Executive Advisory & Strategic Counsel
A trusted senior advisor — retained by the CEO, board or Permanent Secretary — available when decisions get harder and pressure rises.
What it is
Executive Advisory is not a project engagement. It is a relationship built over time, with full context of your organisation. Radnor partners with leaders as a sounding board, a strategic challenger, and a confidential counsel who has no agenda other than your success. We are in the room when the stakes are highest — not to produce more analysis, but to help you think clearly, act decisively, and navigate the political and relational complexity that accompanies every significant decision.
Unlike traditional consulting that arrives with a fixed scope and leaves when the report is delivered, our advisory relationship flexes with your needs. Some months require deep strategic work on governance or restructuring; others demand a thirty-minute call to test a difficult decision. The continuity matters. We carry the memory of your organisation — its history, its unwritten rules, its leadership dynamics — into every conversation.
Who it's for
- CEOs navigating market shifts, board transitions, or operational crises
- Board chairs requiring independent counsel on governance and succession
- Permanent Secretaries leading public sector transformation under political scrutiny
- Founders and business owners preparing for scale or exit
- Executive teams that need a neutral facilitator for strategy alignment
How it works
Onboarding & context immersion
We spend significant time understanding your organisation's strategy, culture, key relationships, and decision-making rhythms before offering any advice.
Monthly strategic sessions
Structured time with you and (where appropriate) your leadership team to review progress, anticipate risks, and pressure-test critical choices.
On-call availability
Unlimited access via phone or encrypted channels for urgent decisions — no billing by the hour, no friction when you need counsel most.
Board & governance preparation
Support for board papers, meeting facilitation, and preparation for high-stakes presentations or regulatory engagements.
Strategic projects as needed
When deeper work is required — restructuring design, M&A support, leadership assessment — we embed that into the retained relationship.
Confidential sounding board
A safe, external space to think aloud about sensitive issues without organisational politics or internal repercussions.
What's included
- Monthly strategic sessions with the CEO or leadership team
- On-call access for urgent decisions and sounding board moments
- Board and governance advisory and preparation
- Stakeholder landscape management and political navigation
- Leadership pipeline and succession guidance
- Confidential counsel on high-stakes institutional decisions
- Quarterly offsite strategy facilitation with your leadership team
- Board paper review and preparation support
- Crisis response and communications counsel
- Access to Radnor's network of senior practitioners across Africa
Example engagement
Regional Bank CEO · Strategic & Governance Transformation
A CEO of a major East African bank engaged Radnor as retained advisor during a period of regulatory change and board renewal. Over 18 months, we provided counsel on navigating a complex board transition following the departure of the long-standing chair, designing a new group operating model to comply with evolving Central Bank requirements, coaching the CEO through a difficult executive team restructure, and facilitating quarterly strategy offsites that shifted the bank's focus from compliance to growth.
“What set Radnor apart was that they were still present eighteen months in, when the transformation was hardest. They understood our organisation as well as we did — and they were honest.”
Why Radnor for Executive Advisory
Most advisory relationships are transactional — a monthly retainer for a set number of hours, with little continuity or real accountability. Radnor's model is different. We take on a small number of retained clients at any time, which means we can afford to be deeply present, to carry your organisation's full context, and to prioritise your success over utilisation targets.
We do not have junior consultants parachuted into your most sensitive conversations. Every engagement is led by Radnor's principals, each with 20+ years of experience in strategy, governance, and institutional transformation. You get judgment, not just analysis. And because we are independent — not tied to a global firm's methodology or cross-selling targets — our advice is always what we genuinely believe, not what the firm needs to sell next.
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Explore →Is this the kind of partnership you need?
We work with a small number of organisations at any time — by design. If you need a senior advisor who will be honest and stay present, we would like to hear from you.
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