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    Zwyrtek Group Advisory · Organisational diagnosis · Gemba Walk · Interim Management

    Organisational diagnosis and change delivery.

    We help owners and management boards understand where the company loses time, money, people and decisiveness — and then we take the organisation through concrete implementations.

    We do not start with a ready-made recommendation, an IT system or a report. First we talk to stakeholders, gather the employee perspective, observe the work on site, summarise the findings — and only then implement change, often in an interim management format.

    0
    Stakeholder conversation
    1
    Diagnostic survey
    2
    Gemba Walk
    3
    Summary and recommendations
    4
    Implementation and interim
    Let's talk about a diagnosisSee the methodology
    Starting point

    Diagnosis first. Recommendations second.

    Many advisory projects jump too quickly to data collection, systems, workshops or recommendations. That is a mistake. Before we ask employees a single question and before we assess any process, we have to understand how the owner or the board sees their own organisation: what they consider a problem, what they consider a success, what they fear and what they expect.

    Only when that perspective is set against an employee survey and observation of the work on site do the blind spots become visible: the places the board cannot see, the organisation does not name, or nobody wants to touch.

    We don't sell hours. We look for decisions.

    A diagnosis is not a report for its own sake. Every finding should lead to a concrete decision: operational, financial, organisational, legal, digital or ownership-related.

    Methodology

    How we work: from conversation to delivery.

    Our methodology combines the owner's perspective, data from employees, observation of processes where they actually happen, and the delivery of recommendations. We do not stop at a presentation. Where needed, we step into the organisation as interim managers and help land the change.

    0

    Stakeholder conversation

    This is the calibration point for the whole project. Before we audit anything, we need to understand what the owner, the board or key stakeholders regard as the problem, the success, the risk and the goal.

    The stakeholder conversation is an in-depth interview led by a Zwyrtek Group partner. It is not a sales pitch or a general chat about the business. It is a structured diagnostic session, usually lasting 60–90 minutes.

    Goals and ambitions

    Where the company is heading over the next three to five years, what has to happen for that to be achievable, and what blocks growth most today.

    Pain points and constraints

    Which processes cause the most frustration, where decisions get stuck, and where the company loses clients, money, time or people.

    Fears and blind spots

    What the owner would rather not know, what they are afraid to find out, and which topics the organisation keeps skipping, postponing or rationalising.

    What stage 0 delivers
    • diagnostic hypotheses
    • list of areas to verify
    • initial risk map
    • a decision on whether the engagement makes sense
    • scope of the survey and on-site observation
    Stage 0 rules out pointless projects

    If the owner is not ready for the decisions that change requires, it is better to establish that at the outset than after several weeks of work and dozens of pages of reporting.

    1

    Diagnostic survey

    The survey shows what the organisation looks like from the inside. It gathers quantitative and qualitative data from a wider set of roles before we go on site.

    After the stakeholder conversation we send a short survey to employees — individually, anonymously or by name, depending on the culture of the organisation and the goal of the project. The survey does not replace the Gemba Walk, but it reveals patterns that are hard to catch during a short visit.

    Closed questions with a scale

    They produce numbers that can be compared across departments, locations and roles.

    Multiple-choice questions with context

    They reveal concrete behaviours: printing documents, where priorities come from, how the ERP is used, and reliance on spreadsheets, messengers and process workarounds.

    Open questions

    They capture signals that never show up in reports: what slows work down most and what the management board genuinely cannot see.

    Ground rules
    • the survey should take no more than 10–15 minutes
    • it is best sent from the owner's or a director's account
    • time between the survey and the on-site visit: 5–7 business days
    • results are discussed with the owner before the Gemba Walk
    What stage 1 delivers
    • quantitative data
    • a map of the organisation's mood
    • recurring themes from the open answers
    • first signals of problems invisible from board level
    • areas to explore during the Gemba Walk
    2

    Gemba Walk

    A Gemba Walk means observing work where value is genuinely created: on the production floor, in the warehouse, in customer service, in accounting, in sales, in procurement or in the document flow.

