Events, sales, and consulting services at Walt Disney World Resort, then Producer at Walt Disney Imagineering running 200+ projects a year. Fortune 100 operating standards, learned by doing.
Groups to 7,500+$10M budgetsWalt Disney Imagineering
About Tess
An operator who has sat in the seat.
More than twenty years leading growth and change, from The Walt Disney Company and Walt Disney Imagineering to the operator’s chair at a fast-scaling company. I don’t advise from the outside. I’ve done the job.
The story
A builder, for as long as I can remember.
I’ve been building things since I was a kid, always poking at how something’s done and asking if there’s a better way. That turned into a career: a marketing and event management degree, my CMP, and more than twenty years leading teams, including a long run at The Walt Disney Company, doing everything from corporate events and sales at Walt Disney World Resort to consulting services and a stint as a Producer at Walt Disney Imagineering.
I’ve sat in the chair. I know what it feels like when growth outruns the systems carrying it.
I helped take a company from $8M to $40M in four years, integrated six acquisitions, and watched turnover fall from 32% to 8%. Same lesson every time: a business only grows as far as its people and its systems can carry it.
That’s the work I love now. Coaching the operators who run the business, and the owner-operators who count on them, so they can stop firefighting, step back, and get to the part only they can do.
Where I go deep
- Operations and systems built to scale
- People, culture, and leadership development
- Change management that actually sticks
- Turning strategy into day-to-day execution
Tess Honan, CMP, Founder
The path
Four chapters, one throughline.
Big-company discipline, then years applying it inside growing businesses. Different industries, same job: make the people and the systems grow together.
Took a plateaued firm and rebuilt it to scale. The engagement behind the numbers on this site.
$8M → $40MTurnover 32% → 8%6 acquisitions integratedCapacity 8 → 20+/mo
Culture, talent, and learning architecture in healthcare. Continuous improvement in tax and financial services, cutting new-hire ramp time by 40%.
Culture & changeLearning systems25% process efficiency
Coaching the operators who run the business, and stepping into the seat when a company needs it. Creative design, construction, professional services, hospitality, and more.
Fractional COO & CPOExecutive coachingEOS Integrator
Nurture the people. Pressure the processes. Protect the creativity.
Experience includes
The Walt Disney Company · Walt Disney Imagineering · CMP · EOS Integrator · 20+ years leading growth
Professional services · construction & design-build · creative design · hospitality · financial institutions · special events · growers & retail
Beyond the work
Curiosity is the throughline.
I’m a certified sommelier, and a pretty relentless traveler and cook. What I love is figuring out how something’s made and what makes it great. Turns out that’s the same thing I do for a business.
The patience of a tasting, the pull of a new place, the care that goes into a good meal. It’s all the same instinct, and it’s the one I bring to your team.
Good systems don’t make people serve the machine. They free people up to do their best work.
Let’s talk
Let’s find out if we’re a fit.
Tell me where the business, or the seat, has you stuck. We’ll start with a discovery call, just a real conversation about what’s going on and how I can help.
Connect
linkedin.com/in/tess-honan
Where
Based in Greater Orlando, working with clients anywhere