Building brilliant teams with founders who give a damn.
Fractional people support and founder coaching for scaling startups. Helping you make the right calls on people, structure, and culture.
TRUSTED BY
STARTUP CULTURE IS THE FOUNDER.
Your culture started the day you founded your company.
You can’t ‘define’ it, it’s already there. In the way that people take their cues from you. It’s what you care about, and how you respond to pressure. Everything you do sets the tone. Over time, your instincts turn into the culture your team works in.
That can be a brilliant thing. It can also be exhausting, if everything is still running on what only you know and decide. Performance conversations you’re avoiding. Hiring decisions that feel high stakes and slightly guessy. Managers doing their best, without clear expectations. The same tensions crop up again and again.
The goal isn’t to build a “perfect HR function.” It’s to build a company that feels energising to lead and to work in - clear enough that people know what they’re doing, human enough that it still feels like the place you wanted to build.
That’s the work I do with founders - turning your instincts, values and intent into people decisions, systems and conversations that actually match the company you’re trying to build.
Download our services guide
Download our services guide
How we work together
From quick start people support to a full fractional people team, we flex with your startup needs.
people counsel
For founders who want a thinking partner on people decisions
The easiest way to work with me. Two sessions a month, async support for the things that can’t wait, and real help with the people decisions you don’t want to make alone.
People sprints
For the thing you keep pushing to next quarter
Focused, scoped projects that take one important piece of people work from half-formed in your head to something clear, useful and working in the company
people retainer
For founders who need deeper, more embedded support
I take on 1-2 retainers at a time so I can work as your Head of People. We blend strategy, coaching and implementation. Every retainer starts with a discovery month, then grows into the level of support your team actually needs.
other ways i love to plug into your team
I also deliver work that doesn’t always fit neatly into a single box, such as workshops and offsites, manager and leadership development, coaching, and psychometrics.
Sometimes these sit inside a bigger engagement. Other times they stand alone. Either way, they’re some of my favourite things to build and facilitate.
If you’re thinking your company might be ready for something like this, I’d love to talk.
who you’ll work with
Business Psychologist | Executive Coach | Head of People
I've spent 15+ years working alongside founders to build high-care, high-trust teams - from bootstrapped startups up to Series C, across the UK, EU, and US.
I've held Head of People roles inside scaling companies. I know what it's like when every decision feels high stakes and you're having to make it up as you go.
That's why I trained as a coach and completed a Master's in Organisational Psychology, because I'm obsessed with how early people decisions stick around.
My research focuses on organisational ghosts: the way founders imprint on their businesses, and how those moments cast long shadows as companies grow.
I don't treat culture as separate from the business. Every people decision is a commercial decision. I'm comfortable with ambiguity, calm under pressure, and focused on helping founders make good calls when things are messy (without losing your values along the way).
15+ founder-led startups backed
We’ve seen it all.
95 % + clients stick around
We build real relationships.
100 % referral-led growth
Built on trust.
truly Exceptional People Person
“
Danielle is truly an exceptional people person. Great people are rare finds at the best of times, but HR folk that can also think commercially and strategically are particularly rare.”
Natasha Guerra (CEO, Runway East)
You don’t need to figure the people side out alone.
Tell me what’s happening in your team and we’ll work out what actually makes sense for your stage.
STARTUPS STAY HAUNTED BY THEIR PAST.
If you're building a company and something feels harder than it should - this may explain why.
I’ve spent a year studying how early founder decisions become invisible scripts that shape culture long after the moment has passed.
I call them organisational ghosts.
This research explores how founder identity imprints culture, why startup environments amplify early patterns, and why those patterns persist as you scale. A lens for understanding what your team has already inherited.
If you want to understand the system you're building - not just react to it - this is for you.