Case study · Cloud Gateway · Developing a whole leadership team to scale a tech company
Fresh from raising to scale, Cloud Gateway put its entire leadership team in one room. Their teams' approval of how they are led rose from 69 to 88.
Fresh from raising to scale its Network-as-a-Service platform, Cloud Gateway put its entire leadership team in one room. Their teams' Manager Approval NPS, scored in a 360, rose from 69 to 88.Manager Approval NPS
A 360 score from each leader's own team, on how well they are led, taken at the start of the programme and again at the close.
13
of Cloud Gateway's leadership in one cross-functional cohort, from the CEO down
8.6/10
how the cohort rated their 10X Performance Partners across the programme
£1.5m
seed raised in 2025 to scale, the inflection that made leadership capability urgent
Executive Summary
- Sector
- Network-as-a-Service and cyber security (technology scale-up)
- Buyer
- People and Talent leadership
The Brief
Cloud Gateway had just raised to scale its Network-as-a-Service platform under a new CEO. The brief was not to send a few managers on a course. It was to develop the whole top team together, across every function, so the company scaled on leadership it had deliberately built rather than leadership it hoped would keep pace.
The Outcome
Cloud Gateway's whole leadership team, from the CEO to engineering, went through one programme together across four focus areas. They rated their 10X Performance Partners 8.6 out of 10, and the proof landed where it counts: their teams' Manager Approval NPS, a 360 score of how well they feel led, rose from 69 to 88.
From the People Director
It was very collaborative and driven by participants, which makes it tailored to the business receiving it. The balance of theory and discussion was great.
I'm delighted everyone challenged one another in the room.”
Jo Hoggarth
People and Talent Director, Cloud Gateway
01 / The Trigger
A scale-up that chose to build how it leads before growth made it harder.
In March 2025 Cloud Gateway raised £1.5 million to scale its Network-as-a-Service platform, with a new CEO and a clear plan to grow. Cloud Gateway saw early what a lot of fast-growing technology companies meet later: the people who would lead that growth were brilliant specialists, in management because they were excellent at their craft, and scaling a company asks something different of them. Rather than wait for that to show up in how teams felt, Cloud Gateway chose to build leadership capability across the whole top team while the company was still small enough to do it together.
What scaling asks of a technical leadership team
01
Specialists, now leading
Leaders there for technical and commercial excellence, now responsible for how their people are led
02
Many hats at once
Scale-up leaders carrying several roles, where leading the team competes with doing the work
03
One company, many styles
Every function led its own way, so the experience of being managed varied across the business
04
Growth on the horizon
A fresh raise and a plan to scale, making shared leadership a foundation to set early, not late
A Network-as-a-Service and security business runs on deep technical expertise. Cloud Gateway's leaders are the kind of people who solve hard engineering and commercial problems themselves, and at a scale-up they wear several hats at once. The shift from doing the work to leading the people doing the work is the one every scaling technology company has to make, and it rarely happens by accident.
Cloud Gateway also knew that leadership at a scale-up is a team sport. If the sales director, the marketing director, the CFO, the product and engineering leads and the people director all lead in different ways, the company a new hire experiences depends entirely on which team they land in. The opportunity was to set one shared standard for how Cloud Gateway leads, before the headcount made that far harder to do.
So the decision was deliberate. Not to pick a few managers and send them on a course, but to put the entire senior leadership team through the same programme at the same time, so the way Cloud Gateway leads was built once, together, by the people who set the tone for everyone else.
02 / One room, every function
The whole leadership team learned together, not a delegated few.
Most companies develop their managers a layer at a time, and the top team rarely sits in the room. Cloud Gateway did the opposite. The CEO, the CFO, the product and network leads, the sales, marketing, partnerships, customer success, governance and people directors all went through the same programme together, as one cross-functional cohort. The room itself was the point. A sales director working a real challenge next to an engineering manager, a CFO sparring with the head of customer success, everyone learning as much from each other as from the content.
One leadership team.
Every function. One room.
One leadership team.
Every function. One room.
- CEO
- CFO
- Chief Product Officer
- Chief Network Architect
- Sales Director
- Marketing Director
- People & Talent Director
- Governance Director
- Head of Partnerships
- Head of Customer Success
- Head of Digital Marketing & Brand
- Engineering Manager
- Business Development Manager
When the people who set the tone for the whole company learn to lead in the same room, the standard they build is one standard, not a dozen.
