Case Study · Inviqa · Digital experience consultancy · One way to manage for a restructured leadership team
Inviqa turned a newly restructured management team into one leadership group, with a shared way to manage they wrote themselves.
Inviqa turned a newly restructured management team into one leadership group, with a shared way to manage they wrote themselves.Leaders developed as one team
0
every discipline in the business, from software engineering and solution architecture to experience design, delivery and client leadership
Every discipline · one way to manage
Their own
a management playbook the leadership team built together and Inviqa keeps, written in the room rather than handed down
9.2/10
how the cohort rated their Performance Partners across the programme
12 workshops
six management themes, each one taught and then worked through back in the real job
Executive Summary
- Sector
- Digital experience and commerce consultancy (engineering, experience design, delivery)
- Buyer
- People & leadership team
The Brief
Following a restructure, develop Inviqa's newly formed management team into a single leadership group that manages the same way, strong enough to carry the business forward. 10X's role was to bring every discipline, engineering, architecture, experience design, delivery and client leadership, into one room, aim the work at the management behaviours that matter most for a consultancy, and facilitate the team building a shared way of working they own.
The Outcome
Eleven leaders, drawn from every discipline in the business, were developed together as one management team, and built a shared way of working that Inviqa keeps, its own playbook, written in the room rather than handed down. Across six management themes, each one taught and then taken back into live client work and troubleshot together, the leaders moved from managing in separate ways to managing as one group, with a standard the next people stepping up will be brought into.
From the leadership
After our restructure, a new management team was forming right across Inviqa, from engineering and delivery to experience design and client leadership, and I wanted to develop them as one group rather than team by team. 10X brought the whole team into one room and helped them define how we manage here, in their own words, aimed at the real challenges of running a consultancy.
Because the way we manage came from our own people, it stuck, and it gave us a genuine leadership team rather than managers working in silos. It set us up for our next chapter, and not long after, Inviqa was proud to join Havas.”
Cathy Dearson
People Director, Inviqa
01 / The trigger
Inviqa reshaped its leadership team, and chose to develop it on purpose.
Inviqa builds digital experience and commerce platforms for some of the best known brands in the world, the kind of engineering, design and delivery work that only holds together when the people leading it manage well. Following a restructure, a new management team had formed across the business: programme directors and client partners, a solutions architect and a technical team lead, an experience design director and a creative lead, a head of support and DevOps. Inviqa chose to treat that new leadership team the way it treats a serious piece of client work. Rather than let each part of the business settle into its own way of managing, Inviqa decided to develop the whole group together, deliberately, into one leadership team strong enough to carry the business through whatever came next.
The shape of the group was the point. Inviqa did not want the engineers developed in one place and the client leads somewhere else. They wanted a programme director, a solutions architect, an experience design director and a client partner in the same room, working out together what good management looks like at Inviqa, so that managing here would mean one thing wherever in the business you sat.
The challenges the team brought were the ones every growing consultancy knows. One leader described the hard part as not seeing the wood for the trees, keeping sight of the long term goals underneath the daily pressure of delivering for clients. Another named the constant tension of elevating the urgent over the important. A third wanted to hand real ownership to a team on a steep learning curve without either overloading them or quietly doing it all themselves. Running through all of it was the question of how to make good decisions quickly, and coach the team to make their own, rather than every call escalating upward.
So the brief to 10X was not to import a management model and train people in it. It was to bring every discipline into one room, aim the work at the behaviours that decide whether a consultancy stays well run as it changes shape, and facilitate Inviqa's leaders building a shared way to manage they would own, a standard written by the people who have to live by it.
02 / Built for a consultancy
The programme spent its time on the management behaviours that decide whether a consultancy stays well run.
10X did not arrive with a fixed course to install. The work was built around how Inviqa actually runs, a business that wins by putting expert, cross-functional teams around a client's problem, and aimed at the handful of management behaviours that matter most when the people leading that work have stepped up from being brilliant at the craft. Before each theme, the leaders shared the real challenges on their plate, so the sessions worked on live problems rather than hypothetical ones.
The six themes
Six management themes, built around the job of leading at a consultancy.
01
Managing up and effective 1-to-1s
Building the relationships upward and across the business, and making 1-to-1s count rather than letting them slip when client work gets loud.
02
Strategic planning, goal setting and delegation
Holding the long term goals above the daily firefight, and handing over real ownership with clear outcomes instead of doing it all yourself.
03
Driving change and innovation
Leading change well in a business whose own job is helping clients change, and making room for the team to look forward, not just deliver.
04
Business acumen and decision making
Making good calls quickly without slipping into analysis paralysis, and giving the team the context to make their own.
05
Giving feedback and managing performance
Making feedback a normal part of the work rather than a formal event, and setting the standard clearly instead of walking past it.
