Less firefighting.
More leading.
The Elements ODS is the operational delivery system for owner-led service businesses. Seventeen elements, five domains and four stages that turn heroics into a system your team runs, so the promise you sold gets kept every time.
The assessment, playbooks and tools to run it come together as the ODS Toolset. Join the list and we'll tell you the day it's ready.
Built for owner-led service businesses, from about $1M to $50M and beyond
The problem
Everything still comes back to you.
The phone will not stop. Three people need a decision only you can make. A customer has escalated again. The business cannot run without you, and that is not a compliment. It is an operation that was never written down, never owned and never measured.
“The operations manual is a person. Everyone asks the owner how to do everything, and the answer varies with their mood and how busy they are.”
From The Elements ODSMeasure what matters
Six numbers tell you whether it is working.
Baseline all six in the first week. Every element you build afterward is there to move at least one of them.
On-time delivery rate
Whether the promise you sold is the promise being kept.
First-time-right rate
Whether it is right the first time, or right the second time.
Rework hours
What being wrong the first time actually costs you.
Owner escalations
How much of the business still routes through you personally.
Complaint-to-resolution
How long a customer stays unhappy before somebody fixes it.
Unplanned overtime
Whether you are delivering on capacity or on goodwill.
How it works
A system your team runs, one stage at a time.
Find out where you stand
An assessment where the owner, managers and field score all seventeen elements, and managers peer-review each other’s areas.
See where ownership lands
Five questions about how you are organized put one accountable name against every element.
Baseline the six numbers
Measured from the records you already have, before anything is built.
Build in stages
Stabilize first, in about ninety days. Each stage ends with a gate you pass on evidence.
The system
Seventeen elements. Five domains. Four stages.
Every element has an owner, a score and a place in the build sequence. The number is the order you build them in.
The book
The whole system, written for owners.
Why operations breaks as a business grows, the seventeen elements, and how to build them stage by stage. Every chapter points to a worksheet or template in the ODS Toolset that you can put to work the same week.
Coming in 2027 in Kindle, paperback and hardcover.
Ways to start
Three ways to start.
The book
The complete system for owners and leadership teams.
- Kindle, paperback and hardcover
- All seventeen elements, stage by stage
- A worksheet or template for every chapter
The ODS Toolset
Everything you need to run the system yourself, in one download.
- The ebook and the operations assessment
- Five domain playbooks
- Meeting Kit, scorecard and reporting
- Every worksheet and template
Cost of Chaos calculator
What your current operation costs you in a year, in about two minutes.
- Rework, overtime, your time, lost customers
- Same math as Chapter 2
- Runs in your browser; free
Coming later: the ODS app, by yearly subscription. Toolset owners get 10% off.
Join the list
Be first to get the tools.
The ODS Toolset will be here when The Elements ODS launches. Leave your email and we'll tell you the day it's ready.