The Business Case

The Compounding Cost of
an Unprepared Manager.

Most organizations do not have a manager problem. They have a profit problem being created by unprepared managers. Every leadership mistake compounds across people, customers, operations, and financial performance.

SHRM

50–200%

of an employee's annual salary. That is what it typically costs to replace them, depending on the role.

Gallup

18%

of annual salary is lost to disengagement, per employee, in lost productivity every year.

Gallup

70%

of the variance in team engagement is attributable to the manager. One person moves nearly every metric.

The Takeaway

The true cost is not one employee leaving. It is the compounding effect of turnover, disengagement, lost productivity, weaker customer experience, and the time senior leaders spend fixing preventable management problems. Investing in a new manager before those costs compound is one of the highest-ROI decisions an organization can make.

Where the Compounding Comes From

Turnover Is Just the Line Item You Can See.

Top Performer Flight

High performers leave poor managers first. Expertise, customer relationships, and institutional knowledge walk out with them.

Customer Experience

Inconsistent service. More complaints. Lower retention. Weaker reviews. It shows up in revenue before it shows up in HR.

Senior Leader Time

You become the coach, the mediator, the escalation path. Hours spent fixing what should have been prevented.

HR Workload

More investigations, performance plans, employee relations issues, exit interviews, recruiting, and onboarding.

Burnout & Absenteeism

Top performers absorb the drag until they cannot anymore. Sick days rise. Overtime rises. Schedule disruptions rise.

Slower Decisions

New managers avoid hard conversations, delay decisions, or make inconsistent calls that create confusion downstream.

Psychological Safety

Employees stop sharing ideas, raising concerns, or challenging bad decisions. Innovation quietly evaporates.

Training Waste

Employees learn new skills that never get reinforced. Money spent on training that does not change behavior.

Employer Brand

Online reviews. Word of mouth. Every future hire gets harder and more expensive.

Who It's For

Managers and Leads.
Especially the Newly Promoted.

Newly Promoted Managers

Strong individual contributors just handed a team. Common language before the habits harden.

Existing Managers & Leads

Running teams without formal training. Ready to trade improvisation for a real toolkit.

Multi-Site Employers

One consistent language for managers across every location. Your standards, delivered the same way.

Growing or Acquired Orgs

Building the leadership bench during a growth phase, or aligning a newly acquired team to a shared way of working.

Our Approach

Companies promote their best doers into management without preparing them to lead.

Inconsistent management across locations. Blurred lines between doing the work and leading it. Avoidable HR escalations. Good employees leaving under untrained managers.

The pattern is predictable, and expensive.

Manager Foundations is a framework, not a fixed curriculum.

We keep the core consistent: an outcomes-first design, a four-day rhythm, and a fixed Day 1.

We customize everything else around your company. Which topics we teach. How deep we go. The language, the examples, and the outcomes we build toward.

The same offering, delivered across very different companies, and still built for each one.

The break between blocks is not a pause. It is where the program earns its return. Two to six weeks on the job with the frameworks fresh, the language shared across the cohort, and a check-in that keeps the work moving. Block 2 opens with what actually happened, not what was supposed to.

Every topic ends with a specific commitment. Not takeaways. Actions. Participants leave each day naming what they will try, with whom, and by when. That is what makes behavior stick after the coach leaves the room.

Program Format

Four Days.
One Rhythm.

$2,950/person

+ $3,500 one-time discovery & customization fee, per cohort

Block 1 · Onsite

Two days at your location

Day 1: Profit & Cash® (Alexa + Michael) + Team Effectiveness (Alexa) · Day 2: Foundations begins

The Break

Two to six weeks

Apply on the job. LMS reinforcement and a check-in.

Block 2 · Onsite

Two more days at your location

Days 3 and 4 continue the topics selected with leadership during discovery.

Cohort Minimum

Six participants. Sizes and locations flex.

Built Around You

The Core Stays. Everything Else Is Tailored To You.

Same framework across companies. Never the same delivery.

Stays Consistent

The Core

Four-day rhythm. Two blocks with an intentional break.
Fixed Day 1. Profit & Cash® in the morning, Team Effectiveness with Predictive Index in the afternoon.
Outcomes-first design. Every topic built backward from what changes six months out.
Minimum six participants. Per-person pricing.

