Our Story:

For twenty years, our founder, Nicole Craig, built a career the way many military spouses do — starting over every two to three years.

New state.
New job.
New systems to learn.
New teams to understand.

Across industries and roles, one pattern showed up again and again: the biggest obstacle to a well-run business wasn’t talent or effort — it was the absence of clear processes. Critical knowledge lived in someone’s head. Projects depended on one person. Nothing was written down. When that person left, momentum stalled.

Moving frequently also meant stepping into organizations at every stage — corporate teams, nonprofit groups, political campaigns. Nicole saw firsthand how smaller organizations, especially small businesses and nonprofits, were often left behind when it came to structure, project clarity, and, more recently, practical AI tools that could make their work easier.

Military life teaches you resilience. It also teaches you project management.

Every military move is a complex operation: timelines, logistics, contingency planning, coordination across multiple parties, and execution under pressure. After two decades of that rhythm — professionally and personally — managing complexity became second nature.

Nicole’s undergraduate degree is from the University of Wisconsin (Go Badgers!), and she earned her MBA with a specialization in Project Management from Louisiana State University at Shreveport, formalizing what experience had already shaped: clarity creates momentum.

After her spouse’s retirement from military service, Nicole and her family settled outside Denver with a shared goal — build meaningful work and spend every possible non-working moment in the mountains: you’ll find them skiing, hiking, mountain biking, and competing in endurance sports in their spare time.

Summit West Strategies was built from that same philosophy. Businesses should support your life — not consume it.

We work with small businesses to create systems that make operations smoother, projects clearer, and tools like AI accessible and practical. And when something falls outside our lane?

We believe in building strong networks. If we can’t do it, we know someone who can.