How big is Strategies & Leaders?

Around 3 full-time equivalents (financial year 2025).

Review: Strategies & Leaders

Q: Who are the clients of Strategies & Leaders?

Among others Compagnie Cecilia, Tumult, De Speelhoeve (Emmaüs vzw), Uit De Marge, Health Impact Coalition (HICO), publiq, Welzijnsschakels, vzw Jongerenwerking Pieter Simenon, Rebelle, Vlaamse Vereniging Autisme.

Strategies & Leaders is een strategiebureau uit Gent, actief sinds 2019. Er werken ongeveer 3 mensen, uitgedrukt in voltijdse equivalenten. Het aanbod is gericht op strategie. Sectorieel richt het bureau zich vooral op missiegedreven organisaties, social profit en duurzaamheid. Tot de publiek bekende klanten behoren Compagnie Cecilia, Tumult, De Speelhoeve (Emmaüs vzw) en Uit De Marge.

1

How this agency makes money

Revenue, margin and what an hour of work brings in. Everything on the earning side sits together here.

Revenue trendgross margin per financial year

20212022202320242025

Latest year: € 199.215 gross margin, growth +23,9% against a sector median of -14%.

At or above sector pace

MarginEBITDA / gross margin · value-added coverage

20212022202320242025

Strategies & LeadersSector median

EBITDA margin -22,6%, sector median 36,9%. Value-added coverage 0,80 (median 1,53).

Loss-making

Revenue per headGross margin per FTE, against payroll cost

€ 60.368

Against a payroll cost of € 68.029 per FTE. The ratio between the two is the coverage rate above.

No data

Yield levelYield per hour worked, against payroll cost

€ 41

4.901 hours worked, 1.485 per FTE. Against that sits € 46 of payroll cost per hour worked, leaving € -5 for premises, equipment, depreciation and profit.

No data

No hourly rate follows from this. Gross margin is already net of services and sundry goods, which mixes rebilled production with the agency's own overhead, and the accounts do not say how many hours were billable. Deriving a rate from this systematically understates it.

2

Can the agency take a hit

Buffer, cash position and payment behaviour side by side, so you can see where they disagree.

Bufferequity in months of payroll

Buffer: -1,5 months (median 9,2 mo). Equity in the latest year: € -27.424.

Critical buffer

Cash positionAvailable cash, and whether it covers short-term debt

Cash € 176.743. Liquidity ratio 0,91: current assets cover short-term debt not in full. Solvency -6,6%.

Tightly covered

Payment behaviourTowards suppliers and towards the NBB

Trade payables correspond to 357 days of supplier credit, sector median 102. The accounts were filed 192 days after closing; the legal deadline is seven months.

Pays slower than average

3

Signals and strengths

Events from the CBE and the Official Gazette over the past 24 months, plus positive markers derived from the figures.

Continuity

2 red flag(s) (24m)

Signals in the last 24 months

Zichtbaarheid verschoven · 1 Sep 2026 · Google Autocomplete
Zichtbaarheid verschoven · 1 Aug 2026 · Google Autocomplete
Board change · 6 May 2026 · Staatsblad
Appointments or resignations on the board. Routine during growth, succession or a new partner. Ask about it when several changes follow each other closely.
Negative equity · 31 Dec 2025 · NBB
Debts exceed assets. Sometimes a subordinated shareholder loan sits opposite that, sometimes not. Ask how the agency is covering this, and on what timescale.
Low value-added coverage · 31 Dec 2025 · NBB
Every euro of payroll generates less than 95 cents of added value. That happens in a build-up year, with a lot of subcontracting, or under pressure on rates. Ask what explains it here.
Critical buffer · 31 Dec 2025 · NBB
Equity covers less than one month of payroll. At an agency that pays out its profit every year this means something different than at one that is losing money. Ask where the reserve sits.
+ 3 older signals within 24m

Click a signal for a plain-language explanation. Each signal is a fact from a public source, without the agency's own context. Best to ask them directly.

What this agency does well

Team grew (+13,8% FTE in the latest year)
Comfortable cash position: 287 days of payroll

Each point is a fact from the filed annual accounts, measured against the same thresholds and sector medians as the signals above.

4

All the figures

Reference material, not a starting point. Expand it if you want to read the series yourself.

