For owner-managers and leadership teams
Make critical decisions with clarity and move strategy forward.
Set direction, make the difficult choices and build the capabilities to act on them. The tools draw on 30 years of leadership experience. AI challenges, you decide.
The tools build on methods used in real strategy engagements.
What are you facing right now?
Start with the issue that matters now.
30+ years
International executive leadership
From decision to execution
Decisions, strategy and negotiation
Human judgement
AI supports the work. Leaders remain accountable.
Why this exists
Most companies can produce an analysis. The hard part is holding on to the choices once daily operations fill the calendar again.
In an owner-managed company, strategy competes with daily operations for time and attention. There is rarely a dedicated strategy function, and the hardest choices can end up with one person. The tools provide a consistent process and access to challenge between meetings, and when the leadership team needs a facilitated conversation, we join the room.
- 01
The strategy process never gets started
Everyone knows it is missing, but daily operations take over, and no one has run a strategy process before. The tool takes you through it step by step.
- 02
The big decisions are made alone
Without a board or a leadership team to challenge your thinking, the hardest choices are made in your own head. Up to six advisers challenge you before you commit.
- 03
The challenge arrives when it is too late
A time-boxed engagement can provide strong challenge, but the decisions continue after the last meeting. That is why the method and the challenge have to be usable day to day, in-house.
Our services
One method, delivered through three tools your team can use directly.
The method from our facilitated engagements, turned into digital self-service tools: AI supports the analysis and challenges you along the way, while the decisions remain yours. They complement the personal advisory work they grew out of.
01 · The direction
Strategy Lab
Upscale Bridge takes you through seven steps from analysis to a one-page strategy: real financials, a critical SWOT that ends in a conclusion, and Must Win Battles with owners and targets.
Use it when
- The company needs to set a clear direction, not just make one choice
- The leadership team must agree on what you say no to
- The strategy has to fit on one page with owners and targets
One page. Owners and targets. Your own words.
02 · The choice
Decision Room
Your own advisory board: nine named advisers. The chair selects the six most relevant to your case and guides you through the decision. Assumptions are tested, alternatives made explicit, and the ownership is yours.
Use it when
- One important choice must be made, and you want to be challenged before you commit
- The assumptions behind the choice must be tested systematically
- The decision has to be explainable afterwards
You come away with a stronger decision, a clear rationale and clear accountability.
03 · The capability to act
Education Lab
Online programmes with an AI sparring partner you can practise against in realistic situations. The first, forhandlingsuddannelse.dk, is live today.
Use it when
- The direction is set and the organisation must carry it through
- A real negotiation is coming up within a month
- The capability must be trained against a counterpart, not just read
You practise the method and receive a certificate when you complete the programme.
See it work
One company, three tools, one year.
This is how the three fit together in practice. The example combines characteristics commonly found in Danish mid-sized companies and is not taken from one client. What comes out of each step is exactly what the tools produce.
The starting point
A manufacturer with 45 employees and DKK 62m in revenue. Grown by saying yes to everything. The owner-manager cannot get the leadership team to agree on what to cut, and there is no board to ask.
See the journey step by stepSee the journey step by step
- Strategy LabMarch
Direction is missing, and the leadership team talks past each other.
Six to eight hours across the bridge, split however it suits. The coach asks the questions, the leadership team writes the answers.
What comes out
- A SWOT that ends in a conclusion, not in a list
- Three Must Win Battles with owner, target and deadline
- The strategy on one page, and a PowerPoint you can edit yourselves
The value
For the first time the leadership team agrees on what they say no to. It is on one page everyone can see.
The first battle runs into a concrete choice: the largest customer demands an eight percent discount.
Twenty minutes. The decision goes on the table, the chair seats six advisers, and each takes it on from their own seat.
What comes out
- The paths on the table, with what each one gives and costs
- A recommendation with its reasoning, and the weakest point said out loud
- The assumptions written down, so they can be revisited later
The value
The choice can be explained to the owners, and the alternatives you ruled out are there in black and white.
- Education LabJune
The decision has to be negotiated, and it is the head of sales who must do it.
Eight modules at your own pace, and training against an AI counterpart that negotiates back.
What comes out
- A prepared Inverted T for that exact conversation
- A debrief after every training round
- A certificate once the final test is passed
The value
The negotiation is run by someone who has trained that exact conversation, and who knows their walk-away point in advance.
The next strategy review
One Must Win Battle is complete, while another needs adjusting because the market has moved. The team returns to the process, and last time's context is saved, so the leadership team can build on the work already done.
What the year cost
- Strategy Lab, one project
- DKK 9,995
- Decision Room, annual access
- DKK 4,995
- Negotiation programme, one seat
- DKK 1,196
- Total, excl. VAT
- DKK 16,186
The method and the company's context stay in the tools, so you can build on them when the next decision comes up, and the challenge is there the day the customer calls. If you want a facilitated engagement along the way, it can be arranged.
