Operator-led coaching & advisory · $10M+ companies
More than coaches.
More than advisors.
Former CEOs who’ve been where you are.
We coach. We advise. We hold you accountable. We teach.
Capstone partners are experienced operators — CEOs, founders, and public company executives who have run companies, navigated exits, and built high-performance teams. We work with the CEO and the leadership team to improve alignment, execution, and performance across the whole business.
How we show up
Four roles. One partner who has run a company.
Most CEOs get one of these from an outside advisor. Capstone partners bring all four, because a CEO’s problems don’t arrive one category at a time.
We coach
One-on-one with the CEO on the decisions, the pressure, and the blind spots that come with the job — from someone who has sat in the same chair.
We advise
On the business itself: strategy, growth, go-to-market, organization, capital, and exit readiness. Operating judgment, not theory.
We hold you accountable
Quarterly priorities, leading indicators, and an operating rhythm — with a partner who follows up on what you said you’d do.
We teach
Playbooks and tools your leadership team keeps using after we leave the room — so the capability stays inside your company.
Unlock Hidden Performance™ · Already running EOS or OKRs?
Get more from the system you already have.
Operating systems give you structure. They don’t give you judgment. When rocks keep slipping, scorecards stop driving decisions, or OKRs turn into a to-do list, the system isn’t the problem. What’s missing is someone who has run a company and can see what the system is surfacing but not solving.
Unlock Hidden Performance™ is Capstone’s approach: it works on top of what you already run — EOS®, OKRs, or your own model.
No reinstall. No new jargon. More results from what you’ve built.
- Sharper priorities. Fewer, bigger bets tied to how the company actually makes money.
- Leading indicators that matter. Scorecards that predict results, not just report them.
- Real accountability. A partner who follows up — and has the hard conversations the system can’t.
- The leadership issues underneath. The people and organizational problems that make execution stall.
What makes Capstone different
Operators first. Then coaches and advisors.
01
We’ve run companies
Every partner has run a company — from growth stage to public market. We recognize your problem because we’ve lived it.
02
We enhance — we don’t replace
Whether you run EOS, OKRs, or your own model, we make it better. The right answer is what’s right for your business, not what’s easiest for us to sell.
03
AI built into how we work
Not a separate offering. We help you build the workflows and the AI roadmap that sharpen decisions and let you compete with larger players.
04
Outcomes, not sessions
We measure success by what changes in your organization — revenue, execution, leadership effectiveness. Not hours logged.
05
Matched to your moment
Scaling, turnaround, exit prep — you work with the partner whose operating history fits your inflection point. Not whoever is available.
$100M+
Average revenue of the companies our partners have run
20+ yrs
Average partner operating experience
4 roles
Coach, advisor, accountability partner, teacher
$10M+
Founder-led, PE-backed, and public companies we serve
The Capstone partnership
Most performance problems aren’t strategy problems. They’re leadership, execution, and organizational design problems. That’s what we fix — across the full operating system of your business.
We work across everything that affects how your company performs — strategic alignment, execution cadence, leading indicators, team design, the customer and buyer journey, and management infrastructure. We enhance what’s working and address what isn’t.
Most Capstone engagements run 24–36 months, structured around quarterly priorities, monthly working sessions, and on-call access when the moment requires it. No session quota. Built around your business, not our calendar.
Client results
What changes when Capstone is in the room
All results anonymized. Industries and timeframes noted.
Technology services · 18 months
+67%
Revenue growth
Founder-CEO, $12M → $20M. Rebuilt go-to-market strategy, restructured the leadership team, implemented an accountability system. Closed the first enterprise contract in company history.
Distribution · 12 months
+41%
EBITDA improvement
PE-backed CEO, $22M company in margin compression. Identified three operational constraints, rebuilt the pricing model, restructured vendor relationships. Exceeded board targets in year one.
Professional services · 24 months
2× multiple
At exit
CEO preparing for a first exit. Built a leadership team that operated without the founder, systematized recurring revenue, prepared the financial narrative. Sold at 2× the typical exit multiple range for their industry.
Who we work with
For CEOs whose vision is outgrowing their organization
We work with CEOs of companies with $10M or more in revenue — founder-led, PE-backed, and public company executives navigating the dual complexity of running the business and managing the market.
We take a deliberately small number of engagements at any given time, so every client has a partner genuinely invested in the outcome.
- CEO or founder-CEO of a $10M+ company ready to scale or optimize
- PE-backed operator facing a board or performance mandate
- Public company CEO managing operating performance and market expectations at the same time
- Leadership team where execution has stalled or complexity has outpaced the organization
- Owner positioning the company for an exit, capital raise, or leadership transition
- Leader who wants a partner who has been there — not a system to install
Founder
Lew Jaffe
FOUNDER & MANAGING DIRECTOR
Lew has led and scaled multiple companies — ones he founded and ones where he was the hired gun, private and public, up to $750 million — including PictureTel Corporation, which he led through its sale in 2001, and Oxford Media. He served as President and COO of Verso Technologies and has been a board director or advisor to more than 50 organizations, including the public company boards of Benihana, Reed’s, and FitLife Brands.
He is also a Clinical Professor and Entrepreneur-in-Residence at Loyola Marymount University’s Fred Kiesner Center for Entrepreneurship, named Professor of the Year in 2016 and 2024. Practitioner and professor: he coaches CEOs from experience and teaches the next generation from the same playbook.
Everyone leaves a little better than how we found them.
How we work
No long contract. We earn the right to stay.
Most of our relationships last 24–36 months because growth never stops presenting new challenges — and our partners are there for all of them, often right through to an exit.
Step 01
Discovery conversation
A candid conversation about your business, your team, and your most critical challenges. No intake form. No pitch deck. We tell you quickly if we’re the right fit.
Step 02
Partner match
We match you with the partner whose operating history most closely mirrors your inflection point. Not whoever is available. Whoever is right.
Step 03
The engagement
Coaching, advisory, accountability, and teaching — structured around your performance priorities. We measure ourselves by what changes in your organization.
Capstone Performance Assessment
Where is your business leaving performance on the table?
Score yourself across 10 performance dimensions. Three minutes. Instant results, with your top three constraints identified.