For Investors
You evaluate the market, the technology, and the team. You almost never evaluate the operating structure that has to deliver on the thesis. 65% of portfolio failures are attributed to people and organizational issues. The due diligence missed it because it wasn't looking.
Structural diagnosis for investors operates at three levels. Before the check, after the close, and when something needs to change. Same method — different depth, different timeline.
Your due diligence evaluates the market, the technology, and the team. It almost never evaluates the operating structure that has to deliver on the thesis.
Read →Can this founder scale? The usual assessment is personal. Structural assessment reveals the problem is almost never the founder. It's the organisational design around the founder.
Read →Climate tech is not SaaS. The operating model assumptions from software investing don't transfer to companies with hardware, regulatory dependencies, and project-based revenue.
Read →A Series B climate adaptation company with strong metrics and validated technology. The structural assessment found something the numbers couldn't show.
Read →The standard narrative says founders who can't scale need replacing. Structural assessment usually reveals the problem isn't the founder. It's the organisational design around the founder.
Read →The standard explanation is wrong hire. The structural explanation is that the org gave them title and salary but not authority.
Read →A portfolio company is underperforming. The market is there. The technology works. The team is talented. Something is broken and nobody can name it.
Read →A Series A clean energy company with missed targets, two COO departures, and board-level frustration. The problem wasn't the people.
Read →The pattern: portfolio company struggling, hire a COO, COO burns out within 18 months. The role isn't the problem. The organisational design is.
Read →The check is written. The company is struggling. Board advice isn't working. You've told the founder to fix the org three times. Nothing sticks. That's where structural diagnosis starts.
Read →What hiring a structural diagnostician looks like. From a two-week pre-investment assessment to six months of organisational redesign.
Read →Your DD evaluates the market opportunity and the impact metrics. It doesn't evaluate whether the organization can structurally deliver on either.
Market narrative and physical science disagree on where climate capital is needed. The data points to sectors where small capital has outsized impact.
Read →Family office direct investing in climate tech is structurally different from fund investing. Standard financial DD misses the organizational risks that determine whether the company can deliver.
Read →Impact frameworks evaluate outputs: carbon reduced, people served, SDGs aligned. They don't evaluate whether the organisation can sustain those outputs.
Read →87% of millennial UHNW individuals consider social impact when investing. 30% of their parents do. The content industry frames this as a values conversation. It's an organisational design problem.
Read →Climate tech carries organizational complexity that SaaS frameworks can't see. The failure modes are structural, predictable, and invisible to standard due diligence.
Read →Family Offices
Fewer bets. Longer horizons. Higher stakes. Family offices entering climate tech bring financial evaluation expertise but need structural diagnosis the standard DD process doesn't cover.
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