Getting What You Want: a reverse-engineering tool for business growth

Executive overview

Most businesses track metrics without knowing if they're the right ones. This tool fixes that by working backwards from the desired outcome to identify the exact activities that drive it.

Start with the result you want. Map each preceding step until you reach daily or weekly actions. Track only the most critical ones.

Reverse-engineer your goal into measurable activities, then use those activities to pinpoint exactly where performance breaks down.

How the tool works

• Start at the end: define the specific result you want (e.g. one new client per month)
• Work backwards through each step that must happen to produce that result
• Example chain: 8 new prospects/week → 4 contacts/week → 2 first meetings/week → 1 needs assessment/month → 2 proposals/month → 1 new client/month
• You don't need to track every step — only the most critical measurables
• Place chosen measurables on a company or departmental scorecard

Diagnosing when results are off

• If you're not hitting a goal, use the map to find where the chain breaks
• Walk back through each step to identify which activity is falling short
• Determine whether the gap is a people issue or a process issue
• Assign clear accountability for the step that's failing

Tying it to processes and customer journeys

• Apply the same method to operational goals, not just sales (e.g. onboard a client within 7 days of contract signing)
• Back-map the activities required to hit that service-level commitment
• Identify which scorecard should track each activity
• Creates a continuous feedback loop: process failures surface as metric misses before outcomes degrade