MEET OUR INDUSTRY GUEST
In this edition of "Conversations with Market Mosaic", we sit down with Sebastian Katkhuda, Lead, Business Development and Client Management, All Risks, WTW.
A strategic advisor with 30+ years in financial services, specialising in how organisations think, decide, and act on market intelligence in complex environments.
Sebastian shares his insights on Decision Intelligence & Organisational Strategy.
Enjoy the full interview below!
Photo: Sebastian Katkhuda
Market Mosaic: In your first conversation with a new client, what's the question, or the observation that reveals more about the organization than anything they'll deliberately share with you?
Sebastian Katkhuda: The most revealing question is: "What has already been tried, and why didn't it work?"
The answer tells you far more than any positioning statement. It exposes how decisions are made, whether failure is analysed honestly or rewritten, and whether the organisation optimises for learning or for internal narrative.
Equally important is the observation: who answers first, and how aligned, or cautious, the room feels. You can quickly see whether you're dealing with a coherent leadership team or a collection of individuals protecting different agendas.
Market Mosaic: Most engagements start with the wrong question, not because the client is unsophisticated, but because the real problem is harder to admit than the one that presents. How do you navigate that gap in the first few weeks without losing trust?
Sebastian Katkhuda: You don't confront the gap directly; you earn the right to reframe it.
In the first few weeks, the focus is on building a shared fact base and demonstrating that you understand the problem as they've articulated it. Only once that credibility is established do you start to introduce alternative interpretations, usually grounded in data, patterns from comparable organisations, or second-order implications of their own decisions.
The key is sequencing:
First: align on what is visible
Then: expand the lens to what is uncomfortable but true
If you move too quickly to the "real problem," it feels adversarial. If you never get there, the engagement has no value. The balance is in making the client feel that the insight is co-created and natural, not imposed.
Market Mosaic: The data is pointing in one direction. The client's instinct, or their internal politics, is pointing somewhere else. How do you hold your position without losing the room?
Sebastian Katkhuda: You shift the conversation from "who is right" to "what decision carries the most reversible risk."
Data rarely "wins" by force. Instead, it reframes the consequences of being wrong. I tend to position it in terms of scenarios:
If we follow the data and it's wrong, what happens?
If we ignore it and it's right, what happens?
This allows leaders to engage without feeling overruled.
At the same time, you maintain your position by being explicit about your recommendation and the assumptions behind it, without becoming rigid. Confidence with transparency tends to preserve credibility, even in politically complex environments.
Market Mosaic: A belief about strategy or market intelligence that was conventional wisdom ten years ago, that you now think was either wrong or incomplete. What changed your mind?
Sebastian Katkhuda: The idea that more data automatically leads to better decisions.
Ten years ago, the prevailing belief was that accumulation, like more dashboards, more research, more signals, would produce clarity. In practice, it often produced the opposite: fragmentation, slower decision cycles, and selective interpretation to support pre-existing views.
What changed is not the volume of data, but the realisation that advantage comes from synthesis, not collection. The organisations that outperform are not the ones with the most information, but the ones that:
Have accurate information
Ask sharper questions
Prioritise what matters decisively
Translate insight into action faster than competitors
In other words, intelligence is less about visibility and more about judgement.
Market Mosaic: A founder or first-time CEO wants to build their first serious strategy or intelligence function. Not which software to buy, but how to actually think about it. What do you tell them?
Sebastian Katkhuda: Start with decision-making, not infrastructure.
The most common mistake is to ask, "What tools do we need?" The better question is: "What are the few critical decisions we need to get consistently right, and what do we need to know to make them?"
From there:
Define the decisions that drive disproportionate value (pricing, market entry, capital allocation, etc.)
Work backwards to the insights required
Establish a disciplined way of challenging assumptions before decisions are made
A strong strategy or intelligence function is not a reporting layer — it is a discipline embedded in how the business thinks and decides.
If you get that right, the tools become obvious. If you don't, the tools become noise.
Maintain a clear path from Diagnosis to guiding principles to defined actions.
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