What KPIs should the owner of a services company look at weekly?
Seven numbers, every week: cash on hand, overdue receivables, booked work, jobs completed on time, customer complaints, open hires, and the hours you spent on approvals. Each number needs one owner and a trigger, the point where that person acts without being asked. A number nobody owns is only a report.
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The seven numbers
The triggers below are examples. Set your own.
| Number | Why it matters | Owner | Trigger |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cash on hand | How many weeks you can run without new money | Finance lead | Under 8 weeks of payroll and fixed costs |
| Overdue receivables | Money you earned and haven't collected | Finance lead | Any invoice past 60 days, or the total up two weeks in a row |
| Booked work | What the next four weeks look like | Sales lead | Under 80% of crew capacity for the next four weeks |
| Jobs completed on time | Whether the work matches the promise | Operations manager | Under 90% for the week |
| Customer complaints | Problems before they show up in revenue | Client success lead | More than 3 in a week, or a second from the same customer |
| Open hires | Seats the work is waiting on | Hiring manager | A role open more than 30 days |
| Owner's hours on approvals | How much of the company still runs through you | Owner | More than 5 hours a week, or up two weeks in a row |
The last row is easy to leave off a dashboard. If it keeps going up, the company is still waiting on you.
One owner and one trigger per number
A KPI works when one person owns it and knows what to do when it moves. One name per number. That person watches it and acts when it crosses the trigger. Bring it to the weekly meeting only if it's still off.
That's the same logic as a decision authority matrix: one owner, one limit, one condition that brings it back to you. The numbers show up in the first five minutes of the weekly operations meeting, and the hour goes to what crossed a trigger.
Where the numbers come from
Use one place. The person who owns each number puts it there the day before. You shouldn't have to ask anyone to pull it.
If two systems give different answers to the same question, fix that first. Keep customer, job and invoice data together and mostly clean. You don't need a data warehouse. Is your company ready for AI? has the five questions that show where you stand.
What to skip
Skip any number nobody would act on. Website visits, followers and total revenue to date feel good. They change nothing on Monday.
Keep it under ten. Past that, nobody reads the page, and the numbers that matter get lost. Keep the same seven every week, so a change stands out.
Pulse in SCOPE™ by Efficiency Sprint
SCOPE™ by Efficiency Sprint maps where a company stands: Stabilize, Codify, Ownership, Pulse, Engine. These seven numbers are what Pulse looks like. AI watches and reports. Problems arrive as exceptions in a weekly report instead of as surprises.
Pulse comes after Ownership for a reason. A number needs an owner before anyone, or any agent, can act on it. Every agent runs until it hits a gate a person still owns.
In one engagement, $1.2M of $1.4M in overdue receivables was collected in three months once one person owned receivables.
Find out where your company stands
Efficiency Sprint makes companies operationally ready for AI. The operational AI readiness check takes about two minutes and shows where your company stands. To run the weekly meeting these numbers feed, use the Weekly 101.
Questions
How often should an owner review KPIs?
Once a week, on the same day, from the same page. The owner of each number watches it in between and acts when it crosses the trigger. You see the result once a week, not every move.
What is a leading vs lagging indicator?
A lagging indicator tells you what already happened: cash, collected revenue, jobs completed. A leading indicator tells you what's coming: booked work, open hires, complaints. Watch both. The leading ones give you time to act.
Do I need a dashboard tool?
Not to start. A one-page sheet with seven numbers, an owner and a trigger for each works. Add a tool once the numbers have owners and come from one place. A tool on top of numbers nobody owns gives you a prettier report.
How many KPIs are too many?
More than ten. If a number doesn't have an owner and a trigger, it doesn't belong on the weekly page.