Are any of these on your 2027 horizon:
- International expansion
- Athlete-to-business owner transition
- Business and family redesign
- Life and work relocation
- Business growth, pivot and global repositioning
- Leadership transition
- Personal positioning and legacy narrative work
In this post, I am outlining a couple of things to help you not only get started, but also ensure you are building on a solid foundation.
Over the past 15 years, my boutique practice has helped clients through these complex situations and life-changing decisions…
I wish that planning and succeeding were as simple as we’d like them to be. Glittery pens, colorful vision boards, numbers that make perfect sense, and odds that work in our favor.
In reality, plans rarely unfold exactly as intended. Priorities shift. Circumstances change. Some decisions take longer than expected. And sometimes, we find ourselves repeating the very patterns we said we wanted to leave behind.
Misaligned actions? Expectations that exceed available capacity? Metrics that measure the wrong things? Commitments that set us up for self-sabotage? Fear of success? Or simply too much already on our plates?
SOLID FOUNDATION
I’ve found that the issue wasn’t a lack of ambition, intelligence, ideas, or even knowledge of what needed to be done.
More often, the underlying issues were these:
1. Not seeing the actual state of the foundation.
The leaks, gaps, outdated structures, unfinished cycles, and blind spots that quietly undermine everything being built on top of them.
2. Postponing decisions that needed to be made.
Until the unresolved questions began consuming energy, limiting opportunities, and making everything else harder.
3. Knowing what needed to change, yet continuing to operate as before.
Because knowing and doing are two very different things. And the distance between them can be surprisingly costly.
This is why I’m making spaces available for my Private Strategic Assessments.
A structured, individual engagement designed to help you take stock of where you are, identify what deserves attention, and establish a considered direction for what comes next.
It includes:
- A comprehensive intake assessment.
- A private working session.
- A customized written assessment, delivered within five days of our session, with itemized recommendations organized thematically and priority of action.
- 30-day follow-up to revisit progress, questions, and emerging decisions.
- The option to apply this investment toward a larger engagement, should we decide to continue working together.
- An introduction or referral when fitting.
This is an evolved version of my original Blockbuster Quickstart Intensive that founders loved for its speed, clarity & ROI, and it draws on another decade of experience, expanded insight, and additional tools.
If this is the kind of work you need, let’s talk and ensure you can begin the next chapter with a stronger foundation and a more aligned set of priorities.
ACTIONABLE PLAN
When you know what’s working, what isn’t, what has run its course, what you are ready to move away from, and what you want to make room for…and, most importantly, how and why, the strategic planning gets a lot easier – as well as the implementation that actually leads to desired results.
So here is a sample of what we can dive into during a single Private VIP Strategic Immersion:
- International expansion:
A market-entry direction, commercial opportunity map, and prioritized relationship and business-development plan (especially US-EU). - Athlete-to-business owner transition:
Turning years of athletic expertise, reputation, and experience into next-chapter business concept, positioning direction, and commercial roadmap that takes into account an evolving personal identity. - Business and family redesign:
Adapting your business model, structure, role, and operating direction to better support the life the person is building. - Life, career, and relocation:
An integrated transition map connecting geographical moves with professional opportunities, business decisions, income, and evolving family priorities. - Business growth and repositioning:
A revised commercial direction, business-model priorities, and a practical growth plan. - Leadership transitions:
A clearer leadership mandate, role definition, decision framework, and organizational priorities. - Personal positioning and legacy:
Turning accumulated experience, expertise, and reputation into new opportunities, intellectual property, a public platform or a meaningful body of work.
It seems like such a diverse work, right? We begin where AI ends: with lived experience. The questions that matter. The things you can’t reduce to a formula. And the possibilities that emerge when you have the space to see them…
It includes:
- Pre-immersion preparation and review.
- A full day of private strategic work (virtually or in-person in Slovenia).
- A personalized Strategic Direction Brief capturing key decisions, strategic
priorities, opportunities, and recommended next steps. - 30 days of strategic integration & implementation support, including scheduled
check-ins and synchronous access for questions and decision-making. - Priority access to subsequent engagements, and a tailored proposal for the next
phase, should we decide to continue working together (for example, Fractional
Leadership, Strategic Advisory, Private Mentoring)
MOST IMPORTANTLY
It goes without saying that simply having a plan is not enough. More often than not, neither is taking daily action for the sake of ticking off the boxes. People like my clients and myself personally, we need something else to make sure our vision is being actualized…We are high achievers who have no problem showing up daily and performing at the highest level, focused, determined, even if it means going through the walls.
But what actually moves the needle…what makes mountains move off of our paths, is our energy. The undeniable conviction we can feel in our gut. The mission that fuels our fire, even on days when we don’t feel like getting out of bed. In fact, we have learned that oftentimes, doing nothing is the right thing to do, to give the physical reality time to catch up with the future we have already claimed.
Said in a less esoteric way: make sure your plan, your emotions, your mindset, and your energetics are in alignment.
And when you hit the point where where what used to work no longer does and what you are creating has no physical evidence that will work, and when you just want to quit and retreat to what you once knew (trust me, you will reach that point), your attitude makes all the difference.
If 2027 calls for a significant move, and you do not want to go at it alone, let’s start a conversation.
Sara
—Sara Oblak Speicher, MBA, is a former elite athlete now working at the intersection of business and life. Her practice brings together strategic advisory, narrative architecture, personal mentoring, and fractional leadership. A rare, multifaceted skillset that she developed over 18 years in the athletic and business ecosystems of NYC. She now resides in her 1000-year-old hometown in Alpine Slovenia, and continues to work with individuals and leadership teams. In the last few years alone, her expertise have contributed to over $60M in added value and commercial impact for clients.
