Scale Up Consultancy
Guiding your vision as a Critical Friend
A critical friend is a trusted person who asks provocative questions and offers critiques of a person’s work as a friend. Scale up consultancy is your critical friend.
About Sid
I started Scale Up Consultancy because entrepreneurship has always been in my DNA.
From charging cars to park on my parents’ drive during the 1985 Ryder Cup, to selling merch at school, hosting packed music events in the ’90s, and importing products in the late ’90s – I’ve always had a nose for opportunity. Over the years, I’ve worked with entrepreneurs who became millionaires, billionaires, and one who famously went bust. So I’ve learned what to do – and just as importantly, what to avoid.
What drives me now is helping others unlock the freedom that entrepreneurship can bring. That freedom to choose where and how you live – and build your life around that vision – depends on three core things:
- A thriving community of entrepreneurs
So that wealth, opportunity, and energy are shared—not hoarded. - Initiatives that get people building, not just talking
Because entrepreneurship is a verb. - Making it easier to buy from owner-led businesses
Supporting local shouldn’t be a hassle. It should be the first choice.
At Scale Up, I go beyond business advice. I plug you into a vibrant community of like-minded entrepreneurs, buyers, and investors. Whether you’re scaling an idea or searching for your next big move, I’ll help you fast-track progress and dodge the banana skins along the way.
A clear vision, meticulously planned and precisely executed, leads to transformative results.
My successes
I’m an accountancy graduate with a diploma in sales and marketing – bringing together the rare blend of financial insight, commercial creativity, and business development strategy. That unique mix underpins everything I do at Scale Up Consultancy.
Before launching my own ventures, I worked alongside two self-made billionaires and two highly successful entrepreneurs. That hands-on experience gave me a front-row seat to what it really takes to build, scale, and exit high-performing businesses.
Here are just a few highlights from my journey:
Teleperformance
I joined when the business turned over just £600k. Eight years later, I was leading a division with revenues of £16 million. My client portfolio spanned start-ups, fast-growth companies, and FTSE 100 giants.
Homecall
Scaled the customer base from under 100 to 430,000 in just 30 months by deploying a global outsourced strategy across 25 partners and 1,200 FTEs. The business was later acquired by Pipex for £120 million.
HomeServe
Grew revenues from £90 million to £120 million by securing long-term partnerships with major water companies, restructuring the account management team, and implementing a scalable partnership strategy.
Precision Financial
Set up and led a management buy-out, built the firm to £75 million in assets under management, and oversaw its successful sale via the Quilter partner buy-out scheme.
The Expert Edge Podcast
Expert Edge Podcast ia a show where business insights meet expert voices and hosted by Find a Business Expert. Each episode talks to a different business leader to uncover the strategies, stories, and secrets that give them the edge in their industry.
Here’s my interview with Find a Business Expert.
20% of new businesses fail during the first two years of being open. Let’s make sure your business succeeds.
does your business have a critical friend?
Critical friendship is much more than a transaction or a business arrangement; significantly, it is a relationship built on trust, underpinned by values.
Ask yourself the following:
- Who is your professional sounding board?
- Who asks you the questions that help you see things in a new light?
- Who stimulates your thinking, and brings ideas from elsewhere?
- Who is a bit removed from your work situation and yet understands it?
- Who provides you with a slightly detached viewpoint and a valuable fresh pair of eyes?
- Who do you trust to have the best interests of you and your work at heart, and yet is not afraid to be very challenging?
- Who motivates you and provides reassurance?
- Who assists you and your team to keep on track, sometimes to try new directions, and to exceed your original expectations?
- Who models principled ways of working, caring about people and about outcomes?
An Advisor, Consultant or Critical Friend.
Which is best for your business?
If you are a business owner how many times have you sought external advice and more importantly where did you seek that advice? How many times have you felt you were unable to turn to someone, outside of the business, to sense check decisions or issues?
I have met business owners time after time who do not know where to turn for someone they can talk to, trust, help them with issues etc.
When asking friends for advice, being friends they probably don’t want to hurt your feelings, they want to be supportive, but in doing this you are not getting true support in the sense that sometimes it is wise and more helpful to get negative feedback (in a supportive manner) when that is what’s needed. If you ask a critic for feedback or support, quite opposite to friends they are usually more negative, unsupportive, and rarely point out good ideas or actions.
Consultants are problem solvers. They excel at developing and selling ideas, and they can be great simplifiers.
Good advisors, though, often muddy the waters, leaving their clients with a new and often broader perspective. They are better problem-definers than solvers. At their best, they contribute to strengthening their clients capacity to solve their own problems.
Advisors can provide an early-warning about emerging problems, signals often missed by a consultant’s sharp focus on eliminating the problem at hand.
Traditional business advisors can be useful and they certainly have their role in business support. However in my experience and that of many of our clients’ business advisors often want to take a predetermined path without necessarily being adaptable to the individual requirements of the client. They can be quite time consuming for the business too, often requiring a lot of the business owners time to assist them.
A critical friend can be defined as a trusted person who asks provocative questions, provides data to be examined through another lens, and offers critiques of a person’s work as a friend. A critical friend takes the time to fully understand the context of the work presented and the outcomes that the person or group is working toward. The friend is an advocate for the success of that work. The Critical Friend role isn’t necessarily to provide the answers, it is much more about providing valuable, honest and confidential viewpoints.
A Critical Friend can help to:
- Air ideas & clear their mind to think through issues
- Generate more ideas and perspectives
- Avoid ‘group think’
- Make better decisions
- Keep focused
- Draw up action plans and stick to them
- Achieve Goals
- Review progress
- Access other networks and outside knowledge/support
As a business owner whichever path you take, be it Advisor, Consultant or Critical Friend, has to be right for your business, the lifecycle it’s in and the specific problem it is experiencing.
WHO I WORK WITH
I work with ambitious entrepreneurs and business leaders seeking expert guidance across finance, marketing, technology, and people.
I am the ideal partner for those launching startups, scaling businesses, or preparing for a successful exit.
BUSINESS STRATEGY
- Research
- Positioning
- MVP
- Proposition
- Infrastructure
BUSINESS FINANCE
- Business model
- 3 year forecast
- P&L
- CAC
- LTV
BUSINESS sales
- Routes to market
- Positioning
- Scripting
- Sales funnels
- Hiring
- CPA
Book a Consultation today
fANCY A CHAT?
Want to find out how I can help your business?
Whether you are struggling with Business Strategy, Business Finance or Business Sales then I can help you and your business.
Get in touch with me and my community of peers living the same entrepreneurial adventures. I connect you with fellow entrepreneurs, investors AND buyers of your service.
Book a 30 minute consultations with me and I will be the critical friend in your team.
FREE BUSINESS RESOURCES
BUSINESS plan
pitch deck
financial templates
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What people say about me
Sid has been an invaluable supporter of HiiGuru for over a year now, securing partnerships and providing a great sounding board throughout our journey.
His willingness to go above and beyond, coupled with his entrepreneurial insight, has been instrumental in helping me navigate challenges and seize new opportunities.
I highly appreciate his dedication, strategic thinking, and the impact he has had on our growth.
I have had the pleasure of working with Sid for 13 years, and throughout this time, he has consistently demonstrated exceptional resourcefulness and a strong ability to navigate complex business challenges. Sid is not only easy to work with but also brings a wealth of experience in starting and scaling businesses. His strategic mindset, problem-solving skills, and dedication to delivering results make him a valuable asset to any venture. I highly recommend Sid to anyone looking for a knowledgeable and capable business partner.
Sid played a pivotal role in launching my business, connecting me with top-tier experts for branding, financial and legal matters, and social media strategy.
He guided me in shaping a solid business plan, validating my financial model, and introduced me to credible investors.
His support and expertise made the entire experience both seamless and invaluable.