Meet Team Wakeman
Most consultants advise from the sidelines. We roll up our sleeves and work inside your business. We diagnose what’s broken, fix what matters most and run your operations until you’re ready to own them.
Team Wakeman brings together expert fractional operators and deep subject matter specialists who’ve scaled businesses before. We don’t just tell you what to do. We embed within your team, implement proven systems, transfer capability and create operational freedom that lets you lead rather than firefight.
Simon Wakeman
Principal Consultant & Fractional COO
Simon has been working as an independent fractional COO since 2023. During his 26 year career, he’s scaled technology-focused growth companies as founder, MD, COO and board member including successful exits. He’s led organic and acquisition-based growth across professional services, operations, technology and marketing. Simon is also an ICF accredited executive coach and holds non-executive roles with technology businesses, social enterprises and charities.
Sarah Harris
Fractional COO
With over a decade leading operational transformations, Sarah helps founder-led businesses scale with confidence, clarity and leadership that actually works. As a fractional COO, ICF certified leadership coach and MBACP counsellor, she brings a rare combination of operational discipline and deep behavioural insight to growth-stage companies. She’s rebuilt teams, redesigned commercial models, guided acquisitions, and helped founders level up how they think, decide and lead.
Jo Wakeman
Consultant – People
Jo is a CIPD-qualified HR & people consultant with more than 20 years’ experience across multiple sectors. At Team Wakeman she specialises in helping founders build high-performing teams and navigate sensitive people challenges with strategic, no-nonsense guidance that combines commercial insight with deep operational expertise, creating the people foundations for scalable growth. Jo is also a qualified executive coach and mediator.
Manish Kapur
Consultant – Practices & Technology
With over 25 years in the creative industry, Manish brings creative insight and operational expertise to help scale-up founders escape operational chaos and build businesses that scale. His career began at 17 in a book design firm and ended three months later when he was fired. That led him to master early Mac technology at a B2B agency, eventually rising to Executive Operations Director at Design Bridge and Partners, one of the world’s largest design agencies.
Becky Orpin
Founder’s Assistant
Becky has been a Virtual Assistant since 2017, bringing more than 15 years’ PA experience across marketing, advertising, events and charity sectors. Becky helps founders reclaim their time by handling essential administrative and operational tasks with flexibility and efficiency. She takes care of the little jobs that drain energy, freeing founders to focus on strategic work and the parts of their business they love most.
Rachel Bland
Consultant – People, Practices & Technology
Rachel brings hard-won expertise to help founders escape founder dependency and build businesses that run without them. With over 15 years consulting experience, Her career spans Big 4 consulting, private equity-backed and leading transformation across the UK and New Zealand. Rachel doesn’t just design systems; she embeds them, stays until they work, and leaves founders with businesses that scale.
Build your business operating system
Team Wakeman helps founders who are trapped by operational chaos in growing businesses to build their business operating system – getting their people, practices and technology to work seamlessly together to remove blockers and accelerate scaling.
Our services