Strategic advisory for CEOs of growing technology companies
Your company is growing, but the choices are not getting easier. Which customers deserve your attention? What can your team decide on its own? And what does AI actually change for your business? I help CEOs and founders get those questions clear and pick a direction.
Strategic advisory by Stephan Engelen, former CEO and international technology executive, with more than 25 years of experience running and growing technology companies. He holds an executive certificate in AI and Business Strategy from MIT Sloan.
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Where does your company run into friction?
A full calendar is not the same as a clear strategy. When growth stalls or your organisation struggles to keep pace, it helps to step back. SEMCOR provides strategic business advisory for technology companies that want to choose more deliberately where they are heading.
Growing without everything running through you
When every decision ends up with the founder, that founder becomes the brake on growth. We look at where responsibilities are unclear and which decisions the team can take over. That gives scaling an organisational shape too, not only a commercial one.
Sharpening strategy and go-to-market
Assumptions that worked with ten people rarely still work at fifty or more. I test your growth strategy with you: which customers are you genuinely relevant to, why do they choose you, and how do you reach them? That focuses commercial effort and makes the choices about new markets explicit.
A leadership team that decides together
A team that nods in the meeting and then decides separately lacks a shared course. I work with CEOs on clear responsibilities, room for dissent and agreements on who decides what. The question is whether the team reaches a decision without you in the room.
AI and technology from the business strategy
Not every AI application deserves an investment. We examine where AI changes your offering, customer relationships or way of working, and where it mostly distracts. The business strategy is the starting point, not the technology itself.
How we work on your strategy
The question behind the question
We start at the decision you are wrestling with and the context of your company. Not at a standard model that has to fit everywhere.
Testing assumptions
We look at what you know, what you assume, and where your leadership team sees things differently. That shows which choices are backed and where evidence is still missing.
Making choices workable
A direction is only useful if your team knows what it means. We translate the choices into priorities, responsibilities and next steps.
Your sounding board: Stephan Engelen
I am Stephan Engelen, a former international technology executive and CEO with more than 25 years at Cisco and Philips, and involvement in more than 30 technology start-ups and scale-ups as an executive, advisor and investor. My expertise lies in SaaS, data and AI. I hold an executive certificate in AI and Business Strategy from MIT Sloan.
Related advisory
- Growth strategy for CEOs of growing technology companies
- Managing organisational complexity as your company grows
- A market approach that grows with your company
- Team accountability: decisions do not all have to land with you
- Understanding AI impact before the market decides for you
- Scaling Beyond the Founder
- AI’s Prisoner’s Dilemma
Frequently asked questions about strategic advisory
What is strategic advisory?
Strategic advisory helps a business leader pick a direction: which customers and markets take centre stage, where do you invest, and what do you deliberately not do? At SEMCOR that also covers the organisation and the leadership needed to make those choices real.
Which companies is this for?
This advisory is aimed at CEOs and their leadership teams of growing technology companies, in practice usually growth companies and scale-ups. The starting point is the strategic decision you as a business leader have to take: growth, customer choice, organisation or the role of AI. If you are active in another field, we first look together whether my experience fits your question.
When is an external strategic sounding board useful?
For example when growth stays too dependent on the founder, you are considering a new market, your leadership team holds different priorities, or you are unsure about the impact of AI. An external partner can question assumptions without being part of the daily decision-making.
Can we work in Dutch or German?
Yes. SEMCOR is based in Antwerp and works with companies across the Benelux in Dutch, English or German.
Which decision is on your mind?
Tell me where your company stands and which strategic question you want to discuss. From Antwerp I work with founders and leadership teams across the Benelux. The first conversation is free and without obligation.