Northstar Health is a digital health company offering a subscription-based care navigation app for employers and health plans. The company generated $84M in revenue last year, serves 2.1M covered lives, and operates in a crowded market with larger incumbents bundling navigation, telehealth, and benefits advocacy. Northstar's leadership has set three company priorities for the next 12 months: (1) grow enterprise revenue, (2) improve gross margin, and (3) reduce member churn. You are the new Strategy Manager, and the COO wants a practical approach to ensure your team's work stays tightly aligned to those priorities rather than becoming a collection of disconnected projects.
Northstar has a 14-person strategy and operations team supporting sales, product, customer success, and partnerships. Over the last two quarters, the team launched 11 initiatives, but only 4 were clearly tied to annual goals. Several senior leaders believe the team is spread too thin: product wants more custom client requests, sales wants faster RFP support, and customer success wants retention programs for at-risk accounts. The CEO has asked for a recommendation on how to align strategy work to company priorities, including what to stop, how to prioritize new work, and how to measure whether the portfolio is actually advancing company goals.
| Metric | Current | Target / Benchmark |
|---|---|---|
| Annual revenue | $84M | $100M next year |
| Gross margin | 58% | 64% next year |
| Annual logo churn | 12% | 8% next year |
| Enterprise sales cycle | 7 months | 6 months target |
| Strategy team capacity | 14 FTEs | No headcount increase |
Additional operating facts:
As the Strategy Manager, prepare a recommendation for the COO: