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Every engagement is different. The following organizations came to Clarus at different moments, with different challenges, and from different sectors. What they found tends to be true across all our work: when strategy and culture move together, progress becomes possible in ways it wasn’t before.
Client names are omitted by design. Details are shared with permission.
A nationally recognized school within a private, coeducational university was both celebrating a milestone anniversary and navigating significant shifts internally and in the broader landscape. Amid this change – presenting both exciting opportunities and unprecedented challenges – school leadership recognized the need for both a clear strategic path forward and a healthy, aligned leadership team to carry it out.
Clarus designed a comprehensive engagement that deliberately integrated leadership development with strategic planning, beginning with focused work with the leadership team on communication, trust, and decision-making before moving into the planning process itself. Stakeholders across faculty, staff, alumni, and partners were engaged in the planning process, with Clarus helping translate insights into a clear strategy.
The School gained a healthier, more closely aligned leadership team, a strategic plan built on genuine stakeholder input, and a clear strategic direction with the cohesion to execute it. Shared ownership of the plan — built during the process, not assumed after — meant implementation had real momentum from day one.
A statewide agency serving more than 200,000 individuals with mental health and substance use needs had successfully navigated a global pandemic, but the leadership team came under enormous strain in the process. With the agency entering a period of significant growth and change, its leader recognized the team needed to heal and align before tackling a new strategic plan.
Clarus began with an intensive leadership development program for 25 agency leaders focused on communication and team dynamics. That foundation was then carried into a comprehensive strategic planning process, engaging 63 stakeholders across 35 organizations to identify five strategic priorities for the agency’s next three years.
The leadership team emerged stronger, more aligned, and genuinely better equipped to work together. The strategic plan they built reflected real stakeholder insight, and the commissioner had a consistent thought partner throughout the nine-month engagement to navigate complexity, sequence change, and respond to emerging priorities.
Following the arrival of a new dean, a nursing school within a major university system had developed a new strategic plan but recognized that executing it would require a stronger, better-aligned executive team. The goal wasn’t just training. It was transformational.
Clarus tailored its Clear Leadership Training program for the 18-member team, incorporating the Enneagram personality framework alongside modules on communication, conflict, and high-performing teams. The design was participatory and experiential, building real trust and collaboration in the room.
Participants reported stronger self-awareness, improved communication, and a deeper understanding of their colleagues. The trust built during the program gave the team the foundation to engage in real-time collaboration and decision-making even as a new organizational structure was being rolled out during the training itself.
A state agency received a multi-million dollar federal grant to improve early childhood services and immediately faced the challenge of aligning a diverse multi-agency steering team around a shared plan. The work required both big-picture vision and careful attention to the complexity of cross-agency coordination.
Clarus designed a carefully sequenced multi-year engagement, moving from a statewide needs assessment through comprehensive strategic planning to implementation support. The process engaged 433 participants across 28 focus groups, 35 in-depth interviews, and 59 partner needs assessments.
The resulting needs assessment and strategic plan received federal approval and became a model for other states. When leadership changes threatened continuity, Clarus maintained alignment across the partner network, and when the plan was complete, the agency re-engaged Clarus to support its implementation. The agency is now recognized nationally as a leader and model in this work.
A national land conservation organization with more than 1,000 members recognized that changing environmental, cultural, and demographic trends required more than incremental adjustment — they required a transformational shift in how the organization understood and engaged its communities. Leadership needed both the insight and the internal consensus to move forward.
Clarus led a large-scale listening and learning initiative, engaging more than 650 stakeholders through in-depth interviews, focus groups, and an online survey, and guided throughout by principles of diversity, equity, inclusion, and reciprocity.
Eight key findings shaped a set of actionable recommendations for how the organization and its members could expand community engagement in conservation work. The process also built something stronger: internal consensus on a shared vision and deeper relationships with the external partners needed to carry it forward.
A conversation is the best place to start. Reach out, and we’ll talk through where you are and whether Clarus is the right partner for what’s next.
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