    We do not audit an organisation from the meeting room alone. We watch how the work really runs: who makes decisions, where information stalls, which activities are duplicated, which systems get bypassed, where paper replaces process, and where people rescue the organisation with their own memory.

    Decisions

    Who actually makes decisions and where decisions get stuck.

    Roles and responsibilities

    Whether the real workload matches the formal scope of duties.

    Work standards

    Whether work is documented, repeatable and possible to hand over to someone else.

    Information flow

    How information travels between departments, systems and people.

    Systems and data

    Whether the ERP, CRM, DMS, WMS and spreadsheets support the work or create a parallel reality.

    Resources and priorities

    Whether people have the tools, time and clarity of priorities needed to do the job.

    We also analyse the eight categories of Lean waste: overproduction, waiting, transport, over-processing, inventory, unnecessary motion, defects and unused human potential.

    Typical findings
    • the system exists, but key decisions are made over the phone
    • documents are entered into the ERP, then printed and handled on paper
    • critical process knowledge sits in one person's head
    • employees perform tasks that appear in no formal job description
    • management reports show data too late for anyone to act on it
    What stage 2 delivers
    • a list of field observations
    • a waste map
    • an operational risk register
    • areas requiring an immediate decision
    • material for the summary and the 30/60/90-day plan
    3

    Summary and recommendations

    After the conversation, the survey and the Gemba Walk we do not write a report for its own sake. The point of the summary is to translate observations into owner and board decisions.

    We set the stakeholder perspective, the survey data and the field observations side by side. We look not only for a list of problems but above all for cause-and-effect relationships: which problems are symptoms and which are the source of the losses.

    Findings map

    The most important observations ranked by impact on efficiency, risk and the organisation's readiness for change.

    Management priorities

    The list of decisions the owner or the board has to make for change to be possible.

    30/60/90-day plan

    A concrete action plan split into quick wins, projects that need preparation, and strategic decisions.

    The biggest organisational lever

    The single place where one management decision can deliver the largest effect without disproportionate investment.

    What stage 3 delivers
    • management summary
    • register of risks and priorities
    • 30/60/90-day plan
    • implementation recommendations
    • a decision on the model for further engagement
    A report is only a vehicle for decisions

    The key outcome of a diagnosis is not a document. It is clarity: what has to be done, what should not be done, who has to decide, and what happens if the organisation changes nothing.

    4

    Implementation and interim management

    In many organisations the problem is not a lack of recommendations but the absence of someone who keeps standards, decisions and pace on track every day. That is why a diagnosis often turns into delivery — including in an interim management format.

    If the client needs support in delivering change, Zwyrtek Group can run the implementation as a project, support the board on a retainer, or step temporarily into the organisation as interim COO, interim CFO or transformation lead.

    Project implementation

    Delivering specific actions from the 30/60/90-day plan: configuring a system, writing SOPs, launching a dashboard, preparing HR documents, rolling out KPIs or cleaning up a process.

    Interim COO

    Operations, processes, work standards, execution of change, day-to-day management of the rollout and elimination of waste.

    Interim CFO

    Controlling, budgeting, cash flow, management reporting, financing, working capital and economic discipline.

    Advisory retainer

    Ongoing strategic and operational support for the owner or the board, without launching a separate project every time.

    Zwyrtek Academy

    Transferring knowledge into the organisation: Lean workshops, ERP training, preparing managers to lead change, and leadership coaching.

    What stage 4 delivers
    • implemented standards
    • KPIs and dashboards
    • updated roles and responsibilities
    • improved processes
    • better use of existing systems
    • an organisation less dependent on the owner and on individual employees
    Scope

    What a diagnosis can cover.

    The scope depends on what comes out of Stage 0 and the survey. Not every project needs a full audit of every area. We pick the areas with the greatest impact on results, risk and the organisation's ability to operate.

