I live in France and run a company with people in Mumbai, Lyon, Paris and Toronto. The distance problem you are describing is one I solve for myself every week.
On site with a founder, mid fit-out. Some decisions do not survive a video call.
Founders who run a business from another country almost never complain about the timezone. They complain that they cannot tell whether the marketing is working, that updates arrive as reassurance rather than numbers, and that when something slips they hear about it a month late. You are not short of effort, you are short of a reliable read.
A single monthly review that a person in another country can act on: what was spent, what came in, what it cost per enquiry, what changed, and what is being done about it. Once that exists you can stop flying in to check.
I sit between you and the team. When a vendor needs pushing, a shoot needs a decision, or an agency is quietly underdelivering, that is my problem rather than a 2am call for you. My own crew is across four cities, so there is usually someone in a workable timezone.
Both directions have the same trap: assuming what worked at home will translate. It usually does not, and the part that breaks is tone rather than product. I have moved brands in both directions and would rather test the message cheaply than launch confidently and be wrong at scale.
Five stages. You are only genuinely needed in two of them.
Where revenue comes from today, what it costs to get, and which of that you can actually see from where you sit.
One call with you, in your working hours. Positioning, channels, budget and what we will refuse to do.
Site, content, campaigns and tracking. My crew executes, or your existing team does with me directing.
Daily decisions happen without you. Vendors, shoots, approvals and the arguments in between are mine.
Spent, generated, cost per enquiry, what changed, what is being fixed. Short enough that you read all of it.
The dashed sections are the hours two offices are both awake. That is roughly six hours between Mumbai and France, and about four between France and Toronto, which is enough for anything urgent to be handled the same day rather than the next one. Whichever of those three you sit closest to, someone is already working.
Not a dashboard login you will never open. One page: spend, enquiries, cost per enquiry, the three things that moved, and the one thing I am worried about.
If the number went the wrong way, it says so, and it says what is being done about it before you have to ask. That is the whole point of hiring someone senior in the middle rather than another executor.
Both of these are Lyon. This is the part of the work that never fits into a monthly report.
Around the table, Lyon
Deb's Bistro Indien, Lyon
The engine room, Mumbai
Suppliers, signage, a floor that is the wrong colour, a shoot that has to happen before the store opens. None of that resolves over email at 2am your time. Sixty people across four cities means somebody is already awake, and close enough to turn up. This is the part founders abroad quietly pay the most for, and the part nobody puts in a proposal.
A family firm, a factory, a clinic or a store that runs fine operationally, while the marketing is a WhatsApp group and an agency nobody has reviewed in two years. You want a senior person accountable for it who is not on the payroll of the people being reviewed.
The product travels. The messaging usually does not. Pricing, proof, tone and the search terms people actually type all change, and finding that out after the launch is the expensive way to learn it.
A first business in a market where you have a network but not a brand. Here the work is credibility and local search long before it is advertising, and it is the fastest of the three to show movement.
I am based in France. My team spans Mumbai, Lyon, Paris and Toronto, which covers most of the working day between India and North America.
Yes. Often the team is fine and what is missing is someone senior owning the plan and the reporting.
Once a month properly, scheduled in your hours, plus whenever something genuinely needs you. Everything else is a written update you can read in five minutes. If you are on three calls a week with your marketing, something is wrong with the setup.
Sometimes. I will review them honestly first. If they are good and badly briefed, that is cheaper to fix than replacing them, and I will say so even though it means less work for my own crew.
No. Most of the work is with founders running something across two countries, whichever two those are. The Indian side is where I have the deepest network and the fastest execution.
One call, no deck. I will tell you whether I am the right person for it.
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