First 100 Days as Managing Director at Crux

Stephen Gilmore was appointed Crux’s Managing Director on 1 March with a clear brief: to shape the company’s next phase of growth and build on its 20-year history of excellence in product design, development, and innovation.

In his first 100 days, he has laid out his strategy for continued growth, focusing on driving ingenuity and expanding Crux’s global presence. This expansion includes the opening of a US office, significantly broadening Crux’s reach and capabilities.

Here, Stephen reflects on the challenges he has faced, his ambitions for Crux and his strategies for realising them. As a company, Crux is focused on further developing its reputation in the industry as the go-to place for inspirational design, world-class creativity and engineering excellence.

In your first 100 days as MD, what has been your primary focus?

The short answer is growth and especially our expansion into the US market. I’ve also been looking at what we can do better to equip us for the next stage of our journey. We have published our strategic roadmap across 20 key development themes and turned these into over 100 individual projects. Together we’ve already progressed about 26 to completion or near completion. The driver is constantly to improve our offering to clients in terms of both quality and reach.

What are the most significant opportunities for growth and innovation at Crux?

We are focusing on three key areas for growth: marketing, continued excellence and new opportunities.

On marketing, I believe that now is the right time for us to speak up, both to say more about what we do to a wider audience and to share thought leadership. We are taking this seriously and have appointed experienced marketing executives to showcase our expertise and wealth of service offerings. I am really pleased that this is already taking effect and people have noted our refreshed brand and increased marketing reach.

Secondly, a key factor in our growth will be repeat business, which means we must continue to deliver consistently excellent work and build our core strength as a world-class design agency. Thirdly, we must look at new opportunities. Geographically, we are expanding our US operation, based in Boston. Here, our dedicated office space will allow us to establish a strong physical presence to build on an already strong foundation and tap into the American market. We are also seeking new opportunities by actively pursuing diversification to venture into ever more specialist and niche sectors, moving beyond our traditional focus on drug delivery and consumer products.

What key challenges have you faced in your role, and how have you tackled them?

The biggest challenge has been changing my behaviour. Since I’ve already been here for over a decade, I have worked hard to change my perspective and do things differently – the hardest for me being taking off some of the hats I’ve worn before. Having been involved in developing how we work now, I have been trying to see things differently and ensure that nothing is immune from a rethink. I want our whole organisation to be in a relentless pursuit of doing things better.

Another challenge is balancing the larger strategic role of MD with keeping in touch with our work and the great colleagues who make Crux special. It is my belief that an effective leader needs to combine a long-distance view with a working appreciation of the detail and strong relationships with their teams.

What’s your proudest moment from your first 100 days as MD?

The last three months have been very exciting as we have been engaged in some of the most significant strategic projects in our 20-year history. For me, the biggest achievement has been obtaining incorporation status in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. We have formalised our bricks-and-mortar operation in Kendall Square, ‘the most innovative square mile on the globe.’ That’s the top end of where I thought we might get to in the first 100 days.

We’ve also secured two strategic secondments. Starting in the autumn, we’re sending two of our best to be resident in Boston, lead the charge there and give us top engineering and human factors expertise on the ground.

How do you envision Crux evolving under your leadership in the next year or two?

We’ve established ourselves as one of the best design consultancies in the world. Our clients value that we can comfortably deliver for them on large, strategically important projects. We will continue to play to our strengths and apply highly sophisticated, niche, problem-solving to product development within all our sectors. We’ve invested in this heavily and our evidence-led approach has served us well as a business. We intend to continue expanding this core operation and further developing our specialisms.

This will be supplemented with an ever-increasing focus on US operations. We’re on a steep growth trajectory as we have committed to Crux roughly doubling in size by 2027. I have seen us grow more than ten-fold since I started, but scaling at this level is a whole different challenge.

What is your management philosophy, and how do you apply it in your day-to-day work?

A key thing I learned from Crux’s co-founders is that you’ll always do well if you find the brightest people and are comfortable working with individuals who are more talented than yourself. Rather than forcing your ideas on them, let them come to you with their bright ideas and get behind them.
Secondly, I believe in being bold and courageous. Where others might see a challenge as complex or difficult, we’ll work to prove to ourselves that it can be done. My general philosophy is that the laws of physics are the only real barrier to achieving a specific brief.

How do you stay informed about the latest trends and developments in product design?

In my experience, there are two key ways to keep informed – building strong networks and having regular conversations with clients to understand their issues and challenges. I’ve built a wide network over two decades in the industry and believe in continuous dialogue with clients about what’s topical and important for them.

As a business, our commercial team and I always keep our ears to the ground regarding emerging technologies, whether artificial intelligence, digital twins, or how to apply the latest and greatest tools and techniques to our clients’ projects.

More than a decade ago, we looked at how to use high-end computational simulation and modelling tools as part of the development process. We got behind it with the best people, software and hardware and took the industry by storm with our ability to do that work to a world-class level. In countless cases, we’ve developed globally recognised capabilities that are unique to Crux and established at our Bristol headquarters, which is quite a nice claim. This year alone we can boast multiple “world firsts” which I find extremely rewarding.

What strategies are in place to attract and retain top talent at Crux?

Having top talent is core to our growth strategy and to get it, we focus on two areas: a robust selection process and strong personal development. This means our clients know they are dealing with the best people in the business. In selection, we are exceptionally and unapologetically picky. Our interview process gets to the heart of recruiting for attitude and aptitude in equal measure. There is no escaping the fact that the bar is very high. If you are on the team, you will need to be one of the most intelligent, capable and versatile people in the industry.

Once at Crux, we invest in your development journey. We’ve got a tailored program per function to equip people with the baseline skill sets and to evolve their capability—from CAD to simulation, brainstorming, use of statistics and mathematics, drawing standards, and soft skills like client development and running workshops.

What excites you most about the future of Crux, and how do you plan to lead the company towards that vision?

I’m glad I found consultancy as a career choice years ago. With Crux especially, what excites me is that there are no limitations on where we could go. We can work in any discipline, in any sector, with any client globally, and have premises, within reason, anywhere in the world.

We work with the most talented and delightful clients on the most interesting projects. Seeing us repeatedly recognised as the go-to consultancy for excellent engineering is rewarding. When it comes to world-class, difficult problem-solving, it’s in our DNA.

Something I find personally rewarding is seeing our young talent develop certain specialisms and be handpicked by our clients to present on the global stage. At the time of this interview, we have more than four conferences where clients have selected us to be in podium positions at well-renowned global conferences like PDA Arizona, co-presenting on some cutting-edge innovations. It shows a testament to the quality of the work that clients are happy to get on stage with us and fly the flag for the great work we’ve done, which is genuinely world-first in some cases. I constantly find this energising and rewarding.

Although Crux is 20 years old, and I’ve been here for 11-12 years, I keep saying we’re only just getting started. We don’t really follow anyone else; we just do it the Crux way. We’re at another inflection point, just beginning to show what we can do on the global stage. With a bigger workforce, more technical capability than ever, and a well-equipped headquarters and lab, together with a sizeable physical presence in the US, we’re well-set to take it to the next level.