Private Strategic Advisory for Decisions That Matter
The Human Futurist
Private IMB Advisory is a highly confidential, year-long strategic advisory relationship for a small number of founders, executives, investors and private clients navigating complexity, transformation and consequential decisions.
Led personally by Chris Styles, it brings together more than 30 years of executive leadership, transformation and advisory experience with the Intelligent Mathematical Blueprint (IMB) — his proprietary decision-intelligence framework developed through more than a decade and 20,000+ hours of original research.
The purpose is not to predict your future.
It is to give you another dimension of intelligence with which to navigate it.
Success does not remove uncertainty.
In many respects, it amplifies it.
The greater the responsibility, the fewer people there are with whom you can think completely openly, particularly when the decisions involve capital, leadership, business direction, family, reputation or legacy.
At this level, the question is rarely simply: “What should I do?” It is also: Why now? What am I not seeing? Is this the right moment to act?
Where is the underlying risk? What happens if I wait? Which opportunity deserves my attention, and which is merely noise?
Private IMB Advisory provides an independent, confidential thinking relationship through which those questions can be examined from a perspective that conventional advisory rarely provides.
A Different Kind of Advisor
Chris Styles is not a conventional coach, futurist or consultant.
He is a former senior banking executive, scientist, researcher, strategic advisor and creator of the Intelligent Mathematical Blueprint.
His career has moved across environments in which decisions have real consequences.
He has led national commercial strategies, large multi-site operations, customer-acquisition programmes, organisational transformation and senior management teams within some of South Africa’s largest financial institutions.
As General Manager at Absa, he was part of the bank’s senior leadership community and top 300 leaders.
His earlier banking career included national commercial leadership roles with Nedbank and Standard Bank.
Before banking, his work in international conservation involved governments, regulators, NGOs, private landowners and international stakeholders across Africa.
For more than a decade following his corporate career, Chris advised entrepreneurs, business owners and senior executives through leadership, change, performance and growth.
That breadth matters.
Because Private IMB Advisory is not theoretical advice delivered from the sidelines.
It combines the judgement developed through decades of leadership with an entirely different way of seeing patterns, timing and consequence.
The intelligent mathematical blueprint
Seeing What Conventional Analysis May Miss
. . .
Over more than a decade of original research, Chris began identifying recurring mathematical structures within human experience.
The result is the Intelligent Mathematical Blueprint – IMB.
Developed through more than 20,000 hours of research and pattern analysis, the IMB is a proprietary decision-intelligence framework designed to identify recurring patterns, timing structures and emerging periods of risk and opportunity.
Within Private Advisory, the IMB provides an additional analytical lens through which Chris can examine:
- Decision timing
- Recurring patterns
- Periods of transition
- Emerging risk
- Opportunity windows
- Competing strategic priorities
- Longer-term cycles and consequences
It does not replace commercial judgement, professional advice, evidence or experience.
It adds another dimension to them.
The Research Behind The IMB
From Independent Discovery to Academic Enquiry
The Intelligent Mathematical Blueprint has developed through more than a decade and 20,000+ hours of original research into recurring patterns, timing and human experience.
Chris subsequently took the IMB into postgraduate research at Bournemouth University, where his proposed PhD sought to investigate aspects of the framework through a formal mixed-methods research design — including whether IMBs could identify significant historical life events with greater-than-random accuracy.
The research was designed not to assume the IMB worked, but to investigate what could — and could not — withstand systematic enquiry.
*The Probation Review documents the proposed doctoral research and should not be interpreted as evidence that the IMB has been scientifically validated.
Depth Behind the Thinking
Why This Matters
The Decision Is Only Part of the Equation
Two apparently identical decisions made at different moments can produce very different outcomes. A sound strategy implemented at the wrong time can fail. An opportunity pursued too early can consume resources before the conditions exist for it to succeed. A period that appears challenging may, viewed differently, be signalling consolidation rather than expansion. And patterns that seem unrelated can become significant when viewed across a longer timeline.
