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Lead With Impact From Day One

Proven strategies to deliver impact, inspire others, and sustain success from the very start.

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Available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook

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The Day One Executive Framework

Three pillars to deliver outcomes, build trust, and sustain performance.

Generate Results

Deliver impact that gets noticed.

Know the Driving Force
Understand the core motivations and priorities that propel a business forward.
Master the Golden Pyramid
Know your unique value and align it with what drives the business.
Know Your Value
Advocate for yourself in career advancement and compensation discussions.
Be Strategic
Maximize career advantage and organizational impact.
Build Decision Intelligence
Make smart, timely choices that accelerate momentum instead of stalling it.
Be a Change Agent
Navigate uncertainty, lead transformation, and move teams forward with confidence.
Operate with Urgency
Execute quickly, without sacrificing quality, so results compound fast.

Nurture Relationships

Influence, connect, and build trust that lasts.

Know Thyself
Self-awareness is the foundation of executive success.
Know Others
Deeply understand underlying motivations and priorities of key stakeholders.
Create a High Value Network
Create meaningful connections that expand opportunities and amplify your reach.
Exude Presence
Say less. Influence more.
Be Accountable
Own your actions and model excellence so others rise to the standard you set.
Raise the Bar
Make yesterday's best tomorrow's benchmark.
Don’t Derail
Recognize and avoid the behaviors that sideline promising leaders.

Cultivate Resilience

Stay strong, centered, and unstoppable.

Be the CEO of Your Life
Treat your career like an enterprise: manage priorities, time, and direction intentionally.
Prize Your Time
Treat time as a strategic asset.
Be Unstoppable
Align personal resilience with strategic self-awareness to overcome obstacles and seize career-defining opportunities.
Walk Through Fire
Build the grit to endure challenges, setbacks, and high-stakes pressure.
Banish the Imposter
Silence self-doubt and replace it with unshakable confidence.
Care for Yourself
Protect your health and vitality so you can perform at your peak long-term.
Commit to You
Treat your life and your future like a non-negotiable priority: Go all in on you and live your legacy.

In the Media

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Conversations and appearances with author April Armstrong that bring The Day One Executive principles to life.

What Executives Are Saying

— Jonathan R. Alger, President, James Madison University

— The Honorable Susan M. Gordon, Former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence

— Maggie Wilderotter, Former President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Frontier Communications

— Rebecca M. Brewster, President and Chief Operating Officer, American Transportation Research Institute

April Armstrong

CEO, AHA Insight

About the Author

April Armstrong is founder and Chief Executive Officer of AHA Insight, a strategic consulting and independent advisory firm that helps executives keep high-stakes change projects from running off the rails.

She is the author of the award-winning leadership and career development book, The Day One Executive: A Guidebook to Stand Out in Your Career Starting Now, which elevated to #1 New Release and #1 Best Seller in six categories in its first week of release in 2023.

Over her career, April has worked extensively with senior executives leading transformational change from the White House, nearly every department and agency of the Executive Branch—including the U.S. Intelligence Community—and numerous private sector corporations. She specializes in helping executives build trust and succeed with transformational change (often valued in the billions of dollars) through multiparty negotiations, consensus-building, and stakeholder engagement.

Prior to forming AHA Insight, April rose through the ranks to become one of the youngest and first female executives at the nation's largest employee-owned science and technology firm, which went public and later split into two Fortune 500 companies. She served as one of four executive decision support facilitators in a company of 45,000 people with more than $7 billion in annual revenue. She was instrumental in growing a $17 million dollar profit and loss center at a Fortune 500 firm to over $200M in annual revenues within five years, and a go-to resource for spearheading turnaround teams and projects in crisis.

She earned a Master of Science degree in management information systems from The George Washington University in Washington, D.C., and a Bachelor of Arts degree in communications and French from James Madison University (JMU), in Harrisonburg, VA.

April has served on several advisory boards including JMU's College of Business Gilliam Center for Entrepreneurship and College of Liberal Arts, and as President of its College of Arts and Letters Advisory Board. Her leadership tips have been featured by Forbes.com, Training Industry Magazine, and on ABC, CBS, NBC, and FOX affiliates across the country.

Services

Go Beyond the Book:
Fastrack Your Success

Turn proven leadership principles into performance and immediate impact with coaching, training, custom workshops and keynote talks—starting now.

Executive Coaching

One-on-one and team coaching to help senior executives and rising/new executives meet the moment.

Custom Workshops

Tailored training programs designed to help you get win-win results with the people on whom your success depends.

Keynote Talks

Inspiring presentations that uplift audiences and transform possibilities.

Strategic Advisory

High-level consulting for complex change, consensus strategy, and organizational transformation.

“Even in this age of AI, successful organizations will engineer the 'people' side of success as much as the technical and business aspects. They will not leave it to chance.”

April Armstrong

Author of The Day One Executive and CEO of AHA Insight

Ready to Level Up Your Leadership?

What will be most needed in the new era? Leaders at all levels and layers able to think and lead like executives. The best organizations will start NOW to embed executive capacity at every layer of their organization.

Book a call today to see whether April Armstrong and The Day One Executive leadership development services are a fit for your needs.

For Individuals

Organizations Impacted

Trusted by leaders across government, industry, and academia to deliver transformational results.

U.S. Government

Superior Court of Los Angeles

Executive coaching workshop for judges and administrators, to enhance resilience; strategic advisory to help streamline judicial caseload.

U.S. Department of Commerce

Strategic advisory and consensus-based decision support delivering unanimous commitment from 13 bureaus for new enterprise IT system to streamline administration of billions of dollars in grants, saving the Department millions of dollars annually.

The White House

Strategic advisory and training with top and senior government officials to improve coordinated national catastrophic disaster preparedness and response.

Office of the Director of National Intelligence

Executive coaching, leadership development workshops, and expert facilitation to support executives and teams leading transformational change.

U.S. Department of Transportation

Multiparty negotiation support to Federal, State, Local, and Tribal infrastructure investment strategies; tech transfer; and public-private partnerships modernizing transportation systems nationwide.

U.S. Intelligence Community

Facilitation of leadership summits, policy agreements, and technology strategies including unanimous endorsement of a technology roadmap by all 18 intelligence agencies.

Private Sector

Booz Allen Hamilton

Strategic advisory and decision support to help shape strategy and educational frameworks for connected and autonomous transportation systems.

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Facilitation of the first national framework to treat early adolescent psychosis by academic researchers and federal, state, local, and tribal mental health providers.

Leidos

Strategic advisory and complex negotiation support to executives and teams leading high-stakes multisector initiatives valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars.