Founder-led & venture-backed
Companies moving from product promise to repeatable growth, stronger commercial systems and operating scale.
Operator-led advisory, studio & confidential executive counsel
Operating judgment for
consequential decisions.
Working Theory helps CEOs, boards and investors accelerate growth, improve business performance and transform how their businesses create and capture value across products, customer experience, commercial models and operations. We align product, technology, data and commercial execution, apply AI and agentic capabilities where they create practical value, and carry the work through implementation to measurable business results.
How clients engage ↓
EvidenceJudgmentResults
01 / The ethos
The hardest decisions do not belong to one function. Growth, product, customers, operations, AI and capital move together.
Working Theory brings direct COO and President-level experience to make those disciplines operate as one system. The work starts with evidence, resolves into a clear operating thesis and stays close enough to execution to know whether it worked.
02 / Who we work with
Software, data and technology businesses at consequential inflection points.
From venture-backed scale-ups through growth-equity and PE-backed companies to global enterprise platforms.
Growth-equity backed
Businesses sharpening product, monetization and go-to-market execution for the next stage of durable growth.
Private-equity backed
Companies translating a value-creation thesis into operating performance, efficiency, cash flow and enterprise value.
Enterprise platforms
Global businesses navigating major product, AI, commercial, portfolio or operating-model shifts.
Working Theory also works directly with boards and investors on value-creation priorities, operating diligence and execution.
03 / Operator-led advisory
One business.
Four connected domains.
Clients engage us when
A consequential decision crosses functions, changes the economics of the business or requires independent operating judgment.
01Growth, revenue, retention or expansion is below the potential of the business
02The product, platform or business model must change, or an important initiative has stalled between vision, delivery and go-to-market
03AI requires decisions about customer value, operating leverage and the balance of labor and capital
04Product, marketing, sales and customer teams are working through disconnected priorities, plans and accountability
05Pricing, packaging or monetization no longer reflect how customers receive value
06Product and R&D investment is outpacing commercial traction, weakening capital efficiency and free cash flow
07A major global market entry, M&A, financing or portfolio decision is ahead
08A CEO or senior executive needs independent counsel on a high-consequence decision
The advisory domains
We connect commercial performance, product, operations and capital rather than treating them as separate problems.
Growth, revenue & customer economics
Align customer insight and product strategy with sales and revenue execution across segmentation, pipeline, pricing, retention, expansion, lifecycle monetization, unit economics and global market entry, giving teams one commercial story and shared plan for winning.
Product, platform & business models
Shape product and portfolio strategy, platform consolidation, commercialization and adoption, turning AI from isolated features into customer value while shifting business models toward consumption, APIs, data products and ecosystem distribution.
Operating models, organization & AI
Build shared priorities, operating rhythms and accountability across Product, Engineering, Revenue, Marketing, Customer Success and Operations, then apply AI and agentic systems where they improve customer outcomes, execution velocity, margin and scale.
C-suite and leadership team building
Build, assess and reshape C-suite and senior leadership teams around the company’s strategy, stage and next horizon of growth. Define the mandates, decision rights, organizational structure and leadership capabilities required to execute.
Value creation, capital & corporate development
Connect operating choices to global P&L performance, capital allocation, capital structure, debt financing, EBITDA, free cash flow, M&A, portfolio consolidation and board or investor priorities.
Three ways to engage
Advisory leads. The studio follows when decisions must become results.
Every relationship is principal-led. The level of involvement expands only when the problem requires it.
04 / How we work
Evidence becomes judgment.
Judgment becomes results.
Every mandate is grounded in operating and financial evidence. Studio implementation is activated only when the client wants help carrying the decision into execution.
01
Evidence
Analyze usage, customer behavior, retention, downsell, pipeline, pricing, capacity, cycle time, unit economics and financial performance to quantify where value is created, lost or unrealized.
