Case Study: From a few hours a week to a fully embedded support team

How Rodelle scaled alongside a fast-growing venture-backed AI company, from supporting a three-person startup to running a four-person global support team.

When we first started working with this particular client, there were three people in their business. Our initial brief was simple: a few hours of executive support each week for the CEO and CTO.

The CEO was juggling investor meetings, fundraising, recruitment and an increasingly unmanageable diary. Our job was to take as much of that operational load off his plate as possible.

Then the company secured its first round of funding, and everything accelerated.

Scaling support as the business grew

What had begun as a few hours a week became a much broader operational role covering executive support, office management, extensive travel, events and the day-to-day practicalities of running a rapidly growing international business.

Eventually, one pair of hands simply wasn't enough.

Rather than starting a recruitment process each time more capacity was needed, we added experienced Rodelle VAs. Over time, and a couple more funding rounds, four of us were working within the business, supporting the C-suite and senior team.

The Lead VA oversaw the account, monitored capacity and brought in additional support when needed. We stayed closely connected through daily communication and weekly calls, understood one another's roles and covered holidays and absences.

For the client, there was one functioning support team rather than four separate assistants to manage.

From diaries to global operations

Across the Rodelle team, our responsibilities included:

• complex C-suite diary and extensive travel management

• office management, budgets and procurement

• furniture design and procurement

• five London office moves and two New York office moves

• equipment and IT provision for international offices

• events, catering and company socials, including quarterly team events and Christmas parties

• supplies, snacks and weekly office treats

• practical support for offices across the UK, US, Australia, Singapore, South Africa and Ireland

• and, occasionally, making sure somebody watered the plants!

At its peak, the Rodelle team was supporting nearly 30 people across the organisation.

We took ownership of the operational details that otherwise landed on the desks of people whose time was better spent growing the company.

The advantage of a managed team

The CEO didn't need to recruit, onboard and individually manage several support people. Rodelle handled the team, including finding a replacement when someone wasn't quite the right fit, without making it another management problem for the client.

Because the wider team worked on a flexible basis, we could increase support without immediately creating the fixed costs and employment obligations of building the same team entirely in-house.

And when circumstances changed, the model changed too

When the company's circumstances later changed and less support was required, the hours provided by the wider Rodelle team reduced. There were no long-term staffing commitments attached to those flexible roles.

That flexibility mattered just as much when the business needed to scale back as it had when things were taking off.

“What began as a few hours of support evolved into a fully embedded operational function. Rodelle didn’t just provide assistants - they built and managed a team that supported our leadership, handled events and travel, and brought real structure to the way we operated.

They gave us the capacity and certainty that allowed our leadership team to stay focused on scaling the business.”

Richard Robinson, CEO and Founder

What started with a few hours became something much bigger

We're particularly proud of this relationship because we grew alongside the company and built trust along the way.

As that trust grew, we were given the freedom to get on with things. We knew the business and the people well enough to use our judgement, spot gaps before they became problems and deal with the day-to-day decisions without everything having to go back to the CEO. He was comfortable relying on the wider Rodelle team, too.

There were inevitably challenges along the way. Fast-growing companies aren't known for standing still, but solving those challenges was part of our job.

The leadership team trusted us to keep things running, and we took that responsibility seriously.

And we'd love to build that kind of relationship again and again.