Build the
People Operating System
your business needs
to scale.
For founder-led agencies and consultancies where growth is quietly outpacing how the business actually runs.
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We design your People Operating System — the leadership rhythms, decision rights, and role clarity that let your team operate without everything flowing back to you.
Who This Is For
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Founder-led agencies & boutique consulting firms
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12–50 employees
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Growing fast enough that the way you've always run things is starting to show the cracks
The 12-25 Person Shift
There’s a predictable stage in founder-led firms.
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At 8–10 people, culture carries you.
At 15+, structure starts to matter.
By 25, the strain becomes visible.
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You may notice:
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Managers unsure where their authority starts and stops
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Tools and processes layered on top of each other
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Inconsistent standards emerging across teams
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People working harder to compensate for unclear systems
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A growing sense that everything still comes back to you
This is not a people problem. It's a systems problem — and it's completely predictable at this stage.
Left unaddressed, complexity compounds. The friction becomes the business.
Design the system
That shapes the Employee
Experience
Employee Experience isn't a culture initiative or a perks strategy.
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It's the lived outcome of how your business actually operates — how decisions get made, how leaders behave day-to-day, how roles are defined, and how work flows.
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In the early days, a strong founder and a tight-knit team carry the culture. But as you grow, that stops being enough. Experience becomes inconsistent. Standards drift. And what worked at 10 people starts to break at 25.
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That's where the People Operating System comes in.
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It's the intentional design of how your business runs — the decision rights, leadership rhythms, role clarity, and management scaffolding that make great experience possible at scale. Not just for your team. For your clients. And for you.
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When the system is clear, people know what's expected and feel set up to succeed. When people feel set up to succeed, performance follows. And when performance follows, growth becomes sustainable.
How We Work Together
2
Targeted EX Sprints
Once your operating system is in place, we tackle what's still slowing performance — leadership capability, onboarding, role clarity, or retention risk.
3
Ongoing Advisory
For founders who want ongoing strategic guidance as they scale. Your People OS evolves as your business does — so structure never falls behind growth again.
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Meet Our Founder
Clare Willenberg
Before founding The Happy Hive Co., Clare spent 15 years in the agency world — advising global brands and operating within fast-paced, client-service businesses.
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She understands:
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Junior-heavy delivery models
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Founder dependency
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Client pressure cycles
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The reality of scaling without internal infrastructure
Her work bridges commercial agency experience with operational design — helping founder-led firms scale without losing clarity, culture or control.
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Frequently asked questions
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