Commercial strategy, organisation, human capital: Stratlane takes on short missions as well as multi-year mandates, with the same requirement for measurable results.
From micro-businesses to the Belgian subsidiary of an international group, including SMEs and mid-sized companies along the way, every organisation faces the same governance, management and growth challenges, at different scales. Stratlane operates across this entire spectrum with the same standard of results.
A recommendation that stays in a report has never turned a company around or structured a team. Before advising others, Gwenaël and Yvonne carried the responsibility for results alone, a general management role in the middle of a restructuring, an HR function to be built under operational pressure. That field experience, acquired even before Stratlane was created, remains the foundation of the way the firm works today: present through to execution, not only through to diagnosis.
"We do not advise from a distance, we are alongside the teams, on the ground."
A diagnosis that stays on a slide changes nothing in an organisation. Value is not measured by the quality of the report, but by what changes once it is closed.
Gwenaël and Yvonne work in interim management, operational steering or end-to-end recruitment, not only as remote advisers: they go through to execution, not only to diagnosis.
Hospitality, food processing, green mobility, B2B textiles, SaaS software, logistics: this diversity is not a career accident, it is a method. It makes it possible to quickly recognise what is structural and what is circumstantial in a situation, where a single-sector profile spots fewer patterns.
The same logic applies to company sizes, from micro-businesses to subsidiaries of international groups, and to cultures and continents: Gwenaël's and Yvonne's careers span several countries and several languages, a richness that makes Stratlane comfortable beyond Belgium alone.
Business performance and human capital are treated as two sides of the same subject, never as two separate departments.
Commercial acceleration without the right people to carry it runs out of steam. A recruitment policy disconnected from strategy recruits into a void.
Interim general and commercial management, executive diagnostic, crisis management, organisational transformation, independent board director mandates.
See case 1 and case 6 →Structuring the business development function, CRM and pipeline management, one-off commercial support without taking over the function, strategic partnerships.
See case 3 and case 5 →Executive and management recruitment, global and multi-country recruitment, HR transformation, talent management and multi-site HR management.
See case 2 and case 4 →Five independent modules, each deliverable in a single day, with practical workshops and post-training support where needed, on site or remotely.
Built on the experience of Gwenaël Odongui-Bonnard, who has taught commercial strategy at ISTEC Brussels since 2025 and holds the HEC Liège Executive Sales certification.
Operational benchmarks lost, weakened HR compliance, customer experience under strain, high reputational risk.
Interim general management, full steering of the P&L and operations, repositioning of the restaurant offer, operational optimisation plan covering technical and administrative aspects.
Continuous recruitment needed across two production sites, covering operational, technical and corporate functions, with no structured internal recruitment capacity.
End-to-end recruitment across both sites, building and training an internal recruitment team, structuring the assessment processes.
Unbalanced pipeline, long sales cycle, unstructured go-to-market.
Go-to-market overhaul, CRM structuring, pipeline management and steering of key negotiations.
International growth requiring a recruitment function covering headquarters and several markets with very different local realities.
End-to-end recruitment leadership, deployment of predictive assessment tools, and establishment of a steering structure in an international deployment context, where Yvonne manages external partners broadly (agencies, various service providers) and not just recruitment firms.
Business development relying on individual initiative, with no dedicated function or process.
Creation of the business development function from scratch, processes, frameworks, forecasting, requalification of the existing portfolio.
Change of leadership within a subsidiary of an international group, in a managerial and cultural environment distinct from the Belgian market, against a backdrop of reputational and organisational fragility.
Find structural solutions to take charge, together with management, of workplace wellbeing as a lever for capacity development, and make it a strategic asset enabling management to position itself on a new cultural and organisational orientation.
Taking over the general or commercial management of a company for the duration of a transformation, a restructuring or a vacant position: Stratlane provides interim leadership for micro-businesses, SMEs, mid-sized companies and Belgian subsidiaries of international groups, on mandates lasting from several months to several years.
Go-to-market overhaul, structuring of the commercial function, CRM and pipeline management: Stratlane supports the commercial growth of scale-up organisations as well as long-established companies, in Belgium, France and beyond.
From building an internal recruitment team to steering global multi-country recruitment, Stratlane structures the recruitment function of micro-businesses, SMEs and group subsidiaries, with particular attention paid to the fit between company culture and the profiles recruited.
Operational reorganisation, crisis governance, stabilising the social climate: Stratlane works on situations where a company's structure no longer keeps up with its ambition, with a responsibility that extends through to execution, not only to diagnosis.
Beyond advisory work, Stratlane can serve as an independent director on a board of directors or a management committee, particularly during phases of transformation, shareholder governance or business transfer.
The core of Stratlane's activity takes place in Belgium and France, with mandates also carried out on the African continent, in particular on logistics and operational organisation matters.
Co-founder · Interim general and commercial management · Structuring and supporting growth · Transformation and reorganisation · Independent board director
From hotel management to interim leadership, a career built on execution rather than recommendation alone.
