Advisory Service

Let’s figure out what’s really going on.

The thing you’re experiencing and the thing causing it are usually two different problems.

A structured assessment that separates the symptom from the cause, establishes the order of operations, and tells you whether the plan you have is the plan you need.

Why we start here

A proposal written before anyone understands the problem is a guess with a bill on it

Most owners arrive describing a symptom accurately and a cause incorrectly, and that isn’t a failure on your part. You are inside the business every day, which is exactly what makes some of it invisible. Sales are down, or a vendor has you over a barrel, or the cash never seems to land where the profit and loss statement says it should, and the thing causing that is rarely the thing you can see from where you’re standing.

So before we recommend anything, we find out what’s actually happening. We separate what’s known from what’s assumed or simply missing, we flag what doesn’t add up, and we write down how confident we actually are. If the facts aren’t there yet, we say so and propose the work to get them rather than a plan built on a guess.

What we look for

Three different problems, usually mistaken for one

Understand · Diagnose
The problem you describe
What you walk in saying. It matters, because you have information nobody outside the business has, and because how you frame it tells us where you’ve been looking. We take your account seriously. We just don’t treat it as the diagnosis.
The problem in front of you
What’s demanding attention right now. Often urgent, often real, and often a consequence rather than a cause. Fixing it buys time. It doesn’t always fix anything.
The thing actually causing both
What we’re looking for. It’s usually further back than the owner expects, and it’s usually structural rather than dramatic: a contract nobody read against the numbers, a system that stopped scaling two years ago, a cost that was reasonable at one volume and isn’t at another.
How it ends

You get an answer you can act on, or you get an honest no

The assessment ends with what we found, what we think is causing it, how confident we are in that, and what we’d do about it in what order. Where the next move belongs to a licensed professional, we say that plainly and we tell you what kind. Where the next move is a larger piece of work with us, that becomes its own proposal with its own scope and its own price, and you are under no obligation to take it.

Sometimes the honest finding is that there isn’t a real problem, or that there is one and we’re not the right people for it. We say that too. The screening step exists so that call gets made early and on purpose, instead of three months into a job that was never a fit.

Sometimes, and if the situation is genuinely narrow we’ll say so and scope it directly. But most of the time the thing you already know about is the symptom, and paying us to fix a symptom is how you end up paying twice.
Whatever exists. Financials, contracts, the loan documents, whatever you use to track what’s coming in and going out. If something doesn’t exist, that’s a finding in itself and it isn’t a mark against you.
If the facts say so, yes. We don’t accept your diagnosis just because you’re willing to pay for the fix you already have in mind. That’s the whole reason an outside look is worth paying for.
The other five

If this isn’t the one

All advisory services
Business Launch & Development AdvisoryBefore the doors open Business Stabilization & Operational ImprovementWhen it’s already tight Owner & Executive AdvisoryThe ongoing seat Special Situations & Strategic ProjectsOne defined problem Cannabis Retail AdvisoryOur named practice

Start with the diagnostic.

One conversation to find out whether this is the right place to begin. If it isn’t, we’ll say so.

Start a conversation See the six stages

Scope, deliverables and timing are determined by the problem RCAG is being asked to solve. Every engagement is defined in writing before work begins.

Roland Conner Advisory Group LLC provides business advisory and consulting services. RCAG does not provide legal, tax, accounting, or investment advice. Submitting information through this website does not create a consulting or advisory relationship.