“We approved the strategy months ago. Why does everything still run the old way?”
“How do we make AI genuinely useful to our teams — beyond the pilot?”
“Our results framework satisfies donors. Why doesn’t it help us decide anything?”
The strategy is approved. What actually changes on Monday?
I make approved strategy operational inside international organisations: governance, prioritisation, and the delivery decisions that make it real.
60% → 95% project completion. 100+ projects, 20+ countries.
The gap
Approval is not adoption.
Where strategy stops.
The strategy isn’t the problem. The system it lands in is.
About
Hi, I'm Ale.
Strategy doesn't fail on paper. It fails on Monday morning, when teams go back to work and nothing has actually changed for them. I've spent twenty years inside international organisations closing that gap, and I've come to love both halves of the job: building a strategy that can survive a matrix structure and an earmarked budget, and doing the unglamorous work of making one that's already been approved actually move. Give me a tangled problem and a room full of people who disagree about it, and I'm in my element.
I'm endlessly curious and a forever-student, always learning something new, always asking what we're really trying to solve. I simplify, I connect the dots, and I make change feel like something people are part of, not something happening to them.
Off the clock, I'm a mum, a cat person 🐱 (don't worry, I love dogs too), and happiest under water. I'm a certified Divemaster 🤿🐠, and the ocean is where I connect my own dots.
Brazilian–Portuguese, based in Europe · Portuguese (native), English & Spanish (fluent), French (intermediate) · MA International Development (Distinction), University of Westminster · PRINCE2
Sixty seconds
Strategy, sailing, and why you never dive alone.
Music: “Wholesome” by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) · CC BY 4.0
Photo & video: Cristina Lopes
What I do
How I Help
Strategy that deliversFlagship
Strategic portfolio management · value-driven prioritisation · value realisation · operationalising strategy
Governance and decision rights that say who decides what, at every level. Prioritisation that names what stops, not only what starts. A portfolio view of the whole, and a results framework built to steer rather than to report. This is the work between an approved strategy and what teams actually do on Monday.
Approval is not adoption.
The Delivery Readiness Review, and two cases it produced
Music: “Cheery Monday” by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) · CC BY 4.0
Where to start
How I usually start.
I stage the work rather than selling one package at three sizes, because organisations arrive here from different starting points and the right first step depends on what you already have in place. Each step below stands on its own, so nothing commits you to the one after it.
Delivery Readiness Review
A strategy has been approved and the open question is whether the organisation can deliver it. Working back from the outcomes the strategy promised to the people it serves, I trace the five mechanisms above and report which of them support delivery, which constrain it, and in what order the constraints have to be lifted.
Instrument · The Monday-Morning Test
You get a short report naming what will stall delivery, and the first move on each. See the method and two case studies · Download the product sheet
Operating Model Alignment
Where the review finds that the strategy cannot command the work, this rebuilds the connection between them: decision rights that say who decides what, prioritisation criteria that name what stops rather than only what starts, and a portfolio view of the whole.
A Results Framework That Shows What to Decide
A framework built to report to funders will rarely tell management anything it can act on. This turns it into one that does, by giving every indicator the threshold that forces action and the person who acts once it is crossed.
Other ways I help
Digital & AI transformation
Digital transformation strategy · responsible AI adoption
Responsible digital and AI that earns its place: governance first, starting with data, so the tools make work easier.
Music: “Deliberate Thought” by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) · CC BY 4.0
Advising leaders & boards
Executive and board advisory · governance design
A trusted outside head for leaders facing reform or ambiguity: naming the real problem and co-creating the answer.
Resource mobilization & partnerships
Resource mobilization · partnership development
Durable funding from both sides of the table. The next cycle is won on the first day of delivering this one.
Selected impact
What “made real” looks like.
Two decades of experience across funders, implementers & partners
How I work
Change your teams are part of.
Connecting the dots
I map what change means for the people living it: the gains, the losses, the fears. Then I find win-win answers.
Trust, before and when conditions shift
Trust comes from the clarity of every interaction, especially when conditions change.
Co-creation, not handover
Solutions are built with your teams, which is why they keep working long after I've gone.
Get in touch
Tell me what you're navigating: a strategy that won't land, a reform that's stalled, a digital investment that needs to earn its place. And if you're not yet sure where the real problem sits, that's often the first thing we'll figure out together.
Strategy, made real.