He started at Wyndham, covering the Hungarian, Maltese and Benelux markets, before joining Hilton Hotels Belgium in Brussels and Antwerp, where he managed B2B, B2C and B2G portfolios across several European markets and as far as the Middle East.
He then took on the commercial management and subsequently the general management of the Hôtel Métropole in Brussels, which he ran for nearly ten years: a P&L of 12 to 15 million euros, a team of 150 to 200 people, an in-depth restructuring and a measurable return to growth, including through the consequences of the 2015 Paris attacks and the March 2016 Brussels attacks, five years of city-centre pedestrianisation works, and then the Covid crisis, without any break in continuity.
Since 2021, he has worked in interim management and advisory roles for organisations with very different profiles, from green mobility to independent hospitality, as well as SaaS software and corporate and institutional communication. After several months leading business development for one of these organisations, he also joined its board of directors on a voluntary basis, from June 2024 to February 2025. He co-founded Stratlane in 2023 and has taught commercial strategy and management at ISTEC Brussels since 2025. Certified PMP, PRINCE2 and Prosci/ADKAR, he completed HEC Liège executive programmes in commercial strategy and digital transformation. His professional career, like his personal and family history, spans several continents, from Europe to the Middle East. He works in French and English.
Today, he takes on interim management, business development and governance mandates, in Belgium, France and beyond, for durations adjusted to the challenge, from a one-off sprint to a multi-year mandate.
He also collaborates, on certain specific mandates, with the Human Partners network, which specialises in supporting company leaders.
"A recommendation that stays on a slide changes nothing. I don't stop at the report, I go through to execution."
Co-founder · Global, multi-country recruitment · HR transformation · Talent management · Multi-site HR management
Thirteen years recruiting and structuring teams, from agency to international group, through to independent HR leadership.
She started agency-side at MacAnders, exclusive representative of Talentor for France and Belgium, where she learned to identify and win over rare profiles for demanding clients.
She then joined ICF, an international consulting and communications group of more than 5,000 employees, where she led talent acquisition for Belgium, then for Belgium and the United Kingdom, before founding Innovative HR, her own HR advisory structure, while also taking on the human resources leadership of two industrial entities in Nivelles, where she sits on the management committee and steers HR policy for more than 200 employees. This path gives her a rare reading of recruitment: seen from the agency side, from the international corporate side, and from the side of the organisation that has to live alone with its recruitment decisions.
She co-founded Stratlane with Gwenaël Odongui-Bonnard in 2023, then worked on freelance assignments for organisations with very different profiles, from food processing to international B2B textiles, where she now leads global recruitment at headquarters and in the subsidiaries. Her professional career, like her personal and family history, also spans several continents. She works in French, Dutch, English, Lingala and Swahili, with one simple conviction: clarity and consistency in an organisation are built, they are not improvised.
Today, she takes on recruitment and HR structuring mandates, from setting up an internal function to steering recruitment internationally, for fast-growing organisations as well as long-established ones.
"Recruiting is not about filling a position. It is about giving an organisation the people it needs to hold its course."
Both short, targeted missions (diagnosis, commercial sprint, one-off recruitment) and structuring mandates lasting several months, sometimes several years (interim general or commercial management, organisational transformation, independent board director mandate, structuring of a recruitment function). The duration adjusts to the subject, not the other way round.
From micro-businesses to the Belgian subsidiary of an international group, including SMEs and mid-sized companies along the way, every organisation faces the same governance, management and growth challenges, at different scales. Stratlane operates across this entire spectrum with the same standard of results.
The core of the activity takes place in Belgium and France. Several mandates have also been carried out on the African continent, in particular on logistics and operational organisation matters. This openness is not merely a geographical extension of the offer, it is grounded in the founders' own careers, whose professional and personal history already spans Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and in a five-language capability within the team. Geography adjusts to the client's ground, not the other way round.
Stratlane brings two practices under one roof: business performance, interim general and commercial management, structuring of growth, transformation, reorganisation, strategic and operational support, independent board director, led by Gwenaël Odongui-Bonnard, and human capital, recruitment, HR transformation, led by Yvonne Vander Elst. Depending on the subject, an assignment draws on one, the other, or both at once.
Yes. Gwenaël Odongui-Bonnard has notably served as a voluntary board director within a Brussels-based company, and Stratlane can act in this role, on a voluntary basis or as a paid mandate, particularly on governance and transformation issues.
Because most mandates touch on subjects that are sensitive for the company concerned, restructuring, organisational tension, strategic repositioning. Discretion is part of the mandate just as much as the result. Case studies remain anonymised by default, unless the client wishes to be named.
With a direct conversation about the situation and the challenge, not with a standardised questionnaire. That conversation determines whether the subject calls for a one-off diagnosis, a structuring mandate, or a combination of both areas of expertise.
Yes. Five modules, selling techniques, B2B sales strategies, sales pitches and value arguments, networks and strategic partnerships, competitive intelligence and benchmarking, each deliverable in a single day with practical workshops, on site or remotely. Content is adapted to the module, whether for field sales teams, sales managers or management committees.
A direct conversation about the challenge, not a standardised questionnaire. Messages go straight to info@stratlane.be.
