WE OFFER GROWTH & SCALING EXPERTISE ON-DEMAND FOR SMALL BUSINESSES
AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AND SYSTEMS NO ONE ELSE HAS
Everything Needed for Smooth Annual Growth of Any Small Business. In Any Industry.
No Company Ever Scaled Without the Experience of Senior Executives That Had Done It Before.
Look Closely and there is always experience and gray hair behind the scenes of any rapid growth company.
Our Approach: Experience + Wisdom + Intellectual Property and Structure = Success
AirTight Management has developed the world’s most comprehensive framework to help top companies scale faster and more smoothly. It is the world’s first Leadership Operating System (LO/S) developed by a Serial Entrepreneur. It is full of training, coaching and consulting to implement.
We help companies identify and eliminate all barriers to growth in any area of the business. AirTight combines thousands of proven best practices, principles and ideas. These are from hundreds of business gurus and thought leaders of the past seventy-five years. All integrated into a teachable and practical framework.
Our hybrid service and product includes a combination of services and intellectual property. It allows a company and its managers to achieve 25% to 100%+ compound annual growth rates. Help them to be free from usual stress, turnover and infighting. Smooth growth, by design and a disciplined structure. This will grow market share, revenue and competitive position over time.
Drawing from Jim Collins’ insights in Good To Great, where he found it took eight to ten years for great companies to refine internal systems, we expedite this process. Customizing generic systems, we cut development time, addressing growth issues that hinder most companies from reaching $10M in annual sales—all within one year.
It is well documented in the book Reengineering The Organization that Organizational Development (OD) and Change Management (OCM) requires a combination of:
1. Training – The foundation of business language, best practices, models, tools and communications collected from over 75 years of management science.
2. Consulting – To design the organization and execute well at each stage of development, where a reorg is typically required annually.
3. Coaching – Needed to hand-hold key individuals in change of habits to make these practices stick long-term and have them map them into their departments.
In addition a framework for disciplined management is needed to align the management team and run an efficient, high-performance business. This set of key systems is needed by any company starting at about seven people to support growth without constant firefighting and costly mistakes and delays. AirTight Management’s framework drops in six standard systems to handle all management issues.
There are several dozens of benefits from these six systems. They are a comprehensive solution to all leadership and management issues. Not to be confused with operational processes or standard operating procedures (SOPs) these are about the structure and cadence of management.
However, most companies only do one of these. And the philosophies from several will not meld well.
This hybrid product + service approach makes this process highly cost effective. Saving on multiple consultants and the risk of hiring the wrong experts with trial and error over many years. This is what most companies do, often for a decade or more.
We become your partner in growth. In effect it is a total framework in a box that might normally require many consultants, coaches and staff to figure out and would take many years for any company to build. And statistically speaking only 1 in 6,300 companies figure this out on their own. Bottom line: We can get you there much faster. And add millions to your company’s valuation. And will even guarantee this in some cases in our Platinum Program.
THE ORIGIN STORY OF AIRTIGHT MANAGEMENT
I was flying from Boston to Long Beach California one day in 2009, after 14 years as a CEO and then seven years advising and consulting for businesses. As an Entrepreneur and CEO, I had grown two startups to $100M and $156M already and helped many dozens of companies grow by then.
But that day it literally hit me in an instant that every problem I ever solved for a client traced back to the absence of one of six systems. I bet my subconscious was working on this for months, if not years. Neuroplasticity, or what Malcolm Gladwell called “Unconscious Competence” is amazing. We form neural networks, biological supercomputers really, in our brain, which do specific things that take 5+ years (10,000 hours of practice to kick in). And for me it appears that moment was the culmination of over 25 years combined experience to generate this unique framework of systems.
After that it took me another year to studio produce the first 120 training videos, create the marketing, name and flesh out all the systems. And by 2010 I was installing the first three AirTight Management systems at clients and getting fast results. By 2012 I had produced over 160 training videos on all six systems. And now I was creating $10M to $30M bumps in client company’s valuations after starting to use these systems. I equate this to engineering (first 8 years of my career) a replicable growth framework that I learned to do as CEO for the 23 years as a CEO by that date.
Today we have refined and polished AirTight Management. We have literally thousands of best practices, tools, thinking models, checkslist and more baked into about 600 videos for any team member to uplevel their performance, and that of their company. AirTight can be used in almost any company to accelerate growth more smoothly and quickly. And to create millions more equity value.
We are the only company in the world with this intellectuial property and who also guarnatees our results by contract which can include adding $10M to a company valuation, reaching 50% CAGR, 2X to 8X of a company’s valuation or other metrics. We alignour intersts with the client and only do well when you do.
Call (619) SCALE06 or (619) 722-5306 9am-6pm CT
Our Team – Experience with 100% Transparency – No Surprises
Robert Norton
Founder, CEO and Chief Consultant / Adviser Leads all Engagements.
- Serial Entrepreneur with four exits returning over $1 billion profit to investors. And generating over $12 billion in annual revenue today
- Creator of The CEO Boot Camp (2004) and AirTight Management (2011) which are state-of-the-art management science
- Previous CTO and VP of Engineering launching dozens of software products that have generated over $10 billion in sales and continue to generate revenue today
- Expert in leadership, scaling and entrepreneurship, Author of 6 books and eBooks and 360+ training videos
- Decades as a Management Consultant and Adviser to CEOs, Boards and Entrepreneurs in 40+ industries
- Author of 4 books including Co-Author with Dr. Warren Bennis, The Father of Leadership
- Independent Director and Adviser to many companies, Boards and VC funds
- Adviser in transactions and exits totaling over $2 billion and raising $1 billion in growth capital
- Experience developing market leading products and services since 1981 and in management since 1984. These include startups, turnarounds and working in two multi-billion-dollar enterprises (International Thomson Organization, now Thomson-Reuters, and Grumman, now Northrop Grumman). Consulted for many Fortune 100 companies.
