About Ivan and Mariana | Shift Intelligence

Ivan Polic

The Founder & Structure

Ivan works directly with the founder. He looks at how presence shapes decisions, where intensity has become structural, and how to redesign the operating architecture so the business can hold its standard across the team. He lived this firsthand: from 80-hour weeks and two failed exits to two hours per week and a clean eight-figure sale.

Drawing from more than 400 board meetings across industries, Ivan helps founders move from operator to architect.

Mariana Polic

The Culture & Leadership Depth

Mariana works with the culture around the founder. She helps build the leadership depth, relational trust, and team capacity required for a business to hold its standard across people, not just through one founder.

Her work blends two decades of leadership development with the lived experience of guiding their own company through crisis, recovery, growth, and exit. Both have to shift. The founder and the culture.

Trusted by Founders Across Industries

Where This Work Began

We did not learn this in a classroom. We learned it inside a business that nearly killed us.

In 2008, our revenue went from $527,423 to $37,415 in a single month. We sat in the parking lot every morning wondering if we could open the door.

We rebuilt. Moved the standard from our heads into the business. Built leaders who could hold it. Stopped being the last call on everything. Down to two hours a week. The standard held. The team held.

We sold to private equity in six days. Eight figures. No contingencies. No earn-out. The buyers called the team and culture the best they had ever acquired. They called once in four years.

I have a great deal of respect for Ivan and Mariana and their business acumen.

And would count them as one of the very few who can be relied on for business advice that actually works.

I have seen first-hand their mastery at uncovering the problem, slicing through the fluff to find the heart of the matter and prescribing solid advice to advance the ball and correct the problem.

Keith Cunningham, The Rich Dad
Author of The Road Less Stupid

12-Year Board Relationship with Ivan & Mariana

If you see it, you already know.

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