We Tailor

Everything Else

Which 6 to 9 topics we teach. Days 2 through 4, built from the menu below.
Depth and sequence. Two to three topics per day, each with teach, practice, and debrief.
Language and examples. Your values, your review process, your HR practices, your goals.
Cohort size and locations. Whatever fits above the six-person minimum.

How Every Program Begins

Day One Is Always the Same.

Two half-days that give everything after them a reason to matter.

Morning · Financial Intelligence

Profit & Cash® Simulation

Hands-on business simulation

A hands-on game that turns financials into decisions every leader can read and act on. Step one: understand the business.

Afternoon · Team Effectiveness

People-Awareness & Behavioral Insights

Data-driven, not personality-typing

Read behavioral styles and learn to adapt, using the Predictive Index assessment. Step two: understand yourself and others.

Predictive Index is our recommended assessment. Alternatives can be discussed.

Days 2 to 4 · The Foundations

The Foundations, Tailored to Your Team.

Together we select 6 to 9 topics, 2 to 3 per day, drawn from four core pillars. Depth beats breadth. Every topic anchored to an outcome you care about.

Pillar 1

Lead Yourself

IC-to-leader mindset shift
Emotional intelligence
Time and priorities
Leading former peers

Pillar 2

Communicate & Coach

Adapting to communication styles
Effective one-on-ones
Coaching basics (GROW)
Feedback that lands

Pillar 3

Drive Accountability

Setting clear expectations
Delegation
Accountability conversations
Recognition and motivation

Pillar 4

Conflict & Change

Difficult conversations
Conflict resolution
HR basics and escalation
Change management (ADKAR)

Success Six Months Out

Measured by What Changes, Not What's Covered.

Every topic is built backward from a specific outcome. Discovery locks the exact ones for your team.

01

Leaders lead differently.

Consistent management behavior across every site.

02

Managers handle the hard stuff.

Accountability conversations, difficult feedback, and escalations, handled with confidence and consistency.

03

Employees have a better experience.

Clearer expectations, better one-on-ones, feedback that lands.

04

HR sees fewer avoidable escalations.

Issues get handled at the manager level, not routed upward.

05

Business results improve.

Retention, productivity, and execution move because your leaders move.

Your Facilitators

The Coaches Who Deliver the Program.

Alexa Lott, SHRM-SCP

Executive Talent & Leadership Strategist

Leads the program. Co-leads Day 1 Profit & Cash® with Michael.

Alexa partners with leaders and organizations to scale their people, sharpen their strategy, and expand their impact. 30+ years in HR leadership. Senior certified HR leader and certified coach in Gallup CliftonStrengths, Predictive Index, and Kolbe. National speaker on leadership, employee ownership, and the future of work. VP of Communications for the Heart of America Chapter of The ESOP Association.

Michael Northrup

Director of Sales & Operations

Co-leads Day 1 Profit & Cash® with Alexa.

Michael's career spans Business Development, Operations, Sales, and Management across industries from Four Seasons Hotel Boston to Springfield Remanufacturing Corporation and PFSbrands. His passion is helping employees at every level understand business and financial literacy, and see how they influence company performance. Active advocate for employee-owned companies, ESOP Association member, and NCEO speaker.

Investment

The Line Item You Choose Instead.

One prevented departure. One re-engaged team. One senior leader who gets their time back. Any of them earn back the investment several times over.

Program

$2,950 / person

Covers all four days, materials, Predictive Index assessments, LMS reinforcement, and a certified GRITT coach on site.

Discovery & Customization

$3,500 / cohort

One-time fee, per cohort. Reduced or waived for a repeat cohort at the same client reusing the same curriculum.

Example

10-person cohort = $29,500 + $3,500 discovery fee = $33,000 total

Minimum six participants. Cohort sizes and locations flex.

Client covers travel & accommodations. Not included in the totals above.

Where This Fits

Foundations First.
Depth Comes Later.

Manager Foundations is Tier 1 in the GRITT leadership development ladder.

This program

Tier 1