06
Coaching and developing talent
Growing the people on the team instead of doing the work for them, so the same problems stop coming back to your desk.
The themes map directly onto the challenges the leaders raised, the urgent crowding out the important, delegating to a stretched team, decisions escalating upward, rather than a generic syllabus.
The rhythm
Learn it, take it back into live client work, then come back and troubleshoot it together.
Each theme ran the same way. A Prime workshop set the approach and the practical tools. Then the leaders took it back into their own teams and live client work and used it on a real situation in the weeks that followed. Then the cohort came back together for an Elevate session to work through what actually happened, the room solving each other's live problems rather than the Performance Partner handing down answers.
Development was the work itself, not a thing that happened next to it. By the later sessions the leaders were not discussing theory, they were comparing how they had handled a real delegation, a real decision, a real conversation, the week before.
Six management themes, each one set in a Prime workshop, applied back in live client work, then troubleshot together in an Elevate session.
What we captured
The way of working the room agreed, written down as Inviqa's own playbook.
The Elevate sessions were not only about solving the problem in front of someone. They were about capturing how Inviqa's leaders had decided to handle it. Across the themes, the Performance Partner facilitated the team agreeing what good management looks like here, and documented it into a playbook in their own words. As Inviqa's Experience Design Director put it, the playbook element helped them define their way of working.
That is the difference. The standard is Inviqa's, not ours, and it does not leave when we do. It is written by the people who have to live by it, and it is what the next people stepping into management at Inviqa will be brought into.
03 / One room, every discipline
Every discipline in the business, in the same room, building one way to manage.
This was never a programme for the engineers alone, or a separate course for the client leads. Eleven leaders, from software engineering and solution architecture to experience design, delivery and client leadership, came together to define what good management looks like at Inviqa, then to hold each other to it. The rooms were deliberately mixed, so a programme director worked a real problem next to a solutions architect and an experience design director, rather than only ever talking to their own function.
Who was in the room
Engineering & architecture
a Solutions Architect, a Technical Team Lead, the Head of Support & DevOps and a Senior Solutions Specialist
Delivery & client
two Programme Directors, a Senior Client Partner and a Client Partner
Experience & creative
an Experience Design Director and an Associate Creative Director
Consulting
a Business Consultant
11 leaders, every discipline, one room
Why the mix mattered
The engineers and the client leads, learning to manage the same way.
Putting a solutions architect and a client partner in the same cohort is harder to run than a single team, and it was the point. At a consultancy, an engagement only works when engineering, design, delivery and client leadership pull the same way, so Inviqa's managers learned the same way they deliver, across disciplines, taking each other's methods away. As one leader put it, the programme was a chance for the group to come together, develop the relationships already there, and solve the biggest problems they face. Managers learn fastest from each other, and the work was about drawing out the experience already inside Inviqa rather than importing answers from outside it.
04 / What changed
By the end, Inviqa managed as one leadership team, with a playbook to prove it.
The strongest evidence at Inviqa is not a score, it is what the leadership team walked away owning. A group that had been managing in separate ways, engineering one way, delivery another, client leadership a third, came out of the programme managing as one team, against a standard they had written together. The playbook is theirs to keep, and it is what the next people stepping up into management will be brought into.
The leaders came in naming the same pressures: the urgent crowding out the important, delegation that felt slower than doing the work yourself, decisions that kept escalating upward. They left with a shared, practical way of handling each, agreed in the room and written into the playbook, so the answer is the same wherever in Inviqa the question comes up.
That leadership team was ready for what came next. Since the programme, Inviqa went on to join Havas, the global communications group, taking a management layer that operates as one team into its next chapter.
The common thread was a leadership team that now manages the same way, whoever you report to and whatever you build.
The cohort rated their Performance Partners 9.2 out of 10 across the programme, with the workshops close behind at 8.7. For a genuinely mixed room, from engineering to experience design, it landed for all of them.
In their own words, what the leaders took from it
Hear it from the leaders in the room.
“The programme demonstrated that we need to continue to work together as a group to build a learning culture. It was a unique opportunity for us to come together, develop our existing relationships and solve the biggest problems we are faced with.”
“Great facilitation that prompted many interesting conversations. Reminded me how important it is to adjust your messaging depending on the audience. Plenty of good tips and ideas that I know aren't common practice yet.”
“The playbook element of the programme is really interesting and helps us define our way of working. Clear expectations were set and the facilitator intervened at the perfect times to keep the conversation productive.”
05 / Start here
If you have just restructured and want to turn a newly formed management team into one leadership group that manages the same way, or you are a consultancy whose best engineers, designers and delivery leads are stepping up to manage, or you want a leadership team strong enough to carry the business into its next chapter, an acquisition included, that is the work we do.
Every partnership between 10X and a client is entirely bespoke and unique. Book a no-obligation call with one of our Development Experts to scope how we could support you and your situation.