Team collaborating in a modern office, reviewing ideas on a glass whiteboard during a business transformation workshop.

Strategy

Helping leaders decide where to focus, what to prioritise and how to move forward with confidence.

Turn uncertainty into confident action

Leaders often need to make important choices before everything is clear. There may be competing priorities, pressure to move quickly, investment decisions to make or different views on what should happen next.

We help organisations create strategy that gives people a clearer basis for action. That means understanding what matters in their specific context, testing the options available and making confident choices about where to focus.

Our strategy work can support things like transformation, digital and AI investment, operating model change, service improvement and portfolio decisions. This might mean aligning teams around shared outcomes, creating a route that can secure backing or shaping a plan that can move into delivery.

Our consultants are trusted by ministers, policy teams, executive leaders and investor-backed boards. We shape strategy that can withstand challenge, influence senior decisions and hold its value under real scrutiny.

42 %

of expected value can be lost when transformation moves into execution and sustainment (McKinsey)

5 %

Only 5% of employees understand their company’s strategy (Harvard Business Review)

11 %

Organisations that sustained transformation goals for at least three years saw 11% average EBIT growth (McKinsey)

Challenges we help leaders solve

Good strategy gives leaders the clarity to make choices, align people and focus investment where it matters. These are some of the reasons clients come to us:

Finding the right direction

Explore credible options and make confident choices about where to go next.

Taking a more intentional approach to AI and digital

Focus AI and digital investment where it supports goals, people, readiness and value.

Supporting investment decisions with confidence

Use evidence to reduce risk and focus where it matters most.

Creating alignment for action

Build agreement around the choices, priorities and trade-offs needed to move forward.

What our strategy services can help you achieve

Strategy helps organisations make better choices before major time, money or effort is committed.

Build strategies that identify the right places to start

We help clients turn ambition into a practical plan by shaping strategies that identify the right places to start and sequence investment for sustainable progress. 

Make decisions based on evidence and reality

We ground decisions in the reality of your organisation and environment, drawing on evidence from people, markets and behaviours so the strategy reflects what will actually shape progress. 

Make technology choices with confidence

We provide vendor-agnostic advice that surfaces the right options for your specific situation, budget and readiness, so digital and AI decisions are shaped around value and long-term fit. 

Create investment cases that can withstand challenge

We build investment cases designed to withstand challenge in government, regulated industries and complex commercial environments, with an integrated view across strategy, design and change so the case reflects the full cost and benefit picture. 

Bring clarity to complex digital landscapes

We help organisations define direction across competing platforms, services and ownership models, creating strategies that can scale across the organisation. 

Align leaders before moving forward

We create the space for genuine alignment, using constructive challenge to help leaders test assumptions, make decisions confidently and move forward with shared intent. 

Our strategy disciplines

Digital strategy

Investment cases

Investment cases designed to withstand challenge in government, regulated industries and complex commercial environments, reflecting the full cost, benefit and delivery picture.

Digital vision and roadmapping

Clear direction from current state to future ambition, with practical sequencing that identifies where to start and protects value at each stage.

Investment prioritisation

Helping organisations identify the right places to start, sequence investment for sustainable progress and protect value as circumstances change.

Business transformation strategy

Transformation strategy and governance

Setting clear direction, defining success measures, and establishing governance that keeps programmes connected to value.

Operating model design

Designing how people, teams, processes and decisions need to work so new services, technologies and ways of working can be adopted and sustained, built around how the organisation works today and how it needs to work tomorrow.

Discovery and opportunity shaping

Understanding the problem, opportunity and evidence before major decisions are made, drawing on insight from people, markets, behaviours and organisational reality.

Advisory and decision support

AI and automation strategy

Defining where AI and automation can create genuine value, how they should be governed and what needs to change across services, operating model and workforce readiness.

Portfolio and investment prioritisation

Helping organisations decide what should happen first, what can wait and how to protect value at each stage as circumstances change.

Executive advisory

Strategic advice for boards and senior leaders on investment decisions, portfolio governance and transformation decisions, with constructive challenge that helps leaders move from ambition into delivery.

Our strategy services approach

Strategy creates more value when it is built around what it will take to deliver. We shape every engagement to help organisations make better decisions, build momentum and sustain change.

Grounded in the reality of your organisation

Strategy grounded in the reality of your organisation and environment, drawing on experience across people, markets and behaviours. 

Vendor-agnostic

We surface the right options for your specific situation, budget and readiness, with no commercial interest in the technology choices you make. 

Comfortable with ambiguity

Our advisors are experienced in complex, high-scrutiny environments. We challenge decision-makers constructively and work well when there is no obvious answer. 

Constructive challenge without ego

Our people challenge thinking and inspire new ideas in a way that clients welcome, handled with empathy and without ego. 

Evidence before opinion

We take time to understand what is really happening, so decisions are grounded in data, user evidence and organisational reality. 

Designed to move from strategy to action

We help clients identify where to start, how to sequence investment and how to protect value as strategy moves into delivery. 

group of people sitting indoors

Complementary services

Understand what is not working, what is causing it and how to improve it. We help organisations design better services, experiences, processes and ways of working.

Learn more

Customer success stories

FS-client-thumb

30% cost savings and 50% faster deployment for FS client with Azure

A prominent provider of financial services, faced significant challenges due to the absence of a centralised platform for new applications.
6-figure savings for Reach with migration to AWS
Cloud Transformation

6-figure savings for Reach with migration to AWS

We are trusted by leading global brands to deliver IT services and solutions which drive success. Explore our Customer Success Stories to find out why Version 1 is the right technology partner for you.
An-roinn-oideachais. Department of Education logo over an image of people in a school classroom
Cloud Transformation

A Modern Data Platform for The Department of Education

Learn how Version 1 collaborated with the Department of Education to deliver innovative IT solutions, improving operational efficiency and educational services. Discover how our tailored approach enhanced data management and system performance.