Governance, Succession & Critical Decisions
Independent counsel when a decision may affect control, value or reputation — shareholder conflict, succession, a transaction, a crisis.
Most decisions can be corrected. A small number cannot.
Who controls the company. What it is sold for. Who succeeds the founder. How a shareholder exits. What is said publicly in the first forty-eight hours of a crisis.
These decisions tend to arrive with incomplete information, competing interests around the table, and less time than they deserve. The work is to slow the decision down enough to structure it, and to make the consequences visible while they are still avoidable.
What this usually looks like
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01
Shareholders want different things, and the disagreement is no longer procedural.
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02
An offer has arrived and the decision is running on the counterparty's timeline.
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03
The board and the executive team are no longer telling the same story.
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04
A negotiation is approaching where the other side is better prepared.
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05
Succession is overdue and nobody will name the problem.
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06
Something has become public, or is about to.
Four areas.
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01
Family, Shareholders & Succession
Family governance and alignment, shareholder entry and exit, ownership transitions, the entry of the next generation, the organisation and mandate of a family office, and succession planning before it becomes urgent.
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02
Governance & Board
Board structure and composition, decision rights, accountability, board cadence, and independent non-executive support.
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03
Negotiation & Transactions
Partner disputes, investor negotiations, material contracts, and negotiations over control. In M&A the contribution is strategic — evaluating the decision, aligning shareholders, preparing the position and governing the transaction. Where transaction, legal or specialist execution is required, it is commissioned separately under an independent mandate.
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04
Crisis & Reputation
Reputational exposure, leadership breakdown, regulatory or media pressure — situation triage, containment options, narrative control and an operating cadence while the situation is live.
How the work is structured
Private Decision Mandate — one decision, one negotiation, one situation. Defined scope and end.
Owner & Family Mandate — succession, family governance, ownership transition, sale of the company or the entry of the next generation, over a defined period.
Standing Private Advisory — continuing counsel to a principal shareholder, a board or a family.
This is not legal representation and does not replace counsel. It is the strategic and governance layer around the decision: your lawyers execute the instrument — the question here is what the instrument should be.
Private Initial Conversation
A confidential conversation, without commitment, to understand the situation, assess whether there is a fit and define the appropriate next step. Nothing needs to be prepared in advance.
Where control, shareholders or counterparties sit across jurisdictions — Iberia, France and francophone markets, Brazil, Angola or the Gulf — the work extends to the cross-border dimension of the decision.
Request a private conversationNotes on Growth, Leadership and Decision
The First 72 Hours: Leading Through a Reputation Crisis
A reputation crisis is rarely decided by the event itself. It is decided by what leaders do — and fail to do — in the first seventy-two hours.
Succession Is a Strategy, Not an Event
In most family businesses, succession is discussed as a date. In the ones that last for generations, it is managed as a strategy — one that starts years before anyone steps down.
The CEO's Blind Spot: Why the Top Job Needs a Shadow Advisor
The higher a leader rises, the less the truth reaches them unfiltered. The most effective CEOs build a deliberate counterweight: one person whose only agenda is the quality of their decisions.
When the decision is irreversible, preparation is the only advantage.
Live situations are prioritised.