Hi, I'm Raghav Krishna.
I help social impact founders stop firefighting and start growing their impact.
Not by adding even more systems but by fixing what's actually generating the chaos.
When I was in search of a Chief of Staff, I didn't know that I would be God-sent a person who will transform and re-align the whole texture of my organisation.
- Puneet Aggarwal
Here's the problem
You have good people who buy into the mission.
They are competent. They do their job.
But somehow you're still the one who gets called when something goes wrong..
Still signing off on things that shouldn't need your approval.
Still coming back from time away to find three things that quietly broke while you were gone.
You've tried to fix it.
New tools.
A restructure.
Maybe someone came in, spent a few weeks with you, and left you a plan.
Six months later, the same things are breaking.
That's not a people problem.
It's probably not even a systems problem.
The fixes weren't necessarily wrong.....
.....they just all addressed what the dysfunction looks like rather than what's generating it.
Which is why they reverted.
And while that cycle continues, every hour you spend in the weeds is an hour you're not doing the work you actually started all this for.
"He revolutionized our organizational DNA, pioneering a self-managed culture that eliminated traditional hierarchies and empowered every team member to excel. His immediate impact was striking: within days of joining, he had established robust SOPs that brought unprecedented clarity and efficiency."
— Puneet Aggarwal
It doesn't have to be that way
When you fix the right thing, the change shows up faster than you'd expect.
Your team starts making calls you used to make.
Problems surface before they blow up.
You take a week away and come back to a team that handled things.
The fires that returned every quarter stop coming back.
It's what happens when you address the actual source of the problem.
Not just the most visible symptom.
And the time and headspace you get back?
It goes to the work that actually moves the mission forward.
"Raghav has an exceptional ability to identify the real constraints behind operational challenges—whether it is communication gaps, broken processes, or missing documentation—and guide teams toward scalable, long-term solutions."
— Atul Shukla
"He made a lasting impact on our growth. He brought structure to decision-making, empowered the team to take ownership, and created a culture of constructive feedback and improvement."
— Neha Singh
"He has a remarkable knack for cutting through noise and making things more
manageable and focused."
— Dr. Kajal NK
"Raghav is a master communicator, able to get to the heart of the problem and come up with a solution in a short amount of time."
— Kevin Freidberg
I've spent 14 years working inside health programs, development nonprofits, wellness startups and my own company — a specialty food business I founded and eventually closed.
I've been the person who rescued failing global health trial operations. The one who cut a product line from 100 SKUs to a dozen and delivered a first profitable year in three. The one who told a founder that the way he was running things was the reason things weren't working.
I've also been the founder who ran out of road and steam and shut shop.
That's not a typical consulting background. It means I know what it actually feels like to be inside rooms with real stakes and with my own money on the line — not just what it looks like from a post-mortem.
Most people who help founders stuck in a firefighting loop, come from the outside — they diagnose, prescribe, and leave before the old patterns come back.
I work inside the problem, not from a distance. And I stay until the patterns have actually changed — not just until the plan is written.
This is why I created the Organisational Dysfunction Diagnostic.
It measures how reactively your organisation is operating, which patterns are keeping the dysfunction in place, and why previous fixes haven't held.
You come out with a breakdown across three dimensions and a tier result — specific enough to know what you're dealing with, honest enough to be worth ten minutes of your time.
What this has looked in practice...
Most consultants are gone before the old patterns come back. I've stayed long enough to see what actually holds.
Nearly 7 years at one organisation. Nearly 4 at another. Nearly 3 at my bootstrapped business. Along with advising multiple leaders.
These aren't short engagements — which means the results below weren't measured at the optimistic moment right after the intervention.
They were measured after the system had been tested.
A public health research organisation where I led multiple programs over many years.
In one, we were operating across 2,000 sq km with 100+ distributed staff and no visibility into what was happening on the ground.
Leadership couldn't see the work. Problems surfaced as crises rather than signals.
Built the intervention operations from scratch — central war room, daily check-ins, field tracking.
It became the bedrock that still remains operational 10 years later and years after I left.
A 20-person health products company where the founder's exact words at joining, were "I have no idea what's happening in my business."
Loss-making for a few years.
Cut the product line from 100+ SKUs to a dozen, rebuilt the operating system around automatic visibility rather than status meetings.
Cash flow positive within five months. 44% revenue growth. Around 60% reduction in management overhead.
A nonprofit where coordination was scattered across four tools, institutional knowledge lived in individuals rather than systems. Too many decisions were routing to the CEO.
Established clear decision making systems that gave back the CEO their time.
Built operational dashboards that gave an accurate picture of fundraising health. Implemented a single project management tool that gave real visibility into an operation that had previously run on memory and email threads.
A specialty food business I founded, built, and eventually closed.
Not a turnaround — a startup that ran out of road.
I know what it feels like to make decisions with your own money on the line, to watch something you built not work despite your best efforts, and to be the one who has to shut it down. That's not a consulting experience and it's why I understand what's actually at stake when you're the one in the room.
Here's how I can help....
1. Organisational Dysfunction Diagnostic
Free, ten minutes. It measures how reactively your organisation is operating, which patterns are keeping the dysfunction in place, and why previous fixes haven't held. You come out with a breakdown across three dimensions and a tier result.
2. Breakthrough Session
This is the natural next step after the diagnostic. A free 30-minute conversation based on your results — what's actually generating the chaos in your organisation, and what a realistic first move looks like. No generic frameworks. No pitch unless it's a genuine fit.
3. The Monday Manager
This is a dispatch I publish every Monday — what's breaking in social impact organisations right now, why, and what actually fixes it. Informed by real experiences doing the work, not from a distance.
Free downloads
Want to see if what I say resonates? Start here.
Three collections from The Monday Manager archive — each one on a different reason social impact organisations stay stuck.
(No email required)
5 dispatches on why social impact founders can't stop being the emergency response team — and what's actually keeping the cycle going
2. The Belief Trap
5 dispatches on the leadership beliefs keeping your team dependent on you — even when you're trying not to be
5 dispatches on why every previous attempt to change how your organisation operates has reverted — and what's actually at the root