Track record

Dr Stephen McCormac's engagements, organised by theme

The engagements below are Dr Stephen McCormac's record: A&B work since founding in January 2024, then twenty-five years before that as employee, interim, contractor, or Managing Director. Some were led end to end; others were a senior role within a larger programme, and each case says which. The work spans European, North American, Indian, and Australian markets in FTSE 100, Fortune 500, and German Mittelstand environments. Client names withheld; references available in a BD conversation with client consent.

Sector lens

Filter by sector

The work travels across sectors. The filter sorts the case studies by the sector each was delivered in; it does not narrow what we take on.

Ambrose and Bell

Since founding

A&B's advisory work covers growth and go-to-market, leadership team assessment, operating model design, organisational design, transformation planning, and restructuring. Coaching runs at C-suite level under EMCC Senior Practitioner accreditation. Engagements are confidential; references available under NDA on shortlist.

Externally backed services business.

Situation: A services business backed by external capital had a strategy that required the leadership team to deliver work it had not delivered before.

Intervention: Belbin profiling with Observer Assessments for each leader, confidential interviews synthesised with structured AI assistance, gap analysis against the operating model the strategy required, and remuneration banding from a specialist partner firm.

Outcome: Two splits surfaced: believers and unbelievers on the strategy, and self-promoters versus leaders who serve. The executive went into the next planning cycle with a sequenced plan of role changes, redesigns, and additions, plus a remuneration position the remcom could act on.

Full case on the Leadership Team Effectiveness page.

Mid-market services firm.

Situation: The chair commissioned a structured read of the operating model ahead of a board decision on the company's next phase.

Intervention: Read across strategy and direction, organisation and talent, commercial process, marketing, and intellectual property and risk. Leader interviews, a pre-read pack, and a review of how decisions were actually made.

Outcome: A sequenced operating model agenda for the board. The structural questions that had been driving friction were named and tabled.

Full case on the Operating Model Transformation page.

Founder-led B2B sales and marketing agency. Startup-to-scaleup transition.

Situation: A founder-led agency at sub-£1m revenue needed the architecture to scale towards a credible exit; the founder was running everything.

Intervention: Strategy Advisor across eighteen months. Authored the five-year plan to £10m revenue and a £14m exit valuation. Built the operating model function by function. Designed governance from zero: standing board agenda, risk register, bi-weekly cadence, fourteen board decks. Installed the sales operating system, the financial reporting framework, and the client delivery system that took the founder out of daily delivery. Onboarded a successor as operational lead.

Outcome: The successor took over operational running per the induction plan. Strategy and methodology validated through the handover; execution passed to the next operating leader.

Executive coaching practice.

Situation: C-suite and C-1 leaders have engaged Stephen as their coach since founding, across manufacturing, marketing, executive recruitment, technology, communications infrastructure, advertising, and education.

Intervention: One-to-one coaching under EMCC Senior Practitioner accreditation and the Henley Level 7 Professional Certificate in Executive Coaching. Solutions-focused, systems, and gestalt approaches selected per engagement. Operator-context coaching, not pure facilitation.

Outcome: Seven coaching engagements held since founding, confidential by contract. Three named programmes: 1:1 Executive Coaching, Leadership Cohort Programme, and First 100 Days Programme.

Full practice detail on the Executive Coaching page.

Theme 1

Global and European transformations

Multi-country operating model rollouts and large enterprise programmes: controls, governance, and delivery landed across 20-plus markets at once.

FTSE 100 consumer goods group. European operating-model rollout.

Situation: €300M transformation programme, 900 resources, 27 European markets. Off-plan in multiple countries; UK implementation at risk.

Intervention: Reporting to the European Programme Director, led programme controls across the European workstreams, then took the UK Implementation Manager role: redesigned UK delivery governance, stabilised scope, rebuilt the plan from first principles.

Outcome: Platform delivered across every European market. The UK rescue plan became the template replicated in other geographies.

FTSE 100 brewer. European SAP transformation.

Situation: €600M SAP rollout across multiple European markets. Multi-year horizon, material risk to schedule and cost.

Intervention: Programme management within the central programme office. Set delivery governance and rhythm, hardened controls, drove resolution on the critical-path issues.

Outcome: Programme stabilised. Controls cadence carried into successive market deployments.

Global drinks and spirits group. Sales transformation.

Situation: A global sales operation needed a step change in commercial discipline and sales-force effectiveness across regions.

Intervention: Lead role on the sales transformation. Reset commercial governance, redesigned the sales operating rhythm, hardened pipeline and forecast discipline.

Outcome: Improved commercial cadence at regional level. Forecasting confidence restored at board level.

Theme 2

Digital transformation. ERP, AI and automation.

Standing up the platforms and capabilities that move work off humans and onto systems: ERP rollouts, BI re-platforming, enterprise automation, industrial robotics.

Where these programmes stall, it is usually the operating model around the technology, not the build. The method is set out on the AI and Automation service page.

Multinational service business. Enterprise automation function.

Situation: Manual process bottlenecks across operations, no in-house automation capability, previous attempts had failed to scale.

Intervention: The function was embryonic; Stephen joined the strategic lead to take it operational. Most of the work sat in the operating model around the technology: governance, sourcing strategy, delivery rhythm, and a demand pipeline feeding the right processes in the right order. Robotic process automation and AI-enabled redesign across target domains.