- Expertise and proven success in all major disciplines including finance, P&L management, operations, sales, marketing, strategy, product development and business development.
- Founder HomeView (multimedia Realty Search Services), the world’s first high-definition, virtual touring company for residential real estate (founded 1989). Achieved $156 million annualized sales within 1 year of a new product launch with a 6-fold increase in sales productivity over industry averages. Penetrated 72% of the market in only 18 months.
- Generated over $1+ billion in total shareholder value, just while at these companies. Over $14 billion in annual sales today from his products.
- Drove sales from $0 to $100 million with 26% pretax profit in 5 years; added $35 million to revenue in a single year.
- Co-founder FIRST CALL Corporation, the world-wide monopoly at the time on distribution of real-time investment research recommendations from dozens of Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and Morgan Stanley and others. Developed the FIRST CALL global research distribution network, FIRST CALL Earnings Estimate product, VideoMunifacts and Portia portfolio management system.
- Launched more than 60 products and services that generate over $14 billion in annual sales today.
Other Background and Connecting with Us
Unlike most Consultants, Mr. Norton’s experience spans all key disciplines needed to start, grow and exit businesses in dozens of industries. He can inject experience and perspective across all disciplines that only experienced CEOs can.
Mr. Norton is certified in Board Governance by The National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD), and a former Chair of the SBANE CEO Dialog program.
For complete background details see LinkedIn profile here.
Mr. Norton has spoken on hundreds of podcasts and been a panel member at various Boston area universities including MIT, Boston University, Babson and Northeastern and others. Topics include scaling, raising capital, business model development and optimization, entrepreneurship, and Organizational Development (OD/OCM).
He has been a member of The CEO Group, IdeaSphere, The MIT Enterprise Forum, WPI Enterprise Forum, The Association for Corporate Growth, Keiretsu Angel Group, and Gathering of Angels as a coach.
We also have a network of many vetted, highly experienced fractional CXOs, contractors and consultants to help clients break through challenges. See “Partner” tab here.
Most companies risk hiring unproven contractors and consultants and waste tens 0f thousands of dollars when they do not deliver results. We’ve rigorously vetted individuals across various disciplines. As a virtual, on-demand, global team, we offer cost-effective solutions without the overhead of larger firms, tapping into proven experts for targeted growth in:
- Marketing online and offline, branding, CMO, PPC, SEO, CRO, etc.
- Sales: B2B, B2C and B2B2C. Direct, inside sales and e-commerce
- Operations, Process improvement & Optimization
- Raising capital, accounting, taxes and finance systems
- Product development, Agile, Innovation, market entry strategy (GTM) and new product launches
- Software development, website, Apps, enterprise systems, etc
And we can help find and vert top experts to reduce the client’s hiring risk in most areas based on over three deacedes of hiring experience.
Gordon McWilliam
Business Consultant and Coach
Gordon has spent most of his career either as an entrepreneur or working for/with them. Learning from experience at Apple and Dell Computer as well as the school of hard knocks with several of his own businesses, he’s had many successes and a few “learning opportunities”. Along the way Gordon acquired a great deal of knowledge about what works and what doesn’t, and it has become a passion to share that knowledge and experience with others.
While consulting with companies around the world, Gordon is always looking for ways to help clients work smartly and avoid the mistakes that so often cause businesses to grow slowly or in many cases fade away. He provides both consulting and coaching to organizations who are looking to take advantage of all opportunities to succeed.
Gordon’s background in sales, operations and day-to-day management has provided the wide breadth of experience to add substantial value to organizations of all categories and sizes. A willingness to listen and understand a problem before thinking about a solution is key to working with others and is a significant strength. As a lifelong learner, Gordon has always been able to stay ahead of the curve by bringing fresh ideas and new ways to solve old problems.
Gordon resides in California with his wife and is also passionate about his family, music, and golf.
Mohammed Tajvir Chowdhury
Online Training & Product Manager
Mohammed Tajvir Chowdhury is responsible for Product Management, Website Administration, Business Data Analysis, Digital Marketing Strategy, and Design. He also has expertise in Project Management. He has completed his Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree from East Delta University, Bangladesh. And is notw working towards an MBA in the USA.
Furthermore, he is an experienced professional with a demonstrated history of working in the Information Technology (IT), Business Operations Management, and customer focused service industry.
Besides this, he is an Instructor of Microsoft products at Udemy Inc. He also has certifications in Agile, Kanban, SCRUM, Business Data Analytics, Business Communication, and Leadership.
Tajvir has helped launch our 40 new training products at www.EntrepreneurshipU.com a project powered by Shopify in 2021 for pre-revenue companies, startups and early-stage companies with six professional certifications. These certifications will accelerate one’s career and set one up for many more senior positions and career growth opportunities like CEO, Vice President, Founder, General Manager and other others.
Zeeshan Naveed
Online Marketing Strategy and PPC Manager
Zeeshan Naveed – A passionate and dynamic digital marketing professional with proven success in digital marketing management, online advertising, e-commerce management, search engine optimization, and online customer acquisition.
Creating measurable strategies that drive revenue growth, enhance brand awareness, and improve brand reputation across all online channels.
Lulu Lijing
Web Developer
Lulu Lijing – Website stack development WordPress, Kajabi, Shopify, HTML, Liquid, etc.
Lijing is a graduate of Missouri State University in Information Technology. She is responsible for web management, including content management, data analysis, website health, performance and security, product management, and technical support for the marketing team.