COMPASS LEFT LEGEND TOOL

The Business Legend

Mapping how your operation runs.

Every business runs on a handful of functions. Map each one: who leads it, the systems it runs on, what it costs, and how it runs. Fill it in below and the map builds itself. The point is not a tidy form, it is seeing your operation clearly.

The Bearing Page

Where you’re going, on one page.

The Legend shows where you are. This page shows where you’re going. It uses the functions you already named on the Legend, so there is nothing to retype. A bearing is not a forecast. Next year you can plan. Three years you can only aim.

The Business Legend · Mapping how your operation runs

The Navigator Briefing · Session Tool

The Least-Managed Asset You Own

The Business Legend

Mapping how your operation runs.

The map

Your business functions

Monthly OpEx$0

Annual CapEx$0

The Legend · what you mark for each function

Leader The one person accountable for the function.

Systems The tools that run it, and who runs each. "A spreadsheet" and "nothing" are valid, telling answers.

Cost The dollars, tagged OpEx (recurring) or CapEx (owned).

Handoff How work passes to the next function, and who owns that pass.

How to read the map

Automated. A system does the work. Running clean.
Partially automated. Some automation, still manual touchpoints.
Manual. Done by hand, where margin and time leak.
⚑No owner. A function, system, or handoff nobody owns, the least-managed asset, whatever color it is.

Work through your business, one function at a time. Rename any function to match how you're organized. Study the handoff between each, that seam between departments is where the trouble usually hides.

Outsourced services

What you pay outside vendors to run

Anything you outsource that isn’t a single system, an MSP, an agency, a bookkeeper, outside legal. One line each. It rolls into the totals up top, so the number becomes your whole cost of operating, not just software.

Nobody's Steering

The Bearing Page

Where you're going, on one page.

The Legend shows where you are. This page shows where you're going. It uses the functions you already named on the Legend, so there is nothing to retype. A bearing is not a forecast. Next year you can plan. Three years you can only aim. Nothing you type leaves your browser.

1 · Who owns the direction

One name

The person accountable for where technology is taking the business, not for whether it is running today. If there is no such person, say so. That blank is the finding.

⚑ no owner yet

2 · Our heading

Where the business is going, in one sentence

Business language, no system names. Not a forecast, a heading.

Locations

Volume

Customers

3 · What has to be true

To reach that heading

One line for each stage of the work. What has to be true about the way you win it, deliver it, and settle up for it?

Chasing revenue — how we quote

Keeping promises — how we deliver

Squaring accounts — how we bill

4 · The marks

Each function, against the heading

These are the functions from your Legend. Give each one a mark. Toward: it is carrying you there. Holding: it works today but will not get you there. Against: it is pulling the other way.

Our heading

5 · The top three

The three that cost you the most

In order, each with a name and a date. This is the list the door checks every new request against.

What we fixOwnerBy when

6 · The door, and the next check

Who decides, and when you look again

Any new system, any new subscription, and any change to how work moves between functions goes through this group before it is bought or switched on. It is a door, not a committee. Check the bearing every quarter in the first year, then twice a year.

Who is at the door

Next bearing check

Does this carry us toward the heading, or does it only solve this week?
Who does this touch downstream?
Does something we already own do this?
Where does it rank against our top three?

Not sure where your operation stands overall? The Compass Score gives you a read in about five minutes at technavigator.us.