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Owner-run businesses · operations: The business works. It only works when you are in it.

Contact meSee what I take on
A Czech aircraft factory, when I started
25
aircraft a year the factory could build
16
aircraft a year it was actually building
Read the case

Evidence

What changed when the bottleneck was found.

  • 40%

    less time from order to finished project at a technology distributor

    ERC (erc.ua)
  • 16 of 25

    aircraft a year built, against what the factory could build

    Distar CZ
  • 150

    aircraft a year a factory could build while it called itself a parts shop

    Aviatex

Owners usually write to me when one of these happens.

  1. You spend most of the week inside the business instead of running it
  2. Everything waits for a decision only you are allowed to make
  3. What happens after somebody buys is slower than what happens before
  4. Your capacity is bigger than your order book and nobody has said so out loud
  5. The process exists, but only in one person’s head

What I take on

  1. 01One job
  2. 02The waits
  3. 03Remove first
  4. 04The proof

Everyone describes the process differently.

What takes the time is almost never what people say takes the time.

How I run it
  • Follow one real order or enquiry through every handoff
  • Time it with a stopwatch, not with a meeting
  • Write down the process as it actually runs

Work sits in someone’s inbox, waiting for you.

Approvals queue behind one person and the same details get typed in twice. Cheap to fix, expensive to leave.

How I run it
  • Find where the work stops, waits or gets done twice
  • Put a cost on each wait
  • Name who owns each handoff
40%
less time from order to finished project, once the handoffs had owners

The fix is usually to remove a step, not to buy software.

Removing a step beats handing it over, and handing it over beats buying a tool for it.

How I run it
  • Remove what isn’t needed
  • Hand over what someone else can own
  • Automate only what is left

A process document goes in a drawer. A number doesn’t.

One measure is agreed at the start and checked a month later.

How I run it
  • Agree the one number that shows the fix held
  • Check it a month later
  • Correct what slipped back

How it runs

Two to four weeks, depending on how many handoffs there are.

  1. 01Free first call
  2. 02Follow one job end to end
  3. 03Time the real bottleneck
  4. 04Remove, hand over, and check
Price
Fixed price, agreed before we start. The first conversation costs nothing.
You bring
  • Access to the people who do the work, not only the people who manage it
  • Whatever the current process is written down as, if anything
  • Delivery times, complaints and refunds
Not this
Writing a process document nobody will follow.

Questions owners ask first.

What do I end up with?
  • The process as it actually runs, not as it is described in a meeting
  • Where the work stops, waits, or gets done twice
  • What to remove, what to hand over, and who owns each piece
  • The one number that shows whether it stayed fixed

You end up with a business that runs a full week without you in it, and a way to tell whether it still does.

What do you need from me to start?
  • The people who do the work, for half an hour each
  • Delivery times, capacity figures, and what breaks when demand rises
  • Complaints, refunds, and why customers left
When would you turn this down?

Writing a process document nobody will follow.

Replacing your team with software because software is cheaper.

How long does it take, and what does it cost?

Two to four weeks, depending on how many handoffs there are.

Fixed price, agreed before we start. The first conversation costs nothing.

How does it start?

With a free first call of about an hour. Bring what is happening and any numbers you trust; if this isn’t the right domain, I’ll tell you on that call.

Tell me what’s not working.

Send what eats your week and where things wait for you. I’ll tell you where I’d look first.

Tell me what’s going wrong

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What I’ve written on running the business.

More work in this domain

  • Distar CZ

    A factory producing sixteen aircraft a year at 64% of its twenty-five-aircraft capacity.

  • ERC (erc.ua)

    Cut project lead time by 40% at a major Ukrainian technology distributor — by making the official path the fast one.

  • AeroSolution

    Turned an aircraft dealer into a full-lifecycle provider and won three partnerships on a ten-year horizon.

  • Aviatex

    A factory that could build 150 aircraft a year was calling itself a shop for parts.

  • MXM

    132 leads at $19.85 — and, more usefully, a process that outlived the campaign.

  • Center of IT and Innovations (CITAUA)

    A company building digital products for banks had a website from the 2000s.