Private IMB Advisory brings these elements together:
- Context. Pattern. Timing. Risk. Opportunity. Consequence.
- The objective is not certainty.
- The objective is better-informed judgement.
Private IMB Advisory
Strategic Continuity, Not Occasional Consultation
Private IMB Advisory is deliberately structured as a one-year relationship.
Because the value of this work does not lie in a single conversation or Blueprint interpretation.
It lies in continuity.
Chris develops a deep understanding of the client, their Blueprint, circumstances, ambitions, responsibilities and evolving decision landscape.
As circumstances change, new information can be considered against the patterns already being tracked. As decisions emerge, their timing can be examined. As new IMB research develops, relevant findings can be integrated into the advisory relationship.
Over time, this creates something difficult to achieve through conventional episodic consultancy:
Strategic memory.
Chris does not have to rediscover the context every time you speak.
He is already inside it.
Who is the Private Advisory Is For
Private IMB Advisory is designed for people carrying meaningful responsibility.
Founders & Business Owners – Navigating growth, capital allocation, partnerships, acquisitions, exits, succession or major strategic change.
Executives & Leadership – Facing transformation, career inflection points, organisational complexity or high-consequence decisions.
Investors & Entrepreneurs – Assessing opportunities, people, timing and strategic risk.
Private Principals & Families – Considering significant personal, family, wealth, relocation or legacy decisions where multiple factors intersect.
The circumstances differ. The common denominator is consequence.
A Deliberately Small Private Practice
Private IMB Advisory is not designed to scale through volume. Chris works with a maximum of 10 Core Private Advisory clients.
This is intentional. A meaningful advisory relationship requires more than calendar availability. It requires time to research, analyse, think, observe and retain the context surrounding each client’s circumstances.
The quality of advisory attention therefore determines the capacity Chris can provide — not by demand.
Engagements are offered for 12 months and are subject to mutual fit and availability. Investment and engagement details are shared privately following application.
PRIVATE CLIENT PERSPECTIVES
Trusted When DecisionsMatter
“We never make any significant business decision without speaking to Chris Styles.”
John Drew, CEO & Founder, Elevated Planet · UK
“The combination of excellence in his area of specialisation, his executive-level business experience and his sharp and enquiring mind will continue to bring immense value to all who have the opportunity to work with him.”
Graham Tapson, Advisor to the CEO, Partner Matters & Talent Deloitte Central Europe
“On the back of this, I used my professional IMB timeline to make a huge career decision.”
Darren McKinnon, Commercial Director, Epic Outdoor · South Africa
THE MIND BEHIND THE WORK
. . .
“I am an intensely curious mind, searching for deeper answers.”
Executive. Scientist. Researcher. Advisor.
Chris’s career has moved from science and international conservation to senior banking leadership, executive advisory and more than a decade of original research.
Throughout it, one characteristic has remained constant: an instinct to look beneath the obvious — to question, observe, recognise patterns and search for the variable others may have overlooked.
That same curiosity ultimately led to the development of the Intelligent Mathematical Blueprint.
The executive understands the decision.
The scientist interrogates the evidence.
The researcher sees the pattern.
The advisor helps the client decide what to do with it.
Ideas in Conversation
SELECTED PUBLIC CONVERSATIONS
From long-form interviews and articles to selected public conversations, Chris occasionally explores the thinking, research and experiences that have shaped his perspective.
These provide a window into the ideas behind The Human Futurist. Private Advisory itself remains entirely confidential.
CLARITY BEFORE CONSEQUENCE
See More Before You Decide.
. . .
The purpose of Private IMB Advisory is not to remove uncertainty. No credible advisor can do that. It is to help you see more of the landscape before you make the decision.
- To recognise patterns before they repeat.
- To consider timing before committing resources.
- To identify risk before it becomes consequence.
And to have an independent advisor who already understands the context when the next important decision arrives.
- Precision Over Prediction.
- Clarity Over Noise.
- Foresight Over Reaction.
If that is the kind of advisory relationship you are looking for, the next step is a private application.