03 / From telling to coaching
Four focus areas, one diagnostic, and a shift the team named for itself.
Across four Prime workshops and the Elevate sessions between them, the programme worked the four areas Cloud Gateway's leaders most needed as they scaled: coaching and developing people, managing performance and setting goals, influence and stakeholder management, and culture and engagement. Every leader started with a Manager Strength Index, a diagnostic that scores each one against the behaviours of good management and surfaces their individual strengths and development focus, so the programme met real strengths and gaps rather than assumed ones. A 10X Performance Partner stayed embedded across the engagement, reachable between the workshops rather than turning up to deliver and leaving. The thread running through all of it was a shift the team named for themselves: from telling to coaching.
How the programme ran
01
Diagnostic first
Every leader completed a Manager Strength Index before any content was set, so the programme started from where this team genuinely stood, not from a guess.
02
The room as the curriculum
Prime workshops paired with Elevate sessions where leaders brought the real challenges from running their own teams and worked them through with their peers.
03
From telling to coaching
The thread through every focus area: moving senior, expert leaders from giving the answer to coaching it out, with feedback as a habit rather than a difficult conversation avoided.
04 / What the team says
The shift, in the leaders' own words.
Here is how Cloud Gateway's leaders describe what the programme changed for them.
“Great use of collaboration and sharing of ideas. I discovered that my colleagues share similar experiences navigating certain situations, and I plan on collaborating with them more to spar on ideas and resolutions.”
“The programme helped me understand the true value of coaching, especially how to use feedback effectively rather than avoiding difficult conversations. The space for open discussion and sharing our own experiences made the sessions genuinely engaging and practical.”
“The facilitation throughout the programme struck the right balance by encouraging discussion while keeping the group focused when necessary. The sessions were engaging and productive, which I found very effective as a manager.”
“The content was highly informative and struck a great balance between research-based insights, practical best practices, and real-world experience. I left the sessions with actionable ideas I could apply immediately.”
“The overall structure worked really well. There was a good blend of small group and whole group discussion, with enough guidance without it feeling scripted. The session reinforced that coaching should be a habit and part of everyday behaviour.”
“I found the topics and advice covered to be interesting and thought-provoking, and we had some really good, healthy conversations. I'll keep coaching front of mind and try to balance my training responses with coaching responses going forward.”
05 / What changed
The proof is not what Cloud Gateway's leaders said. It is what their teams said.
At the start of the programme, each leader's own team scored them in a 360 on how well they are led. The Manager Approval NPS, a net score running from minus 100 to plus 100, sat at 69, already a strong result for a scaling company. By the close it had risen to 88. The same leaders, the same teams, nineteen points higher: a leadership team that already led well, leading visibly better.
Manager Approval NPS, scored by each team in a 360
Each leader's own team scored how well they are led, at the start of the programme and again at the close. The Manager Approval NPS is a net score from minus 100 to plus 100. Cloud Gateway's rose from 69 to 88, a high starting point made higher.
And the cohort backed it up
8.6/10
how Cloud Gateway's leaders rated their 10X Performance Partners across the programme, in a cohort that was never shy about challenging the room.
What the leadership team does differently now
01
Coaching, not telling
Leaders moving from giving the answer to coaching it out, balancing directing with developing depending on the person in front of them.
02
Feedback as a habit
Using feedback effectively rather than avoiding the difficult conversation, and treating coaching as part of everyday behaviour.
03
Leaning on each other
A leadership team that now spars on shared challenges across functions, rather than each leader solving everything alone.
04
Culture, tended deliberately
Treating team culture and engagement as something to actively build as the company scales, not leave to chance.
Why the whole team, together
A scale-up that built one way of leading before growth made it harder.
Cloud Gateway could have waited, developed managers a layer at a time once the company was bigger, and lived with the gaps in between. Instead they brought the whole top team together while they still could, and built a shared standard for how Cloud Gateway leads, the way a Performance Partnership runs: an embedded partner, the work measured at the start and again at the close, and the focus kept on the real problems on leaders' plates. That is what changes when a scaling company treats leadership as something to build deliberately, together, rather than something it hopes will keep pace.
06 / Start here
If you are scaling a technology company, the moment to set how your leaders lead is before growth makes it harder. Cloud Gateway put its whole leadership team in the room and did exactly that.
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