Let me help get your business or academic research on track.
Two tracks of research. One credentialed practitioner.
Applied research for business leaders.
Methodology support for doctoral students and academics.
Wayward Leaders operates two research practices under the same methodological standards. The applied research track helps business leaders measure what their customers, channels, and vendors actually think. The academic research track helps doctoral students and faculty researchers get methodologically defensible work to defense and publication. One credentialed methodologist, one set of standards, two practices.
Track 1: Applied Business Research
Channel and Partner Research
Measures relationships and performance across organizations.
Multi-Stakeholder Vendor Relationship Assessment
Traditional vendor report cards collect one perspective and call it the truth. This framework asks the question across five dimensions and segments the responses by stakeholder role, so the OEM sees what the OEM values, the distributor sees what the distributor values, and the end customer sees what the end customer values. The output is a multi-stakeholder picture of the actual relationship, not an artifact of whoever happened to fill out the form. Built on a Net Promoter Score-inspired framework adapted specifically for B2B channel and supplier contexts. Built for: OEMs evaluating distributor performance, distributors benchmarking against competitors, channel managers measuring vendor relationships, and procurement leaders moving beyond traditional supplier scorecards. Investment: Starting at $12,500.
Distributor and Channel Partner Performance Assessment
Structured performance assessment of distribution networks and channel partner programs. Combines OEM data, distributor self-assessment, and customer feedback into a comparable performance framework. Adjusts for territory, market size, and product mix variables. Built for: OEMs running distributor networks, channel marketing leaders evaluating program ROI, distribution executives benchmarking their performance against peers. Investment: Starting at $15,000.
Brand and Vendor Report Card Development
Custom design of vendor performance scorecards and channel partner assessment programs. Built around your specific stakeholders, evaluation dimensions, and measurement cadence. Includes framework design, instrument development, pilot testing, and rollout support. Built for: procurement leaders refreshing supplier evaluation programs, channel leaders designing partner performance frameworks, supply chain executives building new vendor governance models. Investment: Starting at $15,000.
Voice of the Customer
Captures the buyer's own voice through structured qualitative and mixed-methods research.
Voice of the Customer Plan Development
Design of Voice of the Customer studies from research question through analysis framework. Includes target population definition, sampling strategy, mixed-methods instrument design covering qualitative interviews and quantitative surveys, analysis plan, and reporting framework. Built to deliver findings that operating leaders can act on, not survey averages that sit unread. Built for: marketing leaders launching VoC programs, product managers gathering customer requirements, customer experience teams building ongoing listening programs. Investment: Starting at $7,500.
Voice of the Customer Analysis
Full analysis of Voice of the Customer data, including coding, theme development, segmentation by stakeholder type, and strategic interpretation. Handles qualitative interview data, open-ended survey responses, and mixed-methods data sets. Delivers findings ready for executive readout, not raw transcripts and word clouds. Built for: organizations with collected VoC data that needs rigorous analysis, teams that ran a study but lack analysis bandwidth or methodology rigor, leaders who need defensible findings before making strategic moves. Investment: Starting at $5,500.
Buyer Journey and Decision Process Research
Qualitative research mapping the actual buyer journey through awareness, consideration, evaluation, decision, and adoption. Identifies trigger points, decision criteria, stakeholder roles, and competitive moments of truth. Built on interviews with recent buyers, not assumed personas. Built for: marketing leaders aligning campaign architecture to actual buyer behavior, sales leaders mapping engagement strategy to decision stages, demand generation teams revising lead scoring against real journey data. Investment: Starting at $17,500.
Market and Brand Insight
Measures where the market sits and how brands are perceived inside it.
Customer Segmentation Studies
Mixed-methods customer segmentation research. Qualitative interview foundation, quantitative validation, segment profiling, and strategic implications for go-to-market, product, and channel decisions. Built around how customers actually buy, not who they happen to be. Built for: marketing leaders, product leaders, and channel leaders rebuilding go-to-market strategy on a foundation of how customers actually segment behaviorally. Investment: Starting at $22,500.
Brand Perception Studies
Quantitative and qualitative measurement of brand perception across stakeholder segments. Awareness, association, preference, and intent measured using validated instruments. Comparative analysis against named competitors. Delivers findings ready for marketing, channel, and product strategy decisions. Built for: brand managers measuring brand health, marketing leaders before major positioning shifts, distributor leaders managing their own brand against OEM direct competition. Investment: Starting at $20,000.
Brand Health Framework Development
Custom design of brand health measurement programs. Built around the specific stakeholders, dimensions, and cadence your brand requires. Includes framework design, instrument development, pilot testing, and rollout support. Built for: brand managers building or refreshing brand health measurement, marketing leaders before major positioning shifts, distributor leaders managing their own brand against OEM direct competition. Investment: Starting at $15,000.
Win/Loss Analysis Studies
Structured qualitative research into why deals close and why they don't. Includes interview protocol design, stakeholder interviews across recent wins and losses, thematic analysis, segmentation by deal type and stage, and strategic recommendations report. Built for: sales leaders, marketing leaders, and product managers who need to understand pipeline patterns and competitive dynamics from the buyer's actual perspective. Investment: Starting at $18,500.
Track 2: Academic Research and Methodology Support
The DBA Project Field Guide: From Design to Impact
Forthcoming Fall 2026
The methodology handbook for doctoral students working through applied dissertations. From research design through defense readiness. Written by a credentialed practitioner who has designed six doctoral course builds and continues to support active dissertation work.
Services for Researchers and Graduate Students
Qualitative Research Methodology Consulting
Research design, methodology chapter development, and methods alignment with research questions. For doctoral students preparing for proposal defense and for faculty researchers structuring new studies. Investment: $150 to $250 per hour, or packaged consultation starting at $1,500.
Thematic Analysis Services
Full thematic analysis of qualitative data sets. Coding, theme development, and analysis writeup ready for inclusion in dissertation chapters, journal manuscripts, or applied research reports. Typical data sets are 20 to 40 interviews or equivalent text. Investment: Starting at $3,500.
Dissertation Methodology Support
Focused coaching on the methodology chapter and the data analysis chapter for qualitative dissertations. Includes methods alignment review, instrument development support, analysis planning, and pre-defense readiness review. Investment: Starting at $2,500.
Research Design Consulting
Pre-IRB study design, sampling strategy development, instrument review, and methodological defense preparation. Investment: $150 to $250 per hour.
Manuscript and Proposal Review
Pre-submission review of journal articles, book proposals, or doctoral proposals. Includes structural review, methodological soundness check, and revision recommendations. Investment: Starting at $800.