When a Series B fintech approached us, they were running five projects with a small, scrappy team. Twelve months later, they needed to run fifty. The old approach — informal, hero-dependent, communication-by-Slack — wasn't going to scale.
The Challenge
The company's culture valued speed and autonomy. Any solution that felt bureaucratic would be rejected immediately. We needed to add just enough structure to enable scale without killing the startup energy.
Lightweight Governance
We introduced a three-tier project classification system. Small projects got minimal governance — just a one-page brief and weekly check-ins. Medium projects added a stakeholder map and monthly steering. Large projects got full governance with dedicated PMO support.
Scalable Tooling
Instead of mandating a single PM tool, we established integration standards. Any tool was fine as long as it fed key metrics into a central dashboard. This respected team autonomy while giving leadership visibility.
The Results
Within six months, the company was running 35 projects with better visibility than they'd had with five. On-time delivery improved from 40% to 78%. The CEO's comment: "We finally know what's going on without micromanaging."