You can't manage time, but you can use time to manage focus

One hour, one problem, less spinning

The hardest part of being stuck inside a problem is that you're inside it. An outside facilitator doesn't have a stake in the outcome — just in making sure the room runs smoothly and stays organized around the question at-hand.

You don't need more meetings. You need a focused room, a clear frame, and someone to keep the conversation honest.

The Power Hour is a strict 60-min facilitated session for teams that need to get unstuck on one thing. We use the hour to surface what's actually blocking progress, make the conversation actionable — sometimes that's a pre-mortem — and help the team land on a clearer next step.

$1K, depending on your situation.

Book a 25-min call to see whether this is the right move. Or see more about how it works.

How it works

Power Hour is for the moment when the same issue keeps coming back and nobody wants to keep pretending that's fine. Maybe the team is split. Maybe the decision keeps being put off. Maybe everyone has opinions but no one has a clean way through.

This is not a broad strategy workshop. It's not meant to solve five problems at once. It's for one problem, one session altogether.

We stay inside the hour and work the problem in real time. We facilitate the session, keep it moving, and make sure the room doesn't disappear into side quests or circular debate. That means naming the specific issue, getting clear on what's actually being decided, working through the tension instead of sweeping it under the rug, and leaving with a sharper shared understanding of what comes next.

When it fits — and when it doesn't

It makes sense when the problem is real, the team is already in it, and what you need most is a clean hour to think together. Good fit when people are busy, but stuck in the same loop and they know it.

It's not the right fit if you need a bigger discovery process, a multi-session engagement, or a full reset. This is the smaller tool — it works best when the problem is narrow enough to hold in one room.

That said, a Power Hour often does something useful even when the problem turns out to be bigger than expected. Sometimes the hour solves the thing. Sometimes it clarifies that what you're dealing with isn't a one-session problem — it's a signal that something deeper needs attention, like a customer discovery gap or a team alignment issue that keeps resurfacing. Either outcome is worth the hour. You leave knowing which kind of problem you actually have.

Detailed benefits

Focused by design
A strict 60-minute timebox removes the drift. No wandering discussions, no side quests — just the problem in front of you and a structure that keeps the room honest.

Clarity over a bigger mess
You leave with a sharper shared understanding of the problem and a clearer sense of what comes next. Not a pile of notes, not a vague vibe.

Knows its limits
A Power Hour is often how you figure out which one you actually need — and whether the problem is narrow enough to solve in a session or bigger than you thought going in.

Case study

How ReCity turned data overload into common opportunity areas

ReCity, a Durham-based social impact hub, was 10 years in when we met — they had a coworking space, mostly filled with nonprofits. But their internal compass was spinning. A large community survey sat mostly unprocessed. Only a handful of organizations had filled it out after heavy prompting. There were too many possible directions and no shared way to decide what mattered most.

That wasn't a problem with research, they needed help with wayfinding.

So, we ran nine Power Hours over several months — short, iterative passes through what already existed, designed to reduce the material without flattening it. Three main data sources: the original survey, monthly member meeting input, and a single recurring question introduced mid-process: What is the single biggest challenge your organization currently faces?

Each pass compressed the material further. 109 challenges became 38 opportunities, then 38 became 11, organized across two focus areas: economic stability and social and community context.

What emerged confirmed something the team already sensed but couldn't act on: the challenges weren't organizational failures. Every nonprofit in the network was individually trying to solve the same funding, admin, and partnership problems. The leverage wasn't training 50+ organizations to write better grants. It was building one excellent grant-writing collaborative they could all access.

The final deliverable wasn't a report, though we did show our work. The bigger thing was a single recurring question — asked again this year, keeping the network oriented without needing another full engagement. Not a presentation. A practice set into motion.

Not the right fit? Other ways we can work together: