Powered by FSG Ventures LLC
Case Studies
These case studies don't show what happens when the right conversation occurs at the right moment. Each one begins with a leader who arrived with a stated problem and left with a clearer understanding of the real one. A president redesigning his leadership structure. A CEO preparing to hand off an organization she wasn't sure would survive the transition. An Athletic Director stepping into revenue generation for the first time with a skeptical community and a president watching closely.
What shifted was clarity for leaders who are already carrying the answers.
University President
Helped a president see that his org chart problem was actually a decade of inherited assumptions about what advancement leadership is supposed to look like. By asking the question he hadn't asked himself — what did your last VP actually own, and what did they leave for everyone else to figure out? — the conversation surfaced a leadership identity problem that a new job description would have quietly repeated. He left with a philosophy before a posting, a filter for what he needed, and the language to recognize it in a candidate.
Nonprofit CEO
Held space for two leaders at once — one preparing to leave, one not yet ready to step forward — and named the thing that thirty minutes of guarded silence had been protecting. The COO had a fundraising problem and a false definition of the role she was about to step into. By reframing the CEO's job from benefactor to conduit, the conversation unlocked her from a paralysis she hadn't fully named until that morning. The outgoing CEO left knowing what to prioritize in the time she had left. The COO left understanding that the job was asking her to be more of who she already was.
Athletic Director
Helped an AD reframe his timeline from a liability into a strategy. With no revenue generation background, two underperforming programs, and a president watching for signs of strategic thinking, the work wasn't fundraising — it was sequencing. Together, Dan and the AD mapped the relationship landscape deliberately, leveraged both of their networks to identify the right entry points, built a narrative around the programs that was transparent and defensible, and created a presidential communication framework that positioned the AD as a strategist from day one. The gifts weren't coming in the first few months. Everyone understood why — and what was being built in their place.
