Your 60% Is Documented. Is It Load-Bearing?

Simon Sinek's Golden Circle asks why you do what you do. You probably already have an answer for your own system. It's in an ICM somewhere. A values doc, a mission file, the folder that says what it's for.

A COO I work with asked a different question on a call last month. He wasn't asking why his team ran performance reviews. He was asking what would happen if they stopped.

Nobody in the room could answer.

Those are two different tests. Sinek's question checks whether you can articulate a belief. The COO's question checks whether that belief is load-bearing. You can pass the first one in a conference room with nobody watching. You can only pass the second one by pointing at what actually breaks.

That COO had a month of build-versus-buy behind him. Platforms compared, discovery calls stacked up. Then he asked one question, and the room went quiet. Nobody had ever tested whether their reasons for running reviews would hold up under questioning.

Take whatever you've documented about why a process exists and ask what specifically breaks if you stop doing it. Name a consequence you can check: a number that moves, a decision someone makes differently, a person who acts differently on Monday.

If you can name it, you have a claim to test. Then look for evidence that the process produces that result.

If you can't, you haven't established what the process does in practice.

@Jake Van Clief

's ratio describes database queries, logic, and AI calls. I apply it as an analogy to people and process.

The ratio is his. A client forced the load-bearing test on me, not the other way around. If you want to run it against your own 60%, I'm happy to talk it through.

The full article, The Tool Is Ten Percent, is in David's classroom.

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Your 60% Is Documented. Is It Load-Bearing?