ghSMART & Co: Building and Scaling a Time Smart Firm

"For ghSMART, freedom is the first principle from which all good things flow”—Geoff Smart, Chairman and Founder, ghSMART. ghSMART was a leadership advisory firm that was grounded in the principle of freedom. Talented Consultants and Partners could work remotely from where they wanted to, they could work on whatever they wanted to, and with whoever they like. There was no up-or-out culture, and employees were rewarded based on outcomes, not hours worked. In January 2022, ghSMART & Company conducted a comprehensive review of its 12-year performance, revealing remarkable growth with nearly $100 million in revenue by 2021 and a strong reputation for employee satisfaction and client impact. However, after a decade of success, the firm faced challenges related to its freedom-based culture, including difficulties in promoting self-sustaining partners, limited knowledge sharing, and uncoordinated innovation efforts. To shape its future, the firm’s leadership had identified five key questions regarding maintaining its culture, formalizing promotion policies, decentralizing or centralizing innovation, geographic expansion, and the possibility of going public to address capital constraints. This case discusses these questions, and the central question of whether the company should change or keep their freedom-first culture as the company continued to expand.