Outcome: Function operational with a permanent team in place. Delivery pattern transferable to adjacent functions.

Global confectionery and petcare group. SAP and BI programme.

Situation: Group-wide SAP and business-intelligence programme. Fragmented data, multiple instances, decision support behind the curve.

Intervention: Tightened governance across the SAP and BI tracks, stabilised scope, drove consolidation onto a single reporting backbone.

Outcome: Group reporting platform stood up. SAP delivery brought back inside the programme rhythm.

European industrial machinery clients. Robotics integration consulting.

Situation: Industrial machinery OEMs integrating robotics into manufacturing lines, with real-time control, sensing, and integration questions to resolve.

Intervention: Technical consulting: architecture review, control-system design choices, integration approach across the cell.

Outcome: Integration roadmap signed off. Engineering teams on a defined path with a credible delivery plan.

Theme 3

Turnarounds

Programmes off-plan. Subsidiaries under water. Working capital trapped on the balance sheet. The work is the same shape every time: diagnose, restructure, deliver verifiable cash, hand back a stable operation.

Luxury homewares group, German subsidiary. Working capital turnaround.

Situation: German operating subsidiary inside a wider group recovery. Group target: £37.5M cash release through a 22% inventory reduction.

Intervention: Led the German slice of the group programme with an eight-person team. Inventory diagnostic, planning reset, working-capital governance, hand-over rhythm with central finance.

Outcome: €24-25M of cash released from the German operation. Material contribution to the group recovery total.

UK national healthcare body. Large-scale IT programme turnaround.

Situation: 1,600-resource transformation programme with material overspend and schedule slippage. Board and sponsor confidence eroded.

Intervention: Part of the recovery team. Programme governance restructured, delivery refocused on outcomes, non-delivering workstreams cut, critical path re-based.

Outcome: £20M+ of savings realised within six months. Programme confidence restored at board level.

Microsoft technology integrator. UK subsidiary turnaround.

Situation: Stalled €1M UK subsidiary of a European group. Fragmented leadership, loss-making, no repeatable commercial model.

Intervention: Managing Director and Statutory Director. Rebuilt the operating model end to end: commercial architecture, delivery governance, leadership team redesign, weekly operating rhythm.

Outcome: 4x revenue (€1M to €4M). 30% EBITDA improvement. 15x pipeline expansion. A leadership team capable of operating without the MD.

Also on the record

Two further engagements

Written up in full in the home page track record. References available on request.

Global portfolio growth. A global consumer-goods portfolio grown from $35M to $80M as portfolio lead, leaving an autonomous account leadership team.

Consulting start-up scale-up. Managing Director of the London office. Revenue tripled; the office taken to break-even.

Operator credentials

Stephen's credentials

The track record above sits on this foundation. Engineering and operating credentials, with formal coaching accreditation on top.

Doctorate	Dr.-Ing. (Manufacturing Technology), ISW, University of Stuttgart, under Prof. Pritschow
Masters	M.Eng. (Research), Dublin City University
Engineering	B.Sc. Engineering (Electrical), Trinity College Dublin
Coaching	EMCC Senior Practitioner. Henley PCEC (Level 7, 30 credits). Belbin team profiling. Twenty-plus proprietary tools.
Directorships	Four statutory directorships with full P&L, governance, and investor reporting accountability
Publications	20+ academic publications in AI, robotics, servo control, and manufacturing simulation
Languages	English (native), German (fluent)
EU work rights	Irish passport holder

Testimonials

In their own words

Recommendations published on LinkedIn.

Stephen is a very versatile and experienced business leader. His ability to see a vision and set a direction is world class. He is passionate about what he does and gets results. Integrity and strong values is second to none.

Ben Latreuille

Founder, Wilton & Bain | Maison Margaux

Stephen is one of the most reliable, pragmatic and structured advisers I have ever met. He tackles the most complex problems with the broad view of an experienced business leader and quickly brings tangible results with the approach of a seasoned results-driven executive. A very friendly business partner, driven by strong will and solid foundation of strong values.

Luigi Buompastore

Head of Business Communication Services, Swisscom

Stephen is a first-class senior executive with a rare mix of intellect and empathetic emotional intelligence. Decisive, authentic, and adaptable, he navigates complex situations with impressive results. Above all, he’s a stand-up person I’d recommend without hesitation.

Dominic Hilleard

Co-Founder, Talent Leaders

Sectors and Clients

Where Stephen has worked over twenty-five years

Ten sectors, thirteen countries across Europe, the Americas, India and Australia. Stephen’s personal track record, not a firm-level scope. Operating-model thinking travels; commercial pattern recognition is sector-specific.

Sectors Stephen has operated in

Consumer Goods Technology Industrial & Manufacturing Retail Automotive Energy & Utilities

Adjacent sectors

Financial Services Communications Public Sector & Healthcare Aerospace

Beyond the cases above, the record also includes a global aerospace OEM, a German-HQ automotive Tier 1 supplier, a global tobacco group (FTSE 100), a UK-listed soft-drinks group, and a European sports-fashion and lifestyle group. Client names withheld by convention; full disclosure on a confidential basis in a BD conversation.

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