Independent Strategy Assessment
We’re not here to kiss your ass, we’re here to save it.
67% of well-formed strategies fail at execution. Not because they were poorly designed — because no one with real independence and perspective had the balls to hit you with the truth before it was too late.
We’re those guys.
67%
of well-formed strategies fail at execution.
HBR / Kaplan & Norton
42%
of AI initiatives abandoned before production in 2025.
Gartner, 2025
5%
of AI pilot programs achieved rapid revenue acceleration.
MIT NANDA, 2025
70+
combined years of experiencing and identifying where stategies break
The 2nd Opinion Guys
Our Promise
Brutally honest and deliberately impartial. The ideal one-two punch for a 2nd opinion.
We’re the only guys in the room with no financial interest in what we find. No retainer. No equity stake. Our entire value is derived from our willingness to say what others won't — backed by seven decades of combined expertise and pattern recognition across dozens of industries, countless market cycles, and more than a few organizational failures.
Bridging the Execution Gap is our specialty. We align the brand promise with operational reality. We assess whether your organization has the culture, capability, leadership alignment, and brand integrity to actually execute what's been proposed — before the capital is committed.
No implementation. Ever.
Like us or love us, our engagement ends at delivery. The moment we offer to manage what comes after, we have a financial incentive to find problems that justify it. So we don't. By design.
Two lenses. One truth.
We bring business and brand strategy to every engagement — simultaneously interrogating the operational viability and the brand integrity of the strategy to expose potential conflicts.
NDA before Day One
Confidentiality is not a policy consideration. It is a prerequisite for doing this work at all.
The 2nd Opinion Guys
70+ combined years cannot be replicated by AI.
AI can synthesize data faster than any human. It cannot replicate the pattern recognition that comes from having personally navigated seven decades of market cycles, organizational failures, brand collapses, and unlikely successes. We use AI in our assessment process — but as a research accelerator, not as a substitute for judgment. The difference between data and wisdom is experience. We have both.
Business Strategy
Roy Johanson
A Ph.D. engineer turned McKinsey strategist, Roy reads financial models and operational architecture simultaneously. His methodology is data-first and assumption-hostile — he finds the number someone put in the spreadsheet because it made the strategy work, not because the evidence supported it.
Brand Strategy
Frank EE Grubich
35+ years of brand strategy and brand execution work for a myriad of regional and global clients in over a dozen industries. Frank finds where a company’s promise to its employees and the market is disconnected from what it can actually deliver — before customers experience that gap, not after.
What changes with a 2nd Opinion?
Rapid Assessment · Technology / SaaS
"The model assumed 22% growth in a market that had contracted for three consecutive quarters. No one had flagged it."
Strategy paused 60 days. Revised assumptions built. $4.2M not committed to a plan built on a growth rate that didn't exist.
Deep Assessment · Consumer Retail
"The brand strategy asked customers to believe the company had changed. Nothing customers would actually experience had changed."
Frontline staff hadn't been told about the rebrand. Launch delayed 90 days. Public credibility failure avoided.
Deep Assessment · Financial Services
"The AI strategy had a compelling business case. The data infrastructure it required didn't exist and would take 18 months to build."
Strategy restructured in phases. Foundation first, AI second. Six months longer. Probability of success went from marginal to credible.
Roy and Frank have worked with a wide range of brands and businesses including:
Take Action
What can a 2nd Opinion do for you?
01 —
FIX the assumptions before they cost you.
We find the optimistic number no one tested. You revise the model, reset the timeline, or renegotiate the scope — before a dollar is spent on a premise that doesn't hold.
04 —
MAKE the hard decisions before they're forced
We surface the 3–5 decisions the strategy has been quietly avoiding. You make them deliberately, with full information — not reactively, after the market found the gap first.
02 —
RUN the pre-mortem before execution begins.
We map the most probable failure scenarios in advance. Your team enters execution knowing exactly where the plan is most vulnerable — with contingencies built before they're needed in a crisis.
05 —
WALK into the board room with evidence
An independent assessment from two guys with no stake in the outcome is a different class of evidence than an internal recommendation. Boards notice when a strategy has survived adversarial review.
03 —
BRIDGE the Execution Gap between promise and reality.
We find where the brand promise and the operational reality are already out of alignment. You close that gap before customers experience it and before it becomes a public credibility problem.
06 —
KNOW when to stop before sunk costs take over
An external finding that says “this has a structural problem” gives leadership the cover to make the right call. Reversing early is always cheaper than reversing after the market forces it.
Two Engagements
One week or eight? Depends on what’s at stake.
Engagement One · 1 Week
The Rapid Assessment
For organizations under time pressure — board meeting approaching, budget approval imminent, strategy already in motion. We take in everything, run a structured interrogation session with your leadership team, then review independently and synthesize.
Engagements begins with a signed NDA and ends at delivery — no implementation, no retainer.
Engagement Two · 8 Weeks
The Rigorous Assessment
For strategies where significant capital is committed, the organization is restructuring, or the brand is changing publicly. Eight weeks of document intake, leadership interrogation, eight confidential one-on-one interviews across the organization, and a full week of quantitative research.
Engagements begins with a signed NDA and ends at delivery — no implementation, no retainer.
Our Promise
We will tell you what your consultants, your board, and your team won't. Before the market tells you first.
What Every Engagement Includes
NDA signed before documents change hands
Response to your intake within 48 hours
Both principals on every engagement
Findings that reflect what we actually found
Written report delivered in full, on time
Debrief where every question gets a direct answer
Engagement that ends at delivery. Full stop.