02
Operating thesis
Connect the evidence across growth, product, customers, operations, technology and capital, then identify the value gap and the few levers that matter.
03
Decision & sequence
Make the choices and tradeoffs explicit, define the economics, assign accountability and sequence the work around evidence, dependencies and value.
04
Implementation & value
When required, use the studio to implement alongside client teams and measure the resulting adoption, revenue, retention, efficiency, margin, cash and enterprise value.
05 / Operator's advantage
Strategy shaped
by operating reality.
Working Theory is led by Misha Williams, a former COO and President who has carried the P&L, rebuilt growth, product and operating systems, deployed governed AI and worked directly with boards and investors.
What operators say
“Within his first 90 days, he recruited an outstanding leadership team—CRO, CPO and CMO—who became instrumental drivers of growth. His most impactful achievement was breaking down long-standing silos between Sales, Marketing and Product… Misha is the kind of operator who can create alignment in chaos, and clarity in confusion.”
“Misha was one of the most effective commercial leaders I’ve worked with. He did something most companies talk about and few manage: he got Product, Marketing and Sales working as one team. He built the shared rhythms, language and accountability that aligned what we built, how we positioned it and how we sold it. You could see it in AgentSpark: one story, one set of priorities and a shared plan for winning.”
“Misha brings discipline to complexity without slowing people down. When Spark had struggled to find its footing, he became its champion, created a focused six-week sprint and aligned Product, Sales, Marketing and Customer Success behind a successful delivery and real go-to-market motion across sales-led and product-led growth. At the same time, he pushed us beyond adding AI features, reframing how customers could access, use and derive value from GWI’s data. That thinking shaped AgentSpark and the broader move toward an AI-native business.”
“He drives to results, thinking strategically, utilizing data-based analysis, making key decisions and then executing on them, all while being a true professional with a calm demeanor and the ability to get things done.”
“Misha has a clear and deep understanding of how the application of technology and processes can change the trajectory of an organization. I worked with Misha as we launched Salesforce’s Analytics Cloud.”
“The platform team at FreeWheel was one of the best teams I’d worked on in my career. We achieved incredible results, and no doubt Misha had a lot to do with that as the leader.”
Misha Williams in the media
06 / Founder
Misha Williams has held multiple COO and President roles across 20+ years building and leading software, data and technology businesses. His experience spans Fortune 50 and Fortune 500 platforms including Comcast/FreeWheel, Salesforce and Texas Instruments; Permira- and Stripes-backed GWI; Y Combinator- and Avenir-backed Cotera; and Audax-backed Pipeline360. His accountability has ranged from $100M to $1B+ across North America, EMEA, APAC and LATAM, working directly with boards and investors.
He has built executive teams and led multidisciplinary organizations across Product, Design and Experience, Engineering, Revenue, Marketing, Partnerships, Customer Success and Operations. At Comcast/FreeWheel, he progressed from leading a 300-person global organization to US platform sales and a $1B+ global P&L, consolidating 60+ products into six platform P&Ls, expanding internationally and integrating Beeswax. At Salesforce, he commercialized AI, IoT, analytics and Marketing Cloud capabilities; as founder and CEO of Ceres Media A.I., he built an API-driven audience intelligence platform.
At GWI, Misha built and shipped Agent Spark through a governed MCP API to ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini and Claude, expanding the business beyond seat-based SaaS into consumption, API and AI-platform partnerships. At Pipeline360, he was appointed interim COO by the CEO and Audax Private Equity to transform the customer, services and sales model, where he developed the AI and agentic strategy and built AgentOS, a governed human-in-the-loop operating system. Through Working Theory, he works directly with CEOs, C-suite leaders, boards and investors, remaining principal-led while assembling specialist studio capabilities when mandates move into implementation.
Engage Working Theory ↗Begin with the consequential problem.
Let’s develop a
working theory.
Start a conversation ↗
Operator-led advisory, studio implementation and confidential counsel for consequential business decisions.