5 financial years, 2021 to 2025Result, staff and balance sheet

	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
Result
Gross margin	€ 104.728	€ 113.844+8,7%	€ 206.283+81,2%	€ 160.778-22,1%	€ 199.215+23,9%
EBITDA	€ 26.796	€ -22.109	€ 23.619	€ 4.100	€ -45.051
EBITDA margin	25,6%	-19,4%	11,4%	2,6%	-22,6%
Staff
FTE	1,5	-	-	2,9	3,3+13,8%
Gross margin per FTE	€ 69.819	-	-	€ 55.441	€ 60.368
Payroll cost per FTE	€ 51.394	-	-	€ 53.709	€ 68.029
Balance sheet
Equity	€ 29.559	€ -3.021	€ 12.907	€ 29.748	€ -27.424
Cash	€ 180.014	€ 168.628	€ 135.075	€ 223.409	€ 176.743
Liquidity ratio	1,03	0,98	1,00	1,03	0,91

Payroll cost per FTE comes from the social report where available, otherwise from the Remuneration line. Both are gross costs including employer contributions.

What this factsheet does not know

How good the work is. Figures do not measure creativity, strategy or chemistry.
How the client portfolio is spread. Concentration is not in the accounts.
Freelancers and subcontractors are not in the FTE figures. An agency with 40 staff may in practice run with 70 people.
The figures cover financial year 2025, filed on 11/07/2026. At a fast-moving agency reality today may differ.

Based on publicly filed annual accounts (NBB) and official records (CBE, Belgian Official Gazette). An indication, not financial advice. Sector medians calculated on 2 Nov 2026. Sector medians based on financial year 2025: the last year for which nearly all accounts have been filed.

What the agency actually does 1 services

Strategy & Insights

Marketing strategy

Sector focus

Health & pharmaMedia & entertainment

Publicly known clients

Compagnie CeciliaTumultDe Speelhoeve (Emmaüs vzw)Uit De MargeHealth Impact Coalition (HICO)publiqWelzijnsschakelsvzw Jongerenwerking Pieter SimenonRebelleVlaamse Vereniging Autisme

Based on IKAg research and public sources. Incomplete or outdated? Let us know.

1

People 20 people mapped

Strategy weighs heavily here: 12 of 20 are strategists. A specialist, not a generalist: the expertise is narrow but deep.

AD

Aurélie De Cock

JC

Joos Callens

KD

Koenraad Depauw

SC

Sabine Craenen

AU

Arbesa Ukshinaj

Operationeel coördinator

BS

Benno Schiffer

CS

Christel Smedts

DD

Davy De Laeter

FV

Frederic Vanhauwaert

IT

Ike Teuling

JV

Jasper van Thienen

JV

Jef Van den Bergh

JR

Jeroen Robbe

JV

Jeroen van Hove

KV

Koen Van Overmeiren

NV

Nicholas Vijverman

PD

Peter Depauw

SV

Siska Van Houtte

SD

Stijn Demuynck

VD

Veronica Demarest

Based on public profiles. Something wrong? Let us know.

2

Seniors or juniors?

Payroll cost per FTE is the best public proxy for a team's experience level. Higher is not automatically better, but it says something about who sits at the table.

Payroll cost per FTE

€ 68.029

Team composition

3,3 FTE

77% women
24% men

Training per FTE

0,0 h

Many agencies fill this field in incompletely.

€ 68.029

All agencies (2025) € 62.294

Read with care. Directors and partners invoicing through a management company are not in the payroll cost. At small agencies this skews the picture downwards considerably.

3

Will your team stay?

Inflow and outflow from the social report. This series only counts people on the payroll: freelancers who invoice do not appear in it. A low figure therefore means two very different things, a stable permanent team or a small core with heavy outsourcing. A high figure usually points to short contracts. Compare only within the same type of agency.

Exits 2025

48,5%

Inflow 2025

60,6%

2,0 FTE in, 1,6 FTE out

Net team change

+0,4 FTE

202120242025

Source: annual accounts and social reports (NBB), collected by IKAg. Financial year 2025. Calculations by IKAg; an indication, not financial advice. Sector medians based on financial year 2025: the last year for which nearly all accounts have been filed.