IT services business coach
A business coach who has built and sold the firm you are running.
Most business coaches have never priced a consultant, carried a bench through a quiet quarter or lost a key client to a global SI. Ian Markram has done all three, built and sold his own IT services firm, and spent the years since coaching 150+ founders of IT services and systems integration firms through the same climb.
Why generic business coaching does not work for an IT services firm
A consulting firm is not a small business with a technical product. It is a margin machine built on people, utilisation and trust, and it breaks in ways a generalist never sees coming.
The advice you get from a general coach is usually sound and usually irrelevant. Set goals, delegate more, work on the business. None of it tells you why gross margin slipped four points while revenue grew, why your best consultant resigned the week after a review, or why the proposal you were certain of went to a firm with half your capability and a bigger logo.
Those are IT services problems. They have IT services answers, and they live in a handful of numbers: firm wide utilisation within five points of 75 percent, gross margin above 50 percent and known per consultant, EBIT above 15 percent or on a measured staircase toward it, no client above 30 percent of revenue, and a rate card raised in the last eighteen months. If your coach does not ask for those numbers in the first session, you have the wrong coach.
What an IT services business coach actually works on
Loading Growth coaching runs on the Loading Growth Wheel: shareholder value at the centre and nine Keys around it. Every engagement starts by scoring all nine and working the weakest first.
Loading Sales: The EBIT Dial
Utilisation, gross margin per consultant and the sales pipeline, read together on one page every Tuesday. Most founders find three to five points of EBIT here in the first 90 days without selling anything new.
Loading Rates and Loading Clients
A published rate card by grade, a discount policy with a named signatory, and a weekly client health report with a senior owner on every amber. The fastest money in the book, and the easiest to leak.
Growing IP and Growing Market
Categorise five years of engagements, name the first fixed scope offer, put a number in the value proposition, and publish one useful piece a week until the market associates the problem with your name.
Growing Leaders: The Role Reset Framework
Written leadership roles, guardrails inside which leaders can decide and fail, and a founder calendar audit that prices what the firm could do without you. This is what a buyer pays for.
The first 90 days
Coaching that does not change the numbers in a quarter is conversation. The 90 Day Sprint exists so that it does.
Weeks 1 to 2
Score and choose
Nine Keys scored, the weakest two chosen, the baseline numbers written down so progress is measurable rather than felt.
Weeks 3 to 10
Pull three levers
Three levers per Key, each with a seven day action, worked in weekly sessions with Ian and a cohort of founders a year ahead of you and a year behind.
Weeks 11 to 13
Read the result, reset
Compare the numbers to the baseline, decide what becomes standard operating rhythm, and choose the next two Keys.
What founders say
The coaching paid for itself in the first quarter through pricing alone.
With his guidance, we have revamped our sales process, improved client retention, and expanded our managed retainer program for consistent, predictable revenue.
Ian takes a very practical approach to building IT services businesses. He has been there and done it before.
Eight founders on camera and seventeen written recommendations
Who this is for, and who it is not for
- Founders of IT services, consulting and systems integration firms from 1 to 200 staff, billing for expertise rather than licences or tickets.
- Firms competing for the same programs as Accenture, Deloitte, Capgemini, DXC and the big regional SIs, and tired of losing on logo rather than capability.
- Founders who still carry the pipeline, the key relationships and most material decisions, and want a firm that is worth something without them.
- Not for MSPs or SaaS businesses. A one person consultancy is welcome; Everest Basecamp is built for it.
Questions founders ask before the first call
- How is an IT services business coach different from a general business coach?
- A general business coach works on goals, habits and accountability. An IT services business coach works on utilisation, gross margin per consultant, the rate card, client concentration, bench planning and the leadership layer, because those are the numbers that decide whether a consulting firm grows or stalls. Ian has run those numbers in his own firm and in 150+ client firms.
- Do you coach MSPs or software companies?
- No. Loading Growth works only with founders of IT services and systems integration firms: consulting, implementation, data, security, ERP and transformation practices that bill for expertise. Managed service providers and SaaS businesses have different economics and are better served elsewhere.
- What size firm is the right fit?
- Founders of IT services and SI firms from 1 to 200 staff. Everest Basecamp serves firms under 10, Ascent serves 10 to 40 where the founder is still in most decisions, and Summit serves 40 to 200 with an executive team. The Nine Keys are the same at every size; the levers you pull first change.
- Where are your clients?
- Ian is based in Sydney and works with founders around the world. Group sessions run in time zones that suit each cohort, and one to one sessions are scheduled around the founder.
- How much of my time does it take?
- Expect two to three hours a week: one session, one implementation block, and the weekly numbers. The 90 Day Sprint is designed around a founder who is still billing, not one who has stepped back.
- Can I start with the scorecard before committing to anything?
- Yes, and most founders do. The Nine Keys scorecard takes six minutes, names your weakest Key and shows the three levers to pull first. The strategy call that follows is free and there is no obligation beyond it.
Start with the number, not the pitch.
Six minutes on the Nine Keys scorecard tells you which Key is costing you margin. Forty five minutes with Ian tells you what to do about it.