About Us
Your vision,
our expertise
At HD&U, we’ve found most business owners start their journey with a vision of the business they are creating or buying, and are propelled by a dream of what it would feel like to own a thriving version of that business. But reality is different and, over time, that dream can become buried under a mountain of stress, challenges, or uncertainty.
Helping you rejuvenate your business and the experience of owning it, and re-igniting the spark that once drove you to start in the first place, we’re dedicated to helping pioneering business owners find enjoyment and fulfilment in their work as they rediscover their love for the job.
Putting the ‘U’ in HD&U
At HD&U, we take a humanistic approach to our business consulting solutions. Working with you as a collaborative team, experienced advisors, and your dedicated support network, we take the time to fully understand every layer of your business to get to the core of what makes your company tick, and what challenges it needs to overcome in order to thrive.
From high-ranking managers to employees on the ground, we work alongside you and your teams to deliver tailored support, expert guidance, and learning & development solutions that fit your needs, budget, and time constraints. Offering direction, improving performance, developing strategies, and building a positive culture that values teamwork and staff engagement, we’re committed to empowering your company to become more agile, sustainable, and ultimately, more profitable.
How we work with U
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Diagnose
We’ll assess your business and identify potential roadblocks to growth
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Strategise and Plan
Establish key goals and objectives, and map out your journey to success
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Implement Change
Execute plans and key projects to overcome the challenges we’ve identified
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High-Performance Growth
Close capability gaps, nurture skills, and improve the way teams work together to achieve shared objectives
Not your typical business consultants
Narrowly targeted business consulting services are usually limited in how much they can bring about change. At HD&U, we take a whole-of-business approach by analysing your business from top to bottom to identify and resolve issues. Making proactive changes that prevent future problems from arising, we also uncover hidden opportunities for growth and improvement.
Our team of business consultants include Turnaround, Change, Finance, Business Improvement, Leadership, and HR professionals who work together to support business owners, leaders, and teams at every level of your company.
HD&U combines cutting edge business consulting and coaching techniques with the experience and qualifications of a team of specialists, as well as the unparalleled transparency, alignment, and accountability of the TeamLife platform. This allows us to blend management consulting, business coaching, and advisory services into a complete solution tailored to your exact needs and goals.
Meet the team
James Dalton
James brings a diversity of experience and ideas resulting from having worked at a global advisory firm and his own performance improvement consulting practice. He commenced his career with KPMG Audit, transitioning to KPMG Consulting in the supply chain practice, followed by a corporate role at Sensis prior to working in his own consulting practice. In 2006, James returned to KPMG and worked in the Transactions and Restructuring Practice in both New York and Melbourne during the global financial crisis.
He has a wide range of experience in financial restructuring, due diligence assignments, trust account audits, rent roll sale & purchase, operational restructuring, and performance improvement from the small & middle market to multi-national organisations. During his career, he has assessed and developed business plans, designed and implemented solutions to improve performance and effect business turnaround, undertaken business reviews (from a strategic and operational perspective) on behalf of secured lenders, and performed due diligence assessments.
Over the years, James has worked in many sectors, including residential and commercial real estate, listed property funds management, retail, consumer markets, telecommunications, health care, IT, and mining.
Most recently, James led and operated Neil Dalton Consulting (NDC), a boutique practice specialising in providing trust auditing, due diligence, rent roll sale & purchase advice, and business improvement services to Real Estate clients. The Neil Dalton Consulting brand is now owned and operated by HD&U.
Stuart Hayes
Working with some of the world’s leading advisory and consulting firms as a ‘CEO & Mr Fix-It’, Stuart spent over a decade parachuting into unique situations or ailing companies and assuming the role of CEO to get to the bottom of why a business was under-performing. He would then quickly turn things around by transforming the business and its people from the ground up.
Training and working with some of the most elite consulting organisations, including KPMG, Andersen, and Deloitte, Stuart has been a business leader and a professional CEO in Australia, Asia, and the UK, working in diverse environments from governments to private companies.
In 2002, Stuart made the conscious decision to step away from the hustle and bustle of a corporate career to bring his extensive learning, training, and experience to everyday businesses and entrepreneurs. Stuart is driven by a passion for delivering advice, coaching, support, and leadership services that transform SMBs and empower teams for success.
Claudia Navarao
Rani Blake
Rani is renowned for her person centered approach to everything she does, and for thriving upon helping people to enjoy life more. Be it creating special moments, solving problems, finding solutions, or providing a change in perspective, Rani will pull up her sleeves and get the job done!
With experience across various industries and roles, including healthcare, education, hospitality, design, fashion, wellbeing & business ownership. Rani’s accumulated knowledge and skills means she is able to support our team and clients across multiple aspects of business from group work and facilitation to administration, research and client services.
