A quarterly owner review that ends in three decisions

Why quarterly

A heating year has four distinct phases: the autumn ramp, the winter peak, the spring shoulder and the summer lull. A quarterly rhythm puts one review in each, which is often enough to catch a problem before it becomes a season-long one, and rare enough that the owner prepares properly.

The timing also matches when public data changes. Statistics Canada's Business Counts are released twice a year, and provincial program pages change often. A review is a natural moment to check what moved.

The agenda

1. Last quarter's decisions (10 minutes). Done, in progress or dropped, and why.
2. Scorecard walk-through (30 minutes). Each KPI from the Owner KPI scorecard, split by furnace, boiler and heat pump. We only discuss numbers that moved more than you'd expect.
3. Market check (15 minutes). New releases from the sources in your market brief, and any program openings or closings.
4. Capacity look-ahead (15 minutes). The next quarter's demand against your crew, from the capacity plan.
5. Decisions (20 minutes). Three of them, written: what to grow, what to fix, what to stop.

What a good decision looks like

A good decision names an action, an owner, a date and the KPI that will show whether it worked. For example: "Move $1,500 a month of paid search from furnace terms to heat pump terms from 1 March. Owner: office manager. Watch: heat pump quotes issued per month."

A weak decision sounds like "focus more on heat pumps". It feels like progress and changes nothing.

Who it is for

The review suits owners who already have, or are building, a scorecard. It is especially useful for companies with two or three people sharing management, where decisions tend to drift between them. If you are planning an eventual sale or succession, the review also builds the kind of tidy record buyers ask for; the group's exit brand, BizSell.ca, handles that side when the time comes.

How results are measured

After four reviews, look at the decision log. How many decisions were completed? How many were dropped, and was the reason sound? Did the KPIs attached to completed decisions move? A healthy log has most decisions completed and a few dropped for good reasons.

Common mistakes

• Spending the whole meeting on last month's surprises and never reaching the decisions.
• Making seven decisions. Three get done; seven get forgotten.
• Skipping the winter review because "we're too busy". That is when capacity problems are most visible.
• Reviewing marketing in a separate meeting, so spend is never tied to the line it serves.

Preparing for your first review

You don't need a perfect scorecard to start. Bring what you have: last quarter's installs by equipment line, your average tickets, a rough count of missed calls, and anything that surprised you. We will fill the gaps with you and note where the records need tightening.

It also helps to write down, before the meeting, the one thing you are most worried about. Owners usually know where the trouble is; the review gives that worry a number and a deadline. If the worry turns out to be unfounded, that is a useful result too, and it frees attention for the decisions that matter.

Scope and format

Each review includes preparation, the session itself and the written decision log. Reviews are quoted in writing, or included where your proposal says so. We are a business and marketing service, not a contractor. The quarterly review guide gives you a template to run one yourself, and our pricing page covers the marketing plans. Call, text or email to set up a first review.