CongruenceTM: The Operator’s Guide To High Value Companies

A One Company methodology to maximize value creation, optimize capital efficiency, and sustain profitability across the company’s entire lifecycle.

The best companies in the world achieve congruent value exchange between all stakeholders—customers, investors, employees, partners, and society.

The Congruence^TM method offers thoughtful operators an intrinsic, value-focused, and system-thinking method that covers every relevant lever of a company while side-stepping common value-limiting distractions.

Congruence360: A Purpose, Strategy, and Operations Alignment Partnership.

Hands-on partnership to uncover value creation and capital efficiency challenges and empower evolutionary transformation to build a system-centered congruent company.

Incongruences between fundamental building blocks are the #1 challenge every company faces, not competitors or economic cycles.

We partner with mid-market executive teams to deploy our fast-paced, high-impact, and productized method to maximize congruence across purpose, strategy, and operations. Minimizing incongruence maximizes value creation, capital efficiency, and sustainable profitability.

Diagnose360: Self-Assess Level of CongruenceTM & Maturity.

An executive team and board diagnostic to self-assess the entire company in 1 hour.

Diagnose360 is our self-administered assessment, which sits atop the Congruence^TM Method. It reveals the Level of Congruence between purpose, strategy, and operations across the company and returns quantitative scoring and unique qualitative recommendations.

The assessment is optimal to kick-start an internal evolution cycle, exit readiness assessment, or acquisition diligence of a target.

Blueprints and Sparks

Forward-looking predictions and decision-making considerations tailored for executive teams, board directors, and influential operators.

Blueprints are long-form essays that explore the why, what, and how of company-level topics.

Sparks are shorts that connect day-to-day behavioral data points with significant trends that will come to pass.

Vision

The proliferation of profitable holistic companies that aspire for congruent value exchange between all stakeholders throughout their lifecycle.

Our Story

For two decades, I searched for an answer to the questions, “What is a ‘good’ company?” and “How must we build and manage a ‘good’ company?” I can summarize my lessons from doing hands-on work across all functions and seniority levels at over four dozen companies in two ideas.

Each company is most likely to achieve its optimal outcomes when it focuses intently on optimizing value exchange between its unique stakeholders—customers, investors, employees, partners, and society.

Every company has incongruences between its purpose, strategy, and operations, which directly cause value creation and delivery challenges, capital inefficiency, and unsustainability. Methodically maximizing and maintaining alignment between purpose, strategy, and operations is the only path to optimizing value exchange between our unique stakeholders.

These two ideas are the foundation of Acumes’ pillars and its three core philosophies: one company mindset, focus on fundamentals, and system thinking.

John Oommen

Principal Congruence Architect

John is a seasoned purpose, strategy, and operations leader with over 20 years of experience working with Fortune 100, private equity, and venture capital companies in consulting and internal roles. He creates value through board-level purpose framing, company-wide strategy development, planning, and operations design, and hands-on execution enablement across various sectors, including hardware and software technology, business services, manufacturing, supply chain and logistics, energy and utilities, and financial services.

John's key strength is his ability to collaborate with board members, CEOs, and COOs to develop company-level strategy while aligning operations with that strategy. He is a cross-functional leader who is equally comfortable working with frontline value creators and executives. Throughout his career, he has built and led analytical SWAT teams and large operational teams, focusing on sustainable value creation and profitable outcomes.

John holds an MBA from Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management, is an electrical engineer, and is a General Electric-certified Six Sigma Black Belt. He developed the Congruence^TM method and authored "The Spiral Stairway: The System To Build A Holistic Company," a guide for critical-thinking executives and operators. Based in Chicago, John enjoys exploring different cultures, is a fitness enthusiast, and shares his insights through thought leadership content.