Obsidian Edge Partners
When everything is moving at once, you need someone who knows what to stabilize first.
Strategic people leadership for organizations navigating complexity, restructuring, high-stakes change, and growth.
I come in when the stakes are high, the pressure is real, and people decisions require judgment, structure, and care.
Engaged by organizations, and by the leaders inside them when the challenge is theirs alone.
In the room. Not on the sidelines. Never just observing.
ROOTED™
Good decisions do not happen by accident. They are built into how an organization thinks and leads.
ROOTED™ is Obsidian Edge's framework for helping organizations build the internal architecture to make better decisions under pressure.
It is not a program or initiative. It is a structural discipline for embedding fairness, clarity, and accountability into how the business actually operates.
It governs every engagement, whether the client is an organization or one leader inside it.
The Reality
Most organizations in high-stakes change are not missing effort. They are missing someone who has seen this before.
When a company is mid-RIF, navigating an acquisition, restructuring under pressure, or facing leadership complexity, the gaps become visible fast.
Communication breaks down. Leadership misaligns. Documentation lags behind decisions. Employee relations exposure grows quietly in the background.
These things do not fail one at a time. They fail simultaneously.
Legal and Employee Relations Exposure
The risk that grows quietly while leadership is focused on the business.
Leadership Misalignment
Executives who agree in the room and fracture in execution.
No Communication Strategy
Employees who find out through rumor because the message was built too late.
HR Brought In Too Late
When HR arrives after decisions are made, the damage is already in motion.
The Work
When everything breaks at once, this is where I start.
For Organizations
Early in every engagement, we isolate the immediate exposure, establish a communication perimeter, and sequence what comes next.
Employee Relations
Investigations, terminations, performance management, and the documentation that protects your business from the decisions it has to make.
RIF Execution
Strategy, sequencing, communication, and the human architecture of a reduction in force done with precision and dignity.
M&A People Integration
Retention of key talent, cultural due diligence, org design, and the people decisions that determine whether the deal actually works.
Leadership Bench and Succession
Who is ready, who is not, and what happens the day a critical leader walks. An honest read on the team you have, the gaps you cannot see from inside, and the development and succession plan that closes them before you need it.
Obsidian Edge advises organizations through restructuring, leadership change, and complexity. It also advises the individual leaders inside those systems when the challenge is theirs alone to navigate: a severance to negotiate, a leave to manage, an exit to plan. The engagement may be commissioned by a company or sought privately. The standard is the same either way.
For Individual Leaders
Private advisory for one person, when the problem originates in the workplace and the decision is yours to make.
Severance Negotiation
Review of what you have been offered, an honest read on your leverage, and the strategy for a conversation you only get to have once.
Leave Management
Medical, family, and disability leave navigated with the timing, documentation, and communication that protect your standing while you are out.
Exit Strategy
Planning a departure on your terms: sequencing, the internal narrative, references, and what you carry forward.
How We Work
Not a packaged solution. An engagement shaped around your real situation.
The strongest engagements are thoughtful, direct, and tailored to the complexity of the moment.
Each engagement begins with conversation, context, and careful assessment rather than a predefined formula.
Discuss an EngagementFor organizations, work may take the form of
- Organizational design and restructuring navigation
- Mergers, acquisitions, and people integration
- Leadership team effectiveness, alignment, and offsites
- Executive coaching and leadership development, sponsored by the employer
- Strategic HR advisory and embedded people leadership
- Culture and change work
- Intensive strategic sessions for moments requiring clarity, sequencing, or structural redesign
For individual leaders, work may take the form of
- Severance negotiation strategy
- Exit negotiation and departure planning
- Leave navigation and return to work, including FMLA, ADA, disability, and accommodation
- Performance concerns and performance improvement plans
- Workplace conflict and difficult manager dynamics
- Political navigation inside complex organizations
- Promotion and executive advancement strategy
- Career decision making and career strategy while employed
This is strategic advisory on how to navigate an employment system. It is not legal representation, and where a matter calls for counsel, I will say so directly.
Some engagements are short-term and focused. Others evolve into ongoing advisory relationships.
Proof
Trusted across complex environments.
Nearly three decades of people leadership across FedEx, R/GA, Visa, Meta, and JLL, beginning at HSBC Bank USA. The advisory work has since reached founders, executives, and leaders across private equity, nonprofit, health, and entrepreneurial sectors.
What that has meant in practice
Reductions in force designed and executed end to end, including the sequencing, the communications, and the leadership preparation that determine how people leave.
Employee relations matters carried from first report through investigation, decision, and documentation, in environments where every outcome was going to be scrutinized.
Acquisitions integrated at the people level, end to end: org design, cultural diligence, retention strategy for the talent the deal depended on, and onboarding people into a company they did not choose.
Built inside complex systems. Designed for leaders navigating complexity now.
Also from Tola Fadina
The work does not stop at the organizational level.
Obsidian Edge takes on the problem when it originates in the workplace. The Season Between takes on what the workplace leaves behind.
A separate private advisory practice for high-performing women navigating identity recalibration, transition, and the space between who they were and who they are becoming.
The two often run in sequence. Obsidian Edge negotiates the exit. The Season Between is for the question of who you are once the title is gone.
For organizations, The Season Between is available for corporate cohorts, workbook licensing, and group facilitation.
About
The person behind the work.
I have been in the room when the hardest decisions were made.
Begin the ConversationI bring nearly three decades of HR and people leadership experience across complex organizations, including FedEx, R/GA, Visa, Meta, and JLL.
I have led through restructurings, M&A, leadership recalibration, employee relations complexity, talent decisions, and moments where the business reality and human cost had to be held at the same time.
That experience shaped the work of Obsidian Edge: senior people leadership for organizations that need clarity, structure, judgment, and humanity when the stakes are real.
Revenue and humanity are not in competition. But you need someone in the room who has held both at the same time.
FAQ
Common questions.
Every engagement begins with a direct conversation. Not a discovery call designed to sell you something, but a real exchange about what you are navigating and whether this work is the right fit. From there, engagements are structured around the actual complexity of your situation, not a predefined package.
Both. Some engagements are short-term and highly focused: a RIF, a leadership offsite, a specific investigation or high-stakes moment. Others evolve into ongoing advisory relationships where continuity and institutional knowledge are part of the value. The structure is determined by what the work actually requires.
The work is best suited to organizations that have meaningful complexity: mid-market companies, growth-stage businesses, and larger enterprises navigating restructuring, integration, or leadership challenges. The common thread is not size but stakes. Organizations where people decisions carry real consequences and require senior-level judgment.
Both, depending on what the engagement requires. Some of the most critical work, including investigations, leadership offsites, RIF execution, and M&A integration, benefits from on-site presence. Strategic advisory and ongoing support often work well remotely. Presence decisions are made based on the nature of the work, not convenience.
No. Obsidian Edge LLC provides strategic people and HR leadership advisory services only. We do not provide legal, financial, or therapeutic advice. For matters requiring legal counsel, we will tell you directly and, where appropriate, help you think through what kind of legal support you need.
We do not manage transactional HR infrastructure directly. For operational needs including payroll, benefits administration, and recruiting support, we maintain relationships with best-in-class specialists and can connect you to the right people. Executive search engagements are available and handled directly.
Still not sure whether this is the right fit? That is what the first conversation is for.
Begin the ConversationBegin
Let's start a real conversation.
Tell me where you are and what you are navigating. I will follow up personally and, if aligned, share a link to book a discovery conversation.
This is not a sales call. The goal is to understand the real problem, not the presenting one.