THE BRANDTRUTH ALIGNMENT™ TURNAROUND SYSTEM
BrandTruth Alignment™: How We Raise the Value of Your Business.
The Value Builder Score shows where your value is leaking. BrandTruth Alignment™ fixes the leadership, culture and brand gaps behind it, so your business runs better, depends less on you, and is worth more.
What is BrandTruth Alignment™?
BrandTruth Alignment™ is Leadership In Focus's seven-principle turnaround system, known as RESTORE, for aligning brand, culture and leadership in owner-led businesses. It closes the gap between what a company promises, how it actually works and how it's led. We use it after the Value Builder Score to strengthen the drivers that depend on people and leadership, especially owner dependency, key-person risk, customer satisfaction and differentiation.
Watch: How BrandTruth Alignment™ raises the value of your business (2½ min)
Video summary: Kurtis Graham explains the BrandTruth Alignment™ Turnaround System, built from a common pattern found in major turnarounds including Ford, Apple, Starbucks, LEGO, Microsoft, Home Depot, and Walmart. Its seven principles spell RESTORE, and each one strengthens the drivers buyers use to value a company.
"I don't know who we are anymore."
Nobody sets out to misalign their company. It happens because you grow fast, hire quickly and make decisions under pressure. Then one day the brand says one thing, the team does another, and every important decision still lands on your desk.
That gap costs more than morale. Buyers, successors and lenders see it as risk, and they price it in.
Brand, culture and leadership have to tell the same story.
BRAND
What you promise customers
CULTURE
How work actually gets done
BRAND
What your people experience every day
When all three line up, people know what matters, teams move with less friction, customers trust what you say, and the business becomes easier to grow or step away from.
The score finds the gaps. BrandTruth Alignment™ closes them.
The Value Builder Score rates your company on the 8 drivers buyers use to set value. Half of them come down to how the company is led and what it stands for. That's where most owner-led businesses lose value, and where our work starts.
Hub & Spoke
Switzerland Structure
Customer Satisfaction
Monopoly Control
Financial Performance
Growth Potential
Recurring Revenue
Valuation Teeter-Totter
RESTORE
RESTORE: the seven principles of the BrandTruth Alignment™ Turnaround System
Seven principles, in a specific order, that spell the goal: RESTORE momentum. Each one targets a specific part of your business and the drivers buyers look at, and each comes with one question worth answering honestly.
R
Reality Check
The gap between what your organization knows and what it will say out loud is where every stall begins. We start by seeing the business as a buyer would.
When did you last receive genuinely bad news from someone below you, and what did you do with it?
MOVES: ALL 8 DRIVERS
E
Eliminate Complexity
Complexity feels productive while quietly killing execution. Subtraction comes before addition.
If you had to cut 30% of what your team is working on, what would survive? What about 70%?
MOVES: GROWTH POTENTIAL & VALUATION TEETER-TOTTER
S
Strengthen Trust
People don't commit fully to organizations they no longer believe in.
Are there promises that were made and not kept still sitting unaddressed in the room?
MOVES: SWITZERLAND STRUCTURE & HUB & SPOKE
T
True Identity
Great organizations know what, and who, they are and aren't. That clarity is how decisions get made when no one senior is in the room.
If your leadership team answered "What are we, actually?" independently, would the answers be close enough to guide decisions?
MOVES: MONOPOLY CONTROL
O
Operating Discipline
Cadence beats charisma. Turnarounds are saved by discipline, systems, and rhythm, not intensity of personality.
Does your operating rhythm create real accountability, or well-organized updates?
MOVES: FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE & GROWTH POTENTIAL
R
Reconnect to the Customer
Dashboards tell you what happened. Customers tell you why.
When did you last have a direct, unscripted conversation with a customer?
MOVES: CUSTOMER SATISFACTION & RECURRING REVENUE
E
Embed Systems That Survive
The goal isn't a company that needs a hero. It's a company that has learned to function like one.
What only works because you're there, and what happens to it when you're not?
MOVES: HUB & SPOKE & SWITZERLAND STRUCTURE
Some drivers, like recurring revenue and cash flow, also depend on your business model. Where that needs an accountant or another specialist, we'll say so.
From score to sale-ready, in four moves.
Value
Get your free Value Builder Score and review it with us. We add an honest read on your leadership and culture.
Elephants
Name the two or three issues everyone works around, the ones costing the most value.
Alignment
Apply the principles that fix those issues at the source.
Action
Install the rhythm that keeps it fixed, then re-run your score to show the movement.
Most clients start with a 4–6 week diagnostic and blueprint, then choose whether to continue with ongoing support.
Who BrandTruth Alignment™ is for
Owners and leadership teams of established businesses who:
✓ Feel the business relies too heavily on them
✓ Notice growing confusion or friction inside the team
✓ Want to grow, hand over or sell without leaving chaos behind
✓ Care about trust with employees, customers and themselves
Why Leadership In Focus
We've worked inside complex organizations, from global consumer brands to founder-led businesses. We've helped leaders through growth, transition and handover, and we've seen what happens when alignment is ignored and when it's restored.
Our job is to help you see clearly, decide confidently and move forward, with an honest view of where things stand.
BrandTruth Alignment™ in practice
Footlogix
Aligning professional credibility with consumer growth
Principles: True Identity & Reconnect to the Customer
Strengthened: Monopoly Control, Customer Satisfaction, & Growth Potential
EasCan Building Systems
Turning customer truth into a cohesive brand system
Principles: Reality Check & True Identity
Strengthened: Monopoly Control & Customer Satisfaction
Evoke Consulting
More than doubled the business in a period of uncertainty
Principles: Eliminate Complexity, Embed a System That Survives
Strengthened: Growth Potential, Switzerland Structure, & Monopoly Control
“Evoke Consulting has gained great value from working with Curtis and his team. As our strategy advisors, they’ve used a consultative approach in helping us define our strategic direction and establish priorities. As a woman-owned small business, we appreciate the values with which their team operates. Inclusion, openness, and courage are seen in all they do, and that matters to us.”
Brenda Landry President - Evoke Consulting, Author
Common questions
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A seven-principle system from Leadership In Focus for aligning brand, culture and leadership in owner-led businesses, so the company delivers what it promises and depends less on its owner.
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The Value Builder Score shows which of the 8 value drivers are holding your business back. BrandTruth Alignment™ is how we strengthen the drivers that depend on leadership and culture, then we re-run your score to show the progress.
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Coaching works with individuals and agencies work on messaging. We work across the whole organization, so how the company leads, operates and shows up to customers line up.
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It's the recommended starting point because it shows where to focus. If you'd rather talk first, book a 30-minute call.
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Most clients start with a 4–6 week diagnostic and blueprint. From there, some continue with ongoing support while the changes take hold.
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Owners and leadership teams of established businesses, especially those growing quickly, planning a succession or sale, or trying to make the business less dependent on the owner.
Find out where your value is leaking. Then fix it.
Start with the free 13-minute Value Builder Score, or book a call to talk it through.