    1

    Operations and processes

    What work really looks like at each role, where time is lost, where decisions get stuck, where information arrives too late, and where the process depends on one person's memory.

    Follow-up: Process maps, SOPs, operational KPIs, process redesign, Interim COO.
    See the related service
    2

    Roles, positions and HR compliance

    Whether the actual scope of work matches the documents, who makes decisions, who has access to systems, and where a grey zone of tasks has appeared.

    Follow-up: Job descriptions, contract annexes, competency matrix, internal policies, readiness for labour inspections.
    See the related service
    3

    IT systems, ERP, CRM, DMS and Shadow IT

    Whether the systems the company pays for are genuinely used, or whether the organisation still runs on paper, spreadsheets, phone calls and private messengers.

    Follow-up: ERP configuration, DMS/BPM, WMS, CRM, BI dashboards, integrations, elimination of Shadow IT.
    See the related service
    4

    Finance and controlling

    Which products, clients and sales channels are profitable, where margin is lost, what cash flow and working capital look like, and how reliable management reporting is.

    Follow-up: Management controlling, financial dashboard, margin analysis, budget vs. actual, Interim CFO.
    See the related service
    5

    E-invoicing and document flow

    How invoices circulate, who approves documents, where the process still relies on paper, and whether the systems are ready for a new way of working with documents.

    Follow-up: ERP–e-invoicing integration, BPM, OCR, distributed approvals, paperless procedures, training.
    See the related service
    6

    Legal and regulatory risk

    Which legal, tax, employment, ESG, CBAM, CSRD or NIS-2 obligations apply to the company, and what the cost of inaction would be.

    Follow-up: Compliance procedures, ESG/CSRD documentation, CBAM analysis, NIS-2 assessment, legal and tax advisory.
    See the related service
    7

    M&A readiness and succession

    Whether the company runs without the owner, whether the data would survive due diligence, which value killers depress valuation, and what has to be fixed before a transaction or a succession.

    Follow-up: Vendor due diligence, sale preparation, family succession, M&A transactions, post-merger integration.
    See the related service
    How we work together

    What we never do.

    We do not produce reports without taking responsibility for delivery. We do not recommend systems whose implementation someone pays us to sell. We do not enter a project if the owner is not ready for specifics — because no change happens without their management decisions. And we do not stay longer than necessary. Our goal is to build an organisation that runs without us.

    Want to find out where your company loses time, money and decisiveness?

    Let's start with a conversation with the owner or the board. In 60–90 minutes we can establish whether an organisational diagnosis makes sense and which areas need attention first.

    Book a diagnostic callSee our services
    FAQ

    Frequently asked questions.

    Yes, but not in the sense of a formal inspection. It is a management and operational audit whose purpose is to find the places where the company loses time, money, decision quality or organisational resilience.

    Stage 0 is a conversation with the owner, the board or key stakeholders. Its purpose is to understand the goals, pain, constraints, fears and readiness for decisions before we start asking employees questions or observing processes.

    The survey shows the employee perspective and reveals patterns that a short observation cannot capture. The Gemba Walk shows how the work actually flows. Only the combination of both gives the full picture.

    It is observing work where value is created: on the production floor, in the warehouse, in the office, in accounting, in sales or in the document flow. We do not rely on declarations alone — we look at how the process works in practice.

    Stage 0 can be closed within a few days. A full diagnosis depends on the size of the organisation, the number of locations and the scope of areas covered, but it should lead to first decisions within weeks, not months.

    The report is only a vehicle for decisions. The most important outcome is a list of priorities, risks, the biggest organisational levers and a 30/60/90-day action plan.

    Yes. Depending on the findings we can run the implementation as a project, take an Interim COO or Interim CFO role, support the board on a retainer, or train the team through Zwyrtek Academy.

    This material is informational and describes the advisory methodology of Zwyrtek Group. The scope, duration and results of a diagnosis depend on the size of the organisation, data availability, the board's readiness to decide and the specifics of the industry. This page does not constitute legal, tax, financial or organisational advice for a specific company.