What this is
Course Correction is a focused intervention that restores clarity, alignment, and momentum when critical brand, marketing, or creative work goes off course.
When a launch falls flat, a rebrand fails to resonate, or a team keeps shipping work that meets the brief but misses the mark — most leaders already know something is wrong. The harder problem is not being able to name exactly what, or knowing how to fix it fast enough to matter.
Left unaddressed, issues compound. Pressure creates shortcuts. Shortcuts produce weak work, fractured teams, and expensive cycles of revision, hesitation, and blame. The deeper cost is what never happens: the insight that never surfaces, the clarity that never lands, the opportunity the team was too overwhelmed to recognize.
Eliza and Courtney built this practice for this moment.
Eliza takes a brand's complexity and turns it into a clear strategic direction — the brief, the audience definition, the platform idea, the facilitated session that gets a stuck team aligned and moving in two days. Courtney understands how things are actually made, how they reach the market, and how to translate strategic direction into something a team can build and a consumer can feel.
We have each worked on both sides of the table — inside global agencies and the organizations they serve. We know where gaps form and how to close them.
Contents
01 What We Offer
02 Our Approach
03 Who It’s For
04 What Others Said
05 Why This Works
06 Why Eliza & Courtney
07 How We Begin
08 Case Studies
01 What We Offer
The Restoration Sprint
In as short as 7 business days when time is critical.
All engagements begin with The Outside Read — a focused, senior-led assessment that establishes a fast, independent read on what is actually happening before deeper work begins.
The Restoration Sprint is a focused, senior-led intervention designed for moments when something is off and decisions cannot wait. We determine what is actually happening, align the team around what needs to change, and move the work forward with clarity and conviction.
Over two to three weeks, or seven business days when time is critical, we move teams from ambiguity to alignment and from stalled work to clear direction.
The outcome is not just a fixed project. It is a team that can think clearly, make decisions without distortion, and build what's next with conviction. It is a team that knows where it is going and is energized to build it.
We restore the conditions that allow strong work to happen.
02 Our Approach
A typical engagement moves a team from unclear diagnosis to aligned leadership and actionable direction within two to three weeks. We determine what is actually happening, align the people who need to decide, and translate that into action for the team. Every engagement follows a three-part sequence tailored to the situation.
Diagnose.
Restore.
Advance.
Diagnose —
Diagnose establishes an accurate understanding of the situation across strategy, execution, and how the team is working. We identify where the breakdown lives and whether it is rooted in delivery, decision-making, direction, or a combination, including whether the current trajectory still makes sense.
What we do:
- Stakeholder interviews and structured conversations
- Review of strategy, briefs, and existing work
- Rapid synthesis to identify the root issue
What we deliver:
- A clear diagnosis of what is happening
- Clarity on executional versus directional issues
- A foundation for alignment and action
Align —
Restore aligns the people who need to agree around what needs to happen next. Through facilitated sessions, we resolve competing perspectives and re-establish leadership alignment.
What we do:
- Facilitated working sessions with core stakeholders
- Structured conversations to resolve disagreement
- Co-creation of a clear direction
What we deliver:
- Alignment across leadership
- A direction the team believes in
- A team that can make decisions together
Advance —
Produces a concrete output: a recalibrated brief, a new creative direction, a platform framework, or a decision -making structure that allows the work to move forward quickly and with confidence.
What we do:
- Development of the core output
- Translation into clear, usable guidance
- Refinement with the team
What we deliver:
- A recalibrated brief, creative direction, platform, or decision structure
- Direction that translates into execution
- Momentum beyond the sprint
This method does more than align teams. It enables them to generate strong, clear thinking under pressure and move forward with confidence.
03 Who It’s For
This engagement is designed for senior leaders responsible for mobilizing teams in high-stakes moments.
We work with Chief Marketing Officers, Chief Creative Officers, and Heads of Design who have been put in charge of teams or systems that are not working as they should, leaders who can see something is off but cannot yet clearly name why, and need to act quickly.
Typical situations include a campaign off course under time pressure, a growth or transition moment where the current approach no longer works, or a leadership transition requiring rapid alignment of a legacy team.
We typically work with consumer, CPG, and technology companies with established brands and internal teams, from $100M to multi-billion in revenue.
