Our Approach

The mission of Greenway Strategy Group is to create measurable growth and improvement in social impact organizations.  Since 2012, GSG has provided strategic guidance to nonprofit, education, and philanthropic organizations serving communities, children, youth, and learners of all ages. 

Our strength lies in assisting organizations to analyze and synthesize information in order to design innovative solutions to complex problems.  Our consulting team brings decades of applied strategy experience in large, complex organizations. We approach each assignment with a fresh perspective, customizing our tools and processes to match the client's existing knowledge, resources, culture, and desired results.

Our previous experience, professional expertise, and national networks allow us to inform strategy development by presenting effective practices for consideration. Our facilitation techniques allow us to successfully engage decision-makers in forming specific, future direction for growth and improvement. Our project management skills allow us to leave clients with clear plans for implementation and monitoring.

GSG utilizes an inclusive, collaborative approach to strategy development that builds the capacity of organizations to implement meaningful change. We believe in capitalizing on the assets within organizations, rather than providing all the "answers" from external experts. In order for strategic change to be fully implemented, those who do the work must be part of the design.

Our Commitment

We are committed to exhibiting the following core values in all of our client engagements: 

• Understand the unique context of our clients 

• Deploy consultants with applied senior leadership experience to all projects 

• Customize our approach to meet client needs, while ensuring alignment with proven methodologies 

• Provide clear guidance that leads to practical application 

• Advocate for growth and improvement, even if it means difficult conversations 

• Ensure the voices of all stakeholders are considered 

• Engage and empower teams to create, manage, and sustain improvement 

• Maintain a focus on improving outcomes for communities, children, youth, and learners of all ages.

Our Difference

GSG offers a unique combination of skills and approaches, which combine to ensure our clients achieve and maintain measurable growth.

Research and analytical expertise

We find that many strategy consultants are primarily facilitators, bringing together groups of people to develop consensus around shared perceptions.  Our analytical expertise ensures organizations are grounded in reality and a have sophisticated understanding of the external landscape.

Our team brings extensive experience in analyzing data, including analysis of quantitative data regarding program results, program operations, financial performance, and human resource management. Our national connections allow us to identify high-performing comparison organizations for benchmarking.

The GSG team also has deep experience with gathering stakeholder input to inform quantitative analysis. These include the following methods:

• Program observations

• Focus groups

• Surveys

• Design labs including interactive polls, creativity exercises, design thinking workshops, and facilitated discussions

• Community forums involving hundreds of people working in large and small group sessions

• Individual interviews with key informants such as legislators, business leaders, community leaders, funders, philanthropists, and board members.

GSG maintains a comprehensive Resource Bank, organized by topics of relevance to our clients. The Resource Bank includes research on effective approaches, case studies, and guidance from thought leaders.

Collaboration that builds trust and buy-in

While we believe analytical expertise is critical for robust strategy development, we are aware of other consulting firms that consider their external analysis to be “the truth”. Such consultants move directly from analysis to making recommendations to clients about their future direction. 

We believe that objective data presents a basis for conversation, but that creating meaning from data and determining priorities requires engagement of all stakeholders, including those who must do the work.  We utilize structured facilitation protocols that allow all participants to be heard, and also produce clear areas of consensus for future action.  We have managed strategy development sessions with executive teams, and with broader groups of 100 or more, depending upon the culture and requirements of the client. 

Coaching and facilitation

We are committed to developing the capacity of the organizations we serve. We utilize internal teams to drive all consulting projects.  Depending on the project design, we provide training for team leaders, tools for managing team processes, structured formats for team output, and one-to-one coaching to support the team leaders.  Our consultants can also supplement the knowledge of internal staff with information on effective approaches in other organizations, to address the strategic issues that emerge through the planning process. Our interest in is in developing an actionable strategy that leads to measurable growth.  It is not in creating dependency on our consulting firm. 

Resource allocation aligned to your needs, not ours              

GSG consultants are assigned to projects for exactly the number of hours required to support the work. Our team members enjoy flexible assignments, forming customer-centric teams based on the needs of the client.  Many consulting firms look to assign available staff full-time to projects in order to cover costs, regardless of the needs of the customer.

In addition to forming customer-centric teams aligned to the scope of work, additional team members with specific expertise can be leveraged as advisors and coaches as the work evolves.

Strategy experts with practical experience in complex organizations

All of our consulting team members bring applied experience within organizations.  We know the challenges of gaining consensus on strategic priorities, and changing behaviors to address those priorities.  Our approach and recommendations are grounded in reality, and mindful of the community, culture and capacity of our clients.  Our consultants have held strategy and research positions in large, national organizations such as United Way of America, the National Park Service, the Institute for Higher Education Policy, Harvard University, Georgia State University, IBM, Dell, and Turner Broadcasting.  Additionally, several team members have served as executive leaders within public school systems.