“Avoid the usual bottlenecks and make growth lighter.”
Choose lasting foundations over one-off leadership & culture work
Practical, advisory-led support for founders, CEOs, and leadership teams who want clear priorities, strong ownership, honest debate, and a team that can keep executing as the company grows without everything depending on the founder. You get experienced People & Culture support without hiring a senior in-house role before you are ready.
The problem I help solve
Growing companies don’t usually struggle because leaders don’t care. They struggle because the company grows faster than the way people work together. Decisions become unclear. Roles stretch. Feedback gets delayed. Hiring gets riskier. Too much starts depending on the founder’s energy, memory, and improvisation. That is where unnecessary friction starts to build.
Where this fits
Some companies have no HR yet. Some have one HR person, but leadership and culture still sit with the founders. Some already have people processes, but the basics are fragmented and don’t yet support everyday execution.
I offer experienced support that is strategic enough to shape leadership and culture, and practical enough to turn it into decisions, routines, conversations, and ways of working.
This is not outsourced operational HR. It is advisory-led support for founders, CEOs, and leadership teams who want to build the human side of performance intentionally before growth makes it heavier, slower, and harder to correct.
Why founder-led companies?
In founder-led companies, leadership and culture often still sit close to the founder, CEO, or a small leadership team.
That creates speed, ownership, and a strong sense of direction. But as the company grows, the same strength can become a bottleneck if too much depends on a few people’s memory, energy, and improvisation.
I help build the foundations early, so growth does not depend too much on a few individuals carrying everything.
Founder-led does not only mean startups. It also includes SMEs and growth companies where the founder, owner, CEO, or leadership team still shapes how the company works, leads, and grows.
A practical way to build leadership
and culture – shaped by experience
Based on my experience as an in-house People and HR generalist in growing companies, I’ve developed a structured way to build leadership and culture foundations without turning the work into a collection of disconnected HR initiatives.
The right starting point depends on where your company is now. Most companies don’t need everything at once. They need the right next step.
For many teams, the main path is Alku JOURNEY™: a step-by-step way to build the leadership and culture foundations that make growth lighter.
Sometimes, the right starting point is more specific. If hiring is the urgent risk, start with Alku HIRE™.
If things already feel heavy, start with Alku RELIEF™. From there, we can continue into deeper foundation work when the timing is right.
Not sure where to start? In the Intro Call, I’ll help you identify which leadership or culture bottleneck is currently slowing execution and decide what to build next.
Signature path
Alku JOURNEY™
Leadership & culture fundamentals, built in the right order
Alku JOURNEY is the main path for building the foundations that make growth lighter: one leadership team, clearer direction, a lightweight operating rhythm, and consistent people leadership through a structured in-person build sequence.
It helps you avoid scattered initiatives and build the fundamentals step by step so leadership and culture don’t depend on improvisation as the company grows.
Best fit if:
You want a clear, systematic way to build leadership and culture as real business work, not as a one-off workshop, values exercise, or reactive HR project.
What you build:
Leadership team alignment, core clarity, a practical operating rhythm, and a shared people leadership baseline. Step by step, with time to implement and reinforce between sessions.
Practical entry points
Alku HIRE™
When hiring is the urgent risk
Hiring problems are often culture and leadership clarity problems in disguise.
If the role, expectations, ways of working, and decision criteria are unclear, hiring becomes too dependent on gut feel. Alku HIRE helps you define the role, success criteria, interview process, and decision logic before you open the search.
This makes hiring more than a recruitment process. It becomes a leadership and culture clarity moment: what kind of person can succeed here, in this role, in this company, at this stage?
Best fit if:
You are hiring soon and want to reduce the risk of a costly mis-hire.
What you get:
A role-specific hiring foundation, structured interview kit, decision logic, and onboarding baseline for one open role, plus reusable templates for future hires.
Alku RELIEF™
When things already feel heavy
Sometimes it’s hard to build foundations because something is already draining leadership energy.
Alku RELIEF is a short, structured reset for situations where people issues, unclear ownership, tension, underperformance, or constant escalation are making leadership feel heavy.
We stabilize first, then decide what needs to happen next.
Best fit if:
You need a calm outside perspective, a clearer picture of what’s happening, and a practical next-step plan.
What you get:
A factual view of the situation, the likely bottlenecks, a timeboxed stabilization plan, and a clear decision on what to do next.
Follow-on modules
Targeted modules for specific bottlenecks
Add-ons are focused modules that strengthen one part of your leadership and culture foundation. They are not a separate menu of random HR services. They are practical modules for specific bottlenecks that often show up as companies grow: inconsistent people leadership, unclear roles, or missing structure around expectations and progression.
Current add-ons include:
Alku PERFORM™
A practical people leadership cadence for managers: 1:1s, feedback, development check-ins, and better conversations around performance.
Best fit if:
You have managers and want people leadership to become more consistent without launching a heavy performance program.
Alku ARCHITECTURE™
A practical role and leveling baseline: clearer roles, levels, expectations, and role comparability.
Best fit if:
Roles, levels, titles, or expectations are becoming unclear, and you need a practical baseline for hiring, development, progression, or pay transparency readiness.
Ongoing partnership
Alku ADVISORY™
Some teams only need one focused step. Others benefit from ongoing advisory after the first foundations are built.
Alku ADVISORY is an ongoing advisor partnership for founders, CEOs, and leadership teams who want to keep leadership and culture work alive as the company grows.
It gives you a trusted outside partner for reflection, decisions, and reinforcement without turning the work into outsourced HR.
Ongoing advisor partnerships start from €1,900 / month (+ VAT).
The scope is agreed separately based on the level of support needed.
Talks & trainings
For partners & startups
I also work with startup ecosystem partners, such as investors, accelerators, incubators, and founder communities, through talks, trainings, and cohort formats.
These partner formats bring the same leadership and culture foundation thinking to several founder teams at once.
Best fit if:
You support founders and want to give them practical language, structure, and tools for the human side of building a company.
How to start
Start with a 45-minute Intro Call.
We’ll clarify your situation, what you want to achieve, and what currently feels unclear, heavy, or risky. Then we’ll identify which leadership or culture bottleneck is currently slowing execution and decide the most sensible next step: JOURNEY, HIRE, RELIEF, an add-on, or something else.
What clients say
I work with founders and leadership teams who want to build a healthier, more effective way to lead, and turn good intentions into everyday structures that actually stick.
“Sanni brought clarity, structure and a calm outside perspective to our leadership and culture work. Her support helped us have better conversations, align as a leadership team, and agree on concrete next steps.”
— First Name Last Name, CEO, Acme Oy
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