Templates that measure something
Every one of these is a working file rather than a handout. You put your own numbers in and it tells you something you did not already know — usually something you would rather it did not. Free, no email, no signup, no drip sequence. If they are useful, keep them and never speak to us.
The Operating Cadence
Your weekly meeting is not a cadence. Three touches a week and five numbers that tell you — bluntly, and sooner than you want — whether the rhythm is holding or just occupying calendar space.
Carryover rate · Oldest block · Record lag · Days silent
9-sheet workbook · 15-page field guide →
Measures ConcentrationThe Founder Dependency Audit
Not how busy you are — how concentrated you are. How much of the business runs through one person, what it would cost to change that, and how long you could vanish before anybody outside noticed.
Share of load that is you · Items only you can do · Days before it shows
8-sheet workbook · 12-page field guide →
Measures ForesightThe RAID Log
You already know what a RAID log is — that has never been the problem. This one grades itself on the only question that matters: how much of what went wrong was on the risk register before it happened.
Issues you saw coming · Passed triggers · Unconfirmed dependencies · Untested assumptions
9-sheet workbook · 13-page field guide →
Why three, and why these three
They catch three different failures that feel identical from the inside — the vague sense that everything takes longer than it should. Coordination is the record drifting away from reality while everybody stays polite. Concentration is too much running through one person. Foresight is every problem arriving as a surprise and being handled well.
Worth knowing which you have, because the fixes have nothing in common. Coordination is fixed by a rhythm. Concentration is fixed by roughly six weeks per item of deliberate handover. Foresight is fixed by four specific fields and a twenty-minute weekly habit. Running the wrong fix energetically is how a year goes by.
They also overlap in ways worth watching. A stale RAID log is usually a coordination problem rather than a diligence one — the review is not happening because no rhythm holds it. And a risk register sourced entirely from one person reflects one person’s blind spots exactly, which is concentration wearing a governance costume.
The artifact was never the hard part.
Running one of these for eight weeks when it is inconvenient is the hard part. So is being the person who reads the uncomfortable number out loud. All three workbooks end with a sheet designed to be sent back to us, and if the numbers say you are fine, we will tell you that and go away. That happens more than you would expect.