About Constellary
What we believe
Leadership isn’t an individual endeavor, it’s a shared experience.
Leaders are a node in a bigger constellation. This means rather than relying on our own effort, we must work as a collective. Leaders need to know how to lead an area as well as work organizationally.
Recognizing our responsibility to the collective is how we build resilient companies that meet goals and, create environments where people want to come to work.
We believe the power is in the collective, not in individuals leaders.
Ready to level up your leadership?
About our founder, Suzan Bond
Hi, I’m Suzan, the founder of Constellary.
I work with leaders and leadership teams navigating the complexity that comes with rapid change, shifting markets, and growing organizational demands. Questions like: How do we stay aligned when everything is moving fast? How do we make better decisions with less friction? How do we build the leadership and organizational muscle to deliver results in uncertainty?
Before founding Constellary, I served as COO of Travis CI, a global tech company in the developer tools space. I’ve spent more than 20 years working in and with startups and growth-stage organizations across operations, people, and product — and the last two decades focused on leadership and organizational development.
As COO, I led through constant change: leadership transitions, strategic inflection points, and ultimately an acquisition, all while running a distributed global organization. I know what it’s like to make decisions with incomplete information, to lead through ambiguity, and to keep a team moving forward when the ground keeps shifting.
That experience shapes how I work today. My strength is seeing the intersection between leadership behavior, organizational systems, and business strategy — and helping leadership teams connect all three. I help teams clarify roles, strengthen how they operate together, and align their structure and ways of working with what the business actually needs now, not what it needed in the past.
Through Constellary, I’ve developed a constellation of practical frameworks that help leaders make sense of the systems they’re operating in — including the Constellary Organizational Debt Framework, Leadership Archetypes, and models for organizational leadership and leadership team effectiveness. These tools give teams shared language to surface hidden patterns and make more intentional decisions about how they lead and work together.
I’ve worked with leaders at organizations including Bloomberg, Intuit Mailchimp, The New York Times, Gymshark, Puppet, Alloy, StackHawk, TaxBit, and Recursion. I’ve been a regular contributor to Fast Company, where one of my articles was named a Top 10 leadership story of the year, and I’ve spoken and keynoted at numerous industry events, including RubyConf.
I’m a certified executive coach through the Co-Active Training Institute, a former Gallup consultant and certified StrengthsFinder coach, and trained in Organization and Relationship Systems Coaching through CRR Global. My academic background is in social psychology, sociology, organizational development, and leadership.
Our guiding principles
Seek to Understand
We believe there isn’t one answer — there are many ways to a goal. Rather than lead with our experience or opinions, we seek first to understand by asking questions and gathering information. This context informs our strategy and plan to execute.
Relationships First
Relationships aren't a distraction to the work, they're an effective way to get results. We put relationships front and center, seeing our work as a partnership. We focus on creating trust and psychological safety. Our emphasis on relationship building allows us to deliver on your needs and build long-lasting trusted partnerships.
We’re better Together
There isn’t one right way to be a potent leader, there are many ways to lead. We seek to bring out the best in everyone, knowing that combining our strengths makes everyone better and we achieve more. We know that different styles can bring value and that diverse teams bring results.
Be real, not perfect
Being open about our humanity — our mistakes, our vulnerabilities — helps us connect with others. It’s also how we grow and improve so we and our company can be their best expression which leads to better performance. The best leaders know being open about their missteps and what they’ve learned creates a culture of learning.
TRust is everything
Trust is the foundation for all collaboration. We show up when we say we will. We deliver what we say we will. We welcome open conversation and believe in being direct but kind. We seek to understand and then to be understood. You can have confidence we’ll see you and your situation rather than rely on assumptions.
Functional vs Organizational leadership
The word leadership is imprecise and can mean many things. To ensure leaders understand the contours of the role and what’s expected, we need more precise definitions. It also ensures you hire the right company to help you achieve your business goals.
Constellary makes a distinction between functional vs organizational leadership. Our work focuses on helping leadership teams with organizational leadership.
Functional leadership:
Activities of a business function: product, engineering, people, marketing
Often starts at the managerial or senior IC level
First team is in the functional unit
Organizational leadership:
Generally starts at the head of/director level (may vary by size of org)
First team may be the exec team rather than inside a functional unit
Understands how to make decisions and take action in the face of complexity
To get the full list of distinctions between functional and organizational leadership, download the pdf. No email required.
Learn more about our Founder
Suzan Bond keynote at RubyConf 2022
Lost in the Wilderness: Why leader feel lost
Suzan Bond interviews Sarah Drasner on her book, Engineering Management for the Rest of Us