Rani’s inclination to ‘go the extra mile' to deliver quality products and services is recognised and appreciated by all. Not just by us at HD&U, but by our clients as well.
See the results
Case Study 1
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Earthmoving Equipment Wholesaler
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Construction & Mining
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60
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- Previously market leading 45 yr old family business
- Run down by new owners.
- Now losing money rapidly, poor financial records, stale brand, employees aggrieved & customers angry
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- Initiate engagement program to reconnect staff to the business,
- Reinvigorate brand, and restructure sales tactics to approach customers in a new way.
- Coordinate strategic investment to allow the business to form the cornerstone of a larger enterprise with other industry participants
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Within 10 months:
- Doubled revenue
- Established engaged culture
- Raised $10m capital and acquired two smaller enterprises
- Improved operational systems
Case Study 2
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Engineering Consultancy
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Professional Services
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80
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- Established 50 yr old Consulting business
- Haemorrhaging staff due to industry competition
- Losing credibility with customers and losing profitability due to additional costs of operations
- Limited succession of leadership options
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- Construct a high performance culture and
- Introduce Emerging Leader program to improve identification & development of leaders
- Design and launch an employee share scheme
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Within 18 months:
- Approximately 30% of all staff owned shares
- Staff engagement at all time high
- Staff losses stopped
Case Study 3
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Capital Equipment Supplier
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Power Generation
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25
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- Profitability destroyed by poor leadership, to the extent the business was arguably involvement
- Staff unhappy and not confident with owner
- Legal actions with the both #1 customer and #1 supplier
- Loss of exclusivity to sell most profitable product
- Owner ‘lost’, emotional and feeling desperate
- Poor accountability & alignment of staff towards strategy
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- Initiate engagement program to reconnect staff to the business,
- Reinvigorate brand, restructure sales tactics to approach customers in a new way.
- Construct a high performance culture
- Reorganise business and tighten operational systems
- Recruit & onboard new leadership group
- Improve governance and establish board of directors
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Within 18 months:
- Revenue doubles previous all time record
- Staff engagement at all time high
- Legal actions all settled
- Locked in long term contracts with ky customers to guarantee revenue
- Oboarded new leadership group
- Established Board of Directors
- Owner happy in new role on Board, and confident business is moving forward the right way
Case Study 4
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Commercial Cleaning Services
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Professional Trades
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50
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- Micromanagement of owner was stifling growth of profitable business
- Staff unhappy and divided, culture toxic
- Mixed accountability and poor alignment of staff
- Owner worn out from highly intensive and ‘manual’ nature of business
- Revenue had hit maximum and flattened for 4 years
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- Initiate engagement program to reconnect staff to the business,
- Construct a high performance culture
- Reorganise business and systems, and introduce software platforms to simplify operational management
- Recruit & onboard new leaders
- Develop all staff
- Improve governance
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Within 30 months:
- Revenue reaches 6x previous all time record!
- Staff engagement at all time high
- Onboarded new leadership group
- Established Advisory Board
- Owner happy in new role on Board, and confident business is moving forward the right way
Case Study 5
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Small & stumbling manufacturer
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Manufacturing
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20
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- Bold vision but lacking strategic direction & plans
- Poor risk management
- Poor accountability
- No people & culture plans
- Sporadic & un-systemised sales & marketing
- No cash
- Owner not drawing wages and living off credit
- Staff claiming owner owes them ‘shares’
- Poor agility
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- Built forward cash model and guided owner to manage through crisis, to reach break even, then profitability
- Resolved claims on equity and restructured company group
- Identified step-by-step approach to sales and reorganised team
- Improved operational systems
- Introduced governance
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Within 18 months:
- Business profitable
- Record sales & improved market share
- Improved production standards, and lowered unit costs
- Strong management processes, reporting and accountability
Case Study 6
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Micro manufacturing Start Up
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Food Manufacturing
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5
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- Well-branded business with great product
- Lack of action oriented business plan
- Owner inexperienced as a leader and struggling
- Poor accountability & alignment systems
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- Mentored owner to clarify plans to achieve strategy, and create and implement systems and accountability structures to ensure team achieved them
- Creation of performance dashboard
- Implemented OKR
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Within 9 months:
- Strong visibility of performance drivers in real-time
- OKR embedded
- Lifted market share
A history of delivering quality services
Stuart Hayes and James Dalton have long been driven by a passion for helping businesses realise their full potential. With years of experience transforming ailing companies into thriving businesses, Stuart and James have now come together to form HD&U.
HD&U stands for Hayes, Dalton, and You: A partnership combining the extensive experience and unique expertise of two industry juggernauts … and You!
Our Accreditations
Get in touch
To learn more about our business consulting services or book a discovery call, please fill out the form below. One of our experienced business consultants will be with you shortly to answer any questions or organise a discussion.