Bending Rules

Questions of the week:??Why are we bending some rules, like starting the rehearsal day without 12 members and not setting the team configuration as 1 of each QA, Ops and Devs?

I write this article based on the insight of my conversation with my team in our monthly 1-on-1 call. I speak with each one of my team members. This article is to share the question of this week and our method to work on it. You can subscribe to the Building Our Team newsletter (2600+ subscribers)

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Why are we bending some rules, like starting the rehearsal day without 12 members and not setting the team configuration as 1 of each QA, Ops and Devs?

We have decided to invest 40% of this year's time in Scorecard Day, i.e., two days per week:

ME Day + Scorecard Day

It's a big investment and risk for a small organisation like ours. This also means we will take less Client work, especially on the custom development side, which will dent our profit this year.

Now that people are completing their training, we may have to wait at least a month or two to start the Scorecard Day. That decision will be bad for business. Let me explain it. We have 5 rounds remaining this year. This means approximately 1.5 for each Check Point (Details given in the training and FAQ): Starter Scorecard, Simple Scorecard and Standard Scorecard.

If we do a simple math estimation on Scorecards

1. Starter = 6 cards
2. Simple = 8 cards
3. Standard = 25 cards

Take the current run rate of completing the starter scorecard in 2 hours. We can put in 3 times, i.e., 6 hours, to work. That equates to 18 cards, meaning we cannot deliver a standard scorecard. Let alone a new requirement that the client might give use, which would be out of the syllabus, and the engine stops.

Also, the above guesswork is only based on a single team. We must average out other players and measure their velocity to deliver an error-free and quality scorecard.

Thus, a sense of urgency comes into the equation because we don't want to run out of cash or clients before completing the remaining 5 rounds.

Remember the steps of making money using the Scorecard Day:

• Team Delivering 1 Day Scorecard
• 3-5 Clients get free Scorecard Setup
• 3-5 Prospects get free Scorecard Setup
• 3-5 New Clients pay an Offer Price for Scorecard Setup
• 3-5 New Clients pay Full Price for the Scorecard Setup
• We start making Pure Profits (￡￡￡)

Note: We still need to get clients lined up to take the offer. We will make money by creating value and bringing outcomes to the client. We make rules to make reaching our goals easy, simple and faster.

That means we must find the shortest way to succeed with what we have. The brutal truth about winning is that if we have 100 steps to reach the summit and only walk to 99 steps, we have yet to achieve our target. The mission has failed.

You will still take some lessons for your next project in life. However, the current business will have to pay the price of your learning. The risk and onus is upon me and Gautam. Taking some creative, quick decisions that are atleast aligned with the overall strategy is an attempt to de-risk the outcome.

We are in the measurement business, so we better upskill ourselves to learn how best to put numbers to work.

I am not asking you to stop asking the question, but at least add a filter and try to answer it yourself or measure its importance to the overall milestones, goals, and outcomes we have set ourselves to achieve. So, instead of seeking the answer, become competent in answering it yourself by practising it more.

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