One operator. No associates. The work is done by the person you meet.
MAGE is a founder-led advisory practice. That means when you hire MAGE, you work with Lucius directly — not a framework handed to a junior, not a methodology delivered by someone who read the brief on the train. Hands-on, from the first conversation to the last deliverable.
Lucius Sayles
Founder, MAGE Consultancy
"Most owner-managed businesses do not have an advice problem. They have an execution problem. They know what needs doing. What they need is someone who has done it — and who will stay in the room until it is done."
Lucius has worked across independent recruitment agencies, lettings and estate agencies, a residential and mixed-use property portfolio, and early-stage technology businesses. The common thread is the same set of problems: pricing held under pressure, people developed deliberately, operations that do not depend on the owner to function, and a weekly rhythm of decisions made on numbers rather than feel.
He has been in the room when fees were conceded, when consultants left at the wrong moment, when capital was allocated by default rather than by design. He has also been in the room when those patterns were reversed — and knows what the reversal actually takes, as distinct from what it looks like on a slide.
MAGE was built to make that experience available to owner-managed businesses without a corporate advisory price tag and without the junior delivery that usually comes with it.
Built from doing, not advising from the outside.
MAGE draws on a specific set of hands-on commercial experiences. Not a portfolio of engagements with large corporates — direct involvement in the kinds of businesses MAGE now works with.
Independent recruitment agencies
Hands-on work with independently owned recruitment businesses on fee margin, consultant development, BD cadence and operating model. The full cycle — from diagnosis to implementation to the point where the changes hold without external support.
Lettings and estate agencies
Advisory work with independent agencies competing against online disruptors. Fee structure review, landlord acquisition strategy, staff incentive design, and the compliance positioning that translates operational competence into a commercial differentiator.
£10m property portfolio — four years
Four years of direct involvement with a residential and mixed-use property portfolio. Asset-level performance review, rent positioning, capital allocation, and the operating model that turned a collection of assets into a coherent, manageable business.
Technology start-up advisory
Advisory work with an early-stage technology company on niche identification, market positioning and go-to-market sequencing. Helping a pre-scale product focus its commercial energy on the markets where it was most likely to win — and decline the ones where it was not.
Start-up launch
Direct experience building a business from inception: commercial model design, early hiring, the first client relationships, and the operating disciplines that allow a small team to deliver consistently without the founder managing every detail.
M · A · G · E
Four disciplines. Applied together, in sequence, to the specific problems of each business.
Management
Operating model, team structure, and the rhythms that let the business run without the owner at the centre of every decision.
See servicesAdvisory
Strategy, positioning, and the commercial decisions that compound — pricing, niche, capital allocation, and where to focus next.
See servicesGrowth
BD discipline, client acquisition, team development, and the pipeline cadence that builds revenue without depending on one or two people.
See servicesExecution
Implementation, change management, and staying in the room until the work is done — not just until the recommendations have been delivered.
See servicesWhat a founder-led practice means in practice.
The person you meet does the work.
No associates, no junior delivery, no handover after the pitch. Lucius runs every engagement from start to finish.
Operator experience, not just advisory experience.
The recommendations come from having been in the same room, with the same pressures. Not from a framework applied from the outside.
Confidential by default.
Owner-managed businesses share sensitive commercial information to get useful help. Every enquiry and engagement is treated as confidential.
Sized for owner-managed businesses.
MAGE is not a scaled advisory business. It is a practice deliberately sized to serve a small number of businesses well — not a large number of businesses adequately.