About

01Smart Pinnacle Works was founded in 2017 by Janet Yardley after a decade-plus in corporate planning roles. The name came from a conversation with a former colleague who described good strategy as finding the pinnacle. The point where effort and clarity meet. The early clients were mostly referrals from Janet's professional network: a Brooklyn-based manufacturer trying to decide whether to open a second facility, a nonprofit in the Bronx restructuring its program delivery model. Those first two years were instructive. The work was messier than any corporate engagement Janet had managed before, and the stakes felt more immediate.

02By 2020, the consultancy had settled into a clearer focus: mid-size companies and growing organizations that needed serious strategic thinking but could not justify a full internal strategy function. The pandemic year was difficult in the obvious ways, but it also brought a wave of clients who suddenly needed to rethink assumptions they had held for years. Janet worked through that period with a handful of clients in logistics, professional services, and healthcare administration, helping them make decisions under genuine uncertainty rather than waiting for conditions to stabilize. That experience shaped how the firm approaches ambiguity today.