The Vitals+ FrameworkTM is a set of diagnostic tools that offers leaders a way to rapidly assess their team’s readiness to scale safely, and then decide what to do next. 

The Vitals+ are anchored on the 15 do-or die questions all scaling teams answer must answer in order to grow. They Framework includes two distinct tools:

1. The Vitals+ BASELINE SurveyTM - A survey for individual reflection. Includes prompts for both objective experience and felt priority to unblock individual and teams work. 

2. The Vitals+ Scaling Safety SCORECARDTM - A visual scorecard for discussion and prioritization. The SCORECARD enables teams to see their own readiness on a gradient and rapidly align on risks and how to bridge from the current state to the next level of readiness.

The Vitals+ BASELINE and SCORECARD will show you:

• How prepared your team is to grow revenue and net income, today

• Your team’s specific risks, today

• The very next steps to strengthen your team’s ability to drive results as you grow     

Think of it as a full inspection of your boat, before you embark on a high-stakes voyage. Any captain, crew, or dock-side investor might breathe easier knowing we’d checked the hull, the pulleys, mechanical systems, and supplies before shoving off. 

What you do next is up to you. Every team’s goals and tolerance for risk is unique. The Vitals+ is designed to rapidly build awareness, shared language, and clear decision making around risk and preparation. 

The Vitals+ Framework is not a review of all corporate processes. It is never a judgement of the quality of people, work ethic, or ideas. The Vitals+ not a prediction of team viability. Long-term survival and thriving depends more on the team’s capacity to align and adapt together than on conditions at any specific moment in time.

The Vitals+ Framework was designed first and foremost for Founders and CEOs leading highly operational teams who:  

• Are feeling both confident and irritated. 

  • Confident with an idea they believe in, a killer team, customers who love them, and a goal they’re hungry for: usually a step function in scale or an expansion into a new venture or offering. 

  • Irritated that after a meaningful effort, the goal hasn’t happened yet. There is a sense that they have all the right ingredients and the current team should be able to stick the landing, but hasn’t YET. 

• Want to get the most out of the current team, and not resort to adding headcount in order to grow. 

• Own goal setting, prioritization, and resource allocation decisions, and can no longer afford to dive into the weeds or rely on the most persuasive voices alone.

• Who want a battle-tested roadmap for scale beyond current operation, guidance and practical tools that don’t require reading a book or getting an MBA 

Team managers

Individual contributors

Board members, if invited by the executive team  

Investors and capital partners, if invited by the executive team

Prospective talent - exploring whether to join a team, with the goal of driving revenue growth

Before allocating significant time or resources to scale.

As part of any major prioritization process and a kind of pre-flight checklist before making a big investment, launching a new product, pushing to grow revenue of an existing product, expanding geographically or making systemic changes.

The Vitals+ allows your whole team to check for strength of foundations, the systems for getting work done, and visibility for each layer of the team to do their best work. We’re looking for what is working and for ‘leaks’ - the better to tune up and plug leaks before pouring more resources in the top.

As a way to define specific goals and scope of work, whether you are working purely with your internal team or engaging outside resources.

Pro tip: Use the Good/Better/ Best to get specific about where we are today, and where we want to be in the next 1-3 months.

For most teams, the BASELINE and SCORECARD quarterly, every 6 months, or annually. 

The frequency most effective for your team will depend on:  

a) how frequently workflow and roles are changing

b) how many layers of ‘translation’ you need between functional disciplines, and 

c) how effective it feels for you and your team.

Scaling means growth from one scale of operations to another.  

Example: Growth from 10 ‘reps’ a year to 100. From 100 to 1,000. Or from 1,000 to 10,000.

Scaling effectively means the team’s capacity to grow to a new scale of operations while driving predictable net income over time, in a way that enables all team members to do the best work of their lives. 

This definition of scale differs materially from growth models which prioritize customer acquisition without financial performance requirements, ‘growth at all costs’, ‘move fast and break things’, ‘hustle culture,’ and activity-based ‘pseudo-productivity.’

1. Define the company you’re assessing.

2. Define the product you’re assessing: pick one. In situations where your team is supporting both an existing product and a new venture, focus on the existing product first. If your time is over 80% dedicated to the new venture, it’s OK to pick that one, just be clear. 

3. Allow 30 - 90 minutes to fill in the BASELINE Survey. In each domain, check all boxes which describe what you’ve experienced so far. If you’re not sure, check what feels most right, today. 

4. Book a clarity call to discuss your results and distill your priorities. 

5. Review your results in the visual format of the Scaling Safety SCORECARD. 

6. Decide what to do next

7. Execute, with as much or little support as you desire.

Whatever you’re doing now:  Consider the Vitals+ tool as an accelerant for your existing communication and decision processes. Your team will know best what is working, and what could use improvement. But opportunities may be tucked into a blind spot or hard to hear when things are moving fast and the stakes or emotions are high. Vitals+ is a lifeline, a rapid way to slice through the noise. It’s designed to help you and your executives align and speak the same language - to see clearly where your team may be stuck, and how to unlock the power already within your team with focused decisions, communication, clarity or visibility. 

Business Model Canvas: The Business Model Canvas is a good tool for use by a tight group of founders in early stage, rapid ideation. It is less effective for operating businesses with existing revenue and performance data. Jargon and format limit its effectiveness for communication. 

Annual strategic planning process: Annual documents tend to require a grueling process and provide more comfort to executives than value to team members. I’ve never seen strategy documents create decisions, alignment, or commitments that stick in a rapidly growing company. 

Concept memos: Memos like Amazon’s famous 6-pager are phenomenal for working through complex concepts and getting meaningful feedback from diverse stakeholders. And, memos are not operating tools. The Vitals+ tool is a complement to deep analysis. Both Vitals+ tools can help an executive team scan operations to determine where the best thinking of a concept memo has, or has not, translated to support the individuals responsible for delivering daily operations and long term capital structure. 

Annual budget process: I love a budget as a communication tool about the conditions under which we could achieve x, y, or z. Budget processes don’t vet whether the team has the clarity and visibility they need to deliver on core budget assumptions. That’s where Vitals+ comes in.

Item descriptioNo problem. 

• We use plain English and no jargon on purpose. This enables insight to flow directly between diverse professionals. 

• The Vitals+ BASELINE can dovetail into any existing management or investor frameworks.n

Great work!

I can help you with that.

We start by getting crystal clear on your executive team priorities. Within two weeks we’ll know what needs to be done and what resources your team has on hand.

If you have the resources you need in-house or in your network, go forth and conquer! The Vitals+ and Good/Better/Best build shared language, pattern recognition, and muscle memory so that your team can prioritize, scope and build what you need. If you have this already, fantastic. That is the goal for all teams.

If you have internal resources and want coaching for a specific issue, or on the overall process, we’ll set up a project and drive, with me as a coach and your biggest fan.

If you need immediate horsepower to build the solutions you agree you need, we can set up a project and I can serve as a player/coach as your team builds capacity.