The situation
An advisory board seat at a friend's new private aviation advisory firm, from formation. No fee, no stake; he paid me in jet hours.
Brandon Holdridge, a founder with an elite brokerage record and a real book of clients, running a small team, who had never hired past a team he inherited, let anyone go, or sold a company.
Someone in the room for the decisions he had not made before, and, when a buyer came, someone to explain his value to a much larger organization in that organization's own terms.
Treat the seat as availability, not governance. Run the sale ourselves, no banker, no broker. Spend the negotiation on what he was bringing before arguing about the number.
Once his value was framed the way the buyer would price it, the offer doubled, quickly. The sale closed in November 2025. I do not claim the price; it is his.
Read on
The decision and the reasoning
Why we did it this way, told first.
ReadWhat we did and what it produced
The work, decision by decision, and the result.
ReadA slice of the project list
A few related projects.
ReadPrivate side
The full report, the source files on record, the timeline and every figure with its source. Password.
Enter