How to get startedHow it connects
Three tools in one connected process.
Strategy Lab sets the direction. Decision Room makes the critical choices along the way. Education Lab builds the capabilities that carry the strategy into action. Then again, when the market moves. One company context ties the tools together, so what you enter in one place makes the next one faster.
04 · The learning
Again, when the market moves. The context is saved, so the next round builds on the work already done.
Shared foundation
Company Context
- Company facts
- Leadership input
- Prior decisions
Shared only with your approval
Each tool makes the next one better.
Indspil
Perspectives for better decisionsfrom Upscale Strategy
A contribution, when there is something worth saying.
The tools challenge your own case. The newsletter does it continuously and for free: lessons from working with strategy, critical decisions and negotiation, always with evidence.
No. 1 · 3 September 2026 · In Danish
Beslutningerne, du træffer alene, er de dyreste
Most SME leaders face the decisive choices alone. Research suggests leaders want more strategic sparring than they get. In Danish.
Read the newsletter
Experience from clients and engagements
Credibility is built through decisions that move the business.
Here are selected examples of what the work has contributed to.
We have received highly competent advice. The follow up has been excellent, and every task has been handled in a structured way, at a high level and at speed. Our work with Claus has exceeded our expectations.
Selected engagements
01 · Strategic focus
Unlimit Group
Market analysis, leadership workshops and a new strategy helped the company move from operating its own stores to focusing on its technology platform.
02 · Commercial proof
From proposition to launch
Commercial strategy, narrative and access to decision makers helped turn an ingredient proposition into a product launch through a recognised Danish brand and national retailer.
What the first users said
What the first users say.
“Den største styrke er, at du får forhandlingsteori gjort enkelt, konkret og operationelt uden at gøre det banalt. Der er en klar rød tråd fra fundament og strategi over forberedelse og spørgeteknik til selve forhandlingen og afslutningen. Det omvendte T, fokus på interesser frem for positioner, variabler og byttehandler og arbejdet med BATNA, mandat og grænser er værktøjer, jeg kan se mig selv bruge direkte i praksis. Også for en person med mange års kommerciel erfaring gav det mig en mere stringent struktur og flere konkrete greb, jeg kan tage med videre.”
Allan Bodal
Commercial and Sales Leader (in Danish)
Forhandlingsuddannelsen
“Jeg bliver meget mere bevidst om, hvordan jeg skal planlægge og angribe en forhandling. Det omvendte T er rigtig, rigtig godt, og skabelonen er virkelig brugbar. NegoBot virker virkelig stærk: jeg gav den komplekse problemstillinger, og den var meget skarp. Jeg har fået alternativer og spørgsmål på banen til min næste forhandling.”
Michael Løvstad Libens
Direktør (in Danish)
Forhandlingsuddannelsen
“Som gammel strategiforsker er jeg imponeret over den brugbare og relevante feedback, dine AI-agenter giver på de cases og dilemmaer, jeg beder om hjælp til. Jeg fik seriøst modspil og nye vinkler på min egen forretning. Og en forretningsidé, jeg har haft i tankerne, blev lagt ned til fordel for en anden. Kill your darlings! Det var tiltrængt feedback. Fedt at se AI blive brugt så vedkommende og konstruktivt på både forretningsudvikling og strategi.”
Claus Nygaard
Professor, direktør og strategisk AI-rådgiver. Offentlig kommentar på LinkedIn, september 2026 (in Danish)
Upscale Strategy
Shortened, used with their permission or taken from their own public comments. The words are their own.
The principle behind the tools
A disciplined process that keeps the decision with the leaders.
The tools make the basis for a decision visible and challenge the most important assumptions. AI contributes to the analysis, while leadership makes the decision and sees it through.
01
Frame the question
Clarify the decision, the stakes and the evidence required.
02
Challenge the logic
Test assumptions, alternatives and commercial consequences.
03
Decide together
Make the choice explicit and build a rationale the team can explain.
04
Mobilise action
Translate the decision into priorities, ownership and follow through.
Built on more than 30 years of leadership experience
The tools first. A facilitated engagement when the leadership team needs it.
Claus Dahlmann Larsen brings more than 30 years of international leadership experience across strategy, commercial development, organisation and negotiation. The method in the tools is his. And when a decision or a strategy process calls for a physical meeting or a facilitated engagement, he is one click away.
- International executive leadership
- Strategy and commercial development
- In-person meetings and facilitated engagements when needed
Start with the decision
A stronger decision starts with a focused conversation.
If your leadership team is facing a strategic or commercial question with real consequences, start with a confidential conversation about the situation, the decision and what meaningful progress would look like for your team.
A focused first conversation. You do not need anything prepared.