Client stories

What working together looks like.

Each story covers where the business was, what I did and what changed, in the words of the people I worked with.

Macrocosmos · AI start-up

Building the people side of an AI start-up from day zero

A new AI venture with a bright but early-career team across the people function and the co-founding group. It needed culture, process and people leadership in place from the start, without a full-time VP of People.

What I did

People team operating model
Critical advice on early hires
Vetted supplier introductions
Culture coding and embedding
Leadership coaching
Conflict resolution
People team mentorship
Co-founder relationship health

Fractional VP of PeopleCoaching

Recruitment Manager → Head of People

Weekly coaching

Culture as a core strength

embedded from day zero

Fractional role that evolved

from the day job to targeted interventions

It's easy to take for granted what an experienced people operator does, but culture has been a core strength of ours, and Yak really helped embed it.

WSWill SquiresCEO · Macrocosmos

Launching the business

When I started my new venture, I leant on Yak heavily to get the business off the ground. I'd hired a young, bright team with a lot of intellect, but all quite green, in the people team, across my co-founding team and beyond. Yak connected us to recruitment partners to help us scale, gave us an independent culture vet, and got our processes and systems in place from day zero.

Growing the team

As we've grown, Yak has leant in as a coach, developing team members across leadership skills, conflict and more, and acting as a sounding board on the state of the business. He coached our first hire recruiter into a well-rounded powerhouse of a head of people, which freed Yak to move on to more targeted work.

He navigates the fractional role brilliantly, evolving it as the business evolves. He's very hands on and action driven, with no long pontificating calls where nobody owns the implementation. He also does a great job of keeping our co-founder relationships healthy.

When we first started working together, I was a Recruitment Manager. Today, I'm Head of People.

AWAlex WilliamsHead of People · Macrocosmos

Two years of weekly coaching

I've work with Yak every week and his guidance has played a huge part in my own development and in what we've built at Macrocosmos. When we started, I was helping build a start-up in a niche, fast-moving area of AI. Yak has been my sounding board, mentor and trusted partner the whole way, able to see the bigger picture while helping me with the detail.

I've always believed culture should be the foundation a business is built on, not an afterthought. Yak helped me challenge, refine and turn that belief into something real, and he's helped shape many of the people processes and structures that underpin Macrocosmos today.

He doesn't simply tell you what to do. He asks the right questions and gives you the confidence to back your own judgement. I couldn't recommend him highly enough as a coach, mentor or strategic partner.