08 What Others Said
“Watch out for Eliza’s insatiable intellect, deep marketing chops and energetic presence. We met just after she joined Microsoft – she on the Office brand portfolio and I on the Microsoft brand – and our paths stayed connected from then on. She brought a fresh perspective to our brand strategy and immediately sought ways to elevate the topic to senior leadership by speaking the language of the business. Eliza led the investigation and storytelling that linked the Office brand to business impact, which triggered my team to benchmark and build on that work. Eliza does not accept the status quo – she is a change agent who thinks customer-first and who is fast to think through ramifications and uncover opportunities for brand growth and innovation.” - Susan Betts, Former Brand Strategist at Google, Microsoft, and Future Brand
“Courtney’s taste level, collaborative spirit, sense of modernity — and artistry — truly elevated the work we did. Our task was to elevate our perception with customers, and with her design leadership, we did just that in measurable ways.” - Sam Chang, Former Creative Director, Copy + Content at Walmart Creative Studio
04 Why It Works
This works because it addresses the problem at the level it exists: how decisions are made, how teams align, and whether the current trajectory is viable. We clarify the present and determine what needs to change.
We do not hand teams a deliverable and walk away. We rebuild the conditions for strong work and leave teams able to continue.
05 Why Eliza & Courtney
Together, we span the range from diagnosis to delivery, determining what is actually happening, what needs to change, and what work the team can confidently move forward with.
We have worked on both sides of the table — inside global agencies and within the organizations they serve. We understand what great work actually requires: how briefs need to be framed, where miscommunication quietly takes root, and what often goes unsaid between clients and agencies. We also know how proximity to a business and its culture can gradually narrow perspective until the brand and consumer stop translating for each other, leaving teams aligned to different parts of the picture without realizing it. We know where these gaps form — on both sides — and how to close them.
Eliza Yvette Esquivel brings over two decades of strategy leadership at global scale, senior roles at Microsoft, Mondelēz, FutureBrand, Wieden+Kennedy, and TBWA\Chiat\Day, and work spanning Nike, Coca-Cola, Clinique, McDonald’s, and American Express. She identifies what is actually happening and what must change.
Courtney Hardt brings twenty years of creative leadership at the intersection of product, brand, and campaign, spanning Ralph Lauren, Coach, Stitch Fix, Walmart, and the co-founding of a Clinton Global Initiative recognized nonprofit. She ensures direction becomes something real, built, and experienced.
06 How We Begin
The Outside Read
All engagements begin with The Outside Read.
This is a focused, senior-led assessment designed to bring an independent perspective to a situation the team is too close to see clearly. We review key materials, speak directly with the primary decision-maker, and cut through internal narratives to establish a clear point of view on what is actually happening and what needs to change.
The Outside Read produces a concise, high-confidence assessment that names the core issue and clarifies whether the problem is rooted in execution, direction, or both. It is designed to give leadership the clarity to act, and the language to make the case internally for what comes next.
This is distinct from the Diagnose phase of the Restoration Sprint. The Outside Read is a fast, external point of view. The Diagnose phase is a deeper, embedded process that engages the broader team, tests and expands that point of view, and uses it to drive alignment and action.
The Outside Read stands on its own, but also establishes the foundation for the Sprint if deeper intervention is required.
07 Case Studies
Clinique
Led a high-pressure global campaign sprint for an in-house studio team under a compressed six-business-day timeline. Conducted stakeholder interviews, designed and facilitated two full-day workshops using structured creative methodology, and delivered a recalibrated brief and three platform ideas with full strategic rationale. Moved a team that was misaligned and stuck to a clear, unified creative direction with immediate executive alignment.
Walmart
Led strategic and creative repositioning of Walmart's beauty and fashion categories at a critical growth pivot, shifting consumer perception from discount to destination. Operated as the senior strategy function for an in-house agency without one — diagnosing the gap between what the creative team was producing and what the brand needed, and redirecting accordingly.
WildLife Works
Led a strategy sprint to reposition a global conservation organization at a narrative inflection point. Integrated foresight, behavioral insight, and audience research to shift the brand's market story from transactional to relational — strengthening trust, differentiation, and leadership positioning at a moment of significant organizational change.
McDonald’s
Brought into a crisis moment when the brand faced significant reputational pressure around children's health. Led global children's well-being strategy across a cross-functional leadership team, resulting in the global addition of apple slices to the Happy Meal — making McDonald's the world's largest distributor of apples. A course correction that became a long-term brand and product platform.
