because you know other firms have it depends on the unique situation that they're dealing with at hand. So yeah, I'll leave them with that. Really good to have you on here and wish you and GCS the best with the launch into intercute for. Yeah, thanks George, really appreciate it.