Great leaders and high-performing teams don't happen by accident.
BolsterUp is how founders and executives make sure they don't leave either one to chance.
To Create High-Performing Teams, You Need Great Leaders
Our singular purpose is to help you keep your company on the growth trajectory your strategy demands, by solving the people problems that block momentum.
The majority of managers are promoted and left to figure out managing on their own, without training and little support. This is a problem because without the right frameworks, feedback practices, and leadership habits, teams suffer quietly until it shows up in regrettable attrition, missed milestones, or lower customer satisfaction.
But not every performance problem is a manager problem. Teams also break down when the people on them don't understand each other — how their teammates think, make decisions, communicate under pressure, and approach their work. That friction is often the result of people not having the tools to see and work with each other's differences.
- We're here to develop leaders and managers who operate with clarity, consistency, and the skills to bring out the best in their people.
- We're here to build teams that collaborate with purpose and perform at their peak.
- We're here to help your business hit the targets that matter: the next round, the next milestone, the next level.
Learning isn't the goal. Behavior change is.
There's no shortage of leadership development programs. Most of them don't deliver — not because the content is wrong, but because they were not designed to change what people actually do on Monday morning.
What we build is behavior change for leaders and for teams. We build the frameworks your managers apply in feedback conversations, development discussions, and key decisions. And we build the self-awareness that helps teammates understand how their colleagues think, communicate, and operate. That deeper understanding is what turns a group of talented people into a team that actually performs.
We measure what changes. The goals: behaviors that stick and a leadership layer that operates differently, teams that are firing on all cylinders, and business outcomes that prove it.
The goal isn't a program. It's new behaviors that raise the ceiling on what your business can do.
First, we were entrepreneurs and bosses.
BolsterUp was founded by Bruce Alfred, an entrepreneur who spent his career building and leading fast-paced, creative businesses.
That background shapes how BolsterUp engages. We don't bring an enterprise mentality and force-fit it onto a 30-person startup or a 45-person agency. We understand the pace of your work, the constraints on your time, and the specific pressure points where leadership gaps do their worst damage.
That's why we focus on high-impact work that fits your team's schedule, as well as practical tools, and sustainable habits that produce results you can measure. And it's why our clients are served not by junior staff, but only by senior coaches and consultants, each with a decade or more of experience.
Built for lasting, measurable behavior change
While there are clear throughlines that challenge all of our clients, each client is made up of individuals, teams, and leaders who are unique. That's why cookie-cutter application of tools, frameworks, and processes is counterproductive. And that's why we always start by gaining understanding first.
Diagnose
Separate the symptoms from the underlying problem — so every intervention targets what's actually blocking performance.
Lead Behavior Change
Coach and consult to create new ways of leading and working — grounded in real work, not theory.
Operationalize
Weave new behaviors into the flow of the workday so they become the default, not the exception.
Embed
Create new habits, solidify routines, and develop mutual accountability that sustains performance without outside reinforcement.
Principal, BolsterUp
Bruce Alfred is a Gallup-Certified CliftonStrengths coach, a lifelong entrepreneur, and the founder of BolsterUp — a coaching and consulting practice that focuses on helping businesses develop the management infrastructure and team performance their next stage of growth requires.
Since 2012, Bruce has worked with organizations including Mayo Clinic, University Hospitals, and the University of Minnesota, as well as growth-stage businesses where leadership and people development are direct inputs to business performance.
Before BolsterUp, Bruce founded and ran a documentary and non-fiction production company — leading creative teams through the full cycle of development, production, and delivery. Highlights include working with Ken Burns on the 18-hour series, Baseball, and producing, writing, and directing a multi-part documentary series on the French Impressionist artists. After moving from New York to Minnesota, he built and led a digital marketing firm delivering creative and technical work for businesses nationwide.
Outside of work, Bruce is a runner, a yoga teacher, and the father of four grown children — and a 130-pound dog who is firmly convinced he is a 25-pound lap dog.
We're trusted by organizations that take leadership seriously.
Select ClientsBook an intro call. No pitch. Just a real conversation.
If you're wondering whether now is the right time, whether your business is the right fit, or where to start — that's exactly what the intro call is for. We'll talk through where you are, what's getting in the way, and what it would take to turn your managers into confident leaders and your individual contributors into a high-performing team.