Diagnosis

Find where the profit is leaking, what it costs, and what to fix first.

Two months in your interviews and your records, read against each other. You end with the leak located, its cost at your own loaded rates, and the first fix named with an owner.

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Deliverables

Five things you keep, and one decision for leadership.

A Diagnosis ends in sentences of this shape: the forecast is rebuilt by hand every Monday because two stages mean different things to two teams; that is about 1,100 hours a year at your loaded rate; the stage definitions are the first fix, and here is who should own it. The cause, the cost and the order, usable whether you make the fixes with us, on your own or with someone else.

What we saw, what we read into it, what we assumed and what we could not check are kept apart, so every claim traces back to what supports it. A figure wherever the evidence supports one, and a plainly marked gap where it does not.

Process

Four steps, from scoping to the leadership briefing, in two months.

The calendar is set at scoping. Scope, access and who is available are what move it.

  1. 1ScopingThe perimeter
  2. 2Interviews and recordsThe evidence
  3. 3Map and priceCause and cost
  4. 4Leadership briefingThe decision
Step 101 / 04

Scoping

The perimeter"A finding needs a clear limit before it has a clear shape."

Thirty minutes, once the Diagnosis is booked and before a record is opened. We agree what it covers, what it will be able to say and what it will not, so the findings arrive with a boundary rather than an apology.

What happens
  • Which teams, which records and which period are in scope
  • Who gives us access, and who will be available
  • The interview list, drafted with you
  • What the Diagnosis will not be able to say, stated up front
OutcomeA scope with a boundary and a limit.
TimingThirty minutes, before anything is read
Step 202 / 04

Interviews and records

The evidence"Numbers alone hide the leak. Interviews alone overstate it."

Weeks one to four. Interviews with the people in each role a deal passes through and the teams they depend on, then your CRM stage history, pipeline, forecast, pay plans and finance records read against what they said, never on their own.

What happens
  • Interviews across marketing, sales, customer success, operations, finance and leadership where it matters
  • Records read against what people say, stage by stage
  • Every claim written down with its source
  • Every assumption recorded with how far it might be off
OutcomeThe evidence, with every claim traceable to what supports it.
TimingWeeks one to four
Step 303 / 04

Map and price

Cause and cost"A leak without a figure cannot be weighed against the cost of fixing it."

Weeks four to six. We find where the leak starts, trace how it spreads through roles, handoffs, data and the way decisions get made, and put a number on it at your own rates: hours, leavers, discounts, the deals that never started.

What happens
  • The map: where it starts and how it spreads
  • Each leak priced at your loaded rates, or the gap marked where the records stop
  • The fixes ranked by what it costs to leave them
  • What deliberately waits, and why
OutcomeThe map, the cost figure and the fix list.
TimingWeeks four to six
Step 404 / 04

Leadership briefing

The decision"What gets fixed first is decided by the evidence, not by opinion."

Weeks seven and eight. What we found, what to fix first and the next decision go to your leadership team, in order of what it costs to wait rather than what is easiest to change, with the limits printed beside the conclusions.

What happens
  • The one leak, its cost and the first move, in the room
  • Limits and gaps printed next to the findings, not under them
  • An owner and a check date proposed for the first fix
  • Whether to continue, on your own, with us or with someone else, left with you
OutcomeOne decision, and five things you keep.
TimingWeeks seven to eight
What we look at

From first contact to renewal, in the records and in the interviews.

Each one is read twice, in your records and in the interviews. Where the two disagree, the gap is often where the money goes.

  1. 01

    Where revenue comes from

    New customers, expansion, price and what churn takes back, each with the person who owns it.

  2. 02

    Price against list

    What discounts and concessions take off the list price, and who signs them off.

  3. 03

    The stages and the handoffs

    How each stage is defined from first contact to renewal, and where two teams use one word for two things.

  4. 04

    Who owns the customer after the sale

    The renewal, the expansion and the first sign a customer may leave: whose job each one is.

  5. 05

    The manager's week

    How much of it goes to reviews and reporting, and how much to coaching the team.

  6. 06

    Targets, capacity and pay

    Whether the plan can be met with the people you have, at the speed new hires reach full output rather than the speed the plan assumes, and what the pay plan rewards.

  7. 07

    The cost in people

    Leavers, absence, exhaustion and rework, each given a figure.

Is this for you?

For leaders who know profit is leaking, not where or what it costs.

  • You can feel profit leaking in how revenue is won and kept, and cannot name the cause or the cost
  • Targets slip, people leave or the same job is redone, and it comes back after each fix
  • You need evidence before you fund a fix, and you have had enough opinions
  • You can give us interviews, access to your records and your cost rates

Not sure these describe your company? Put it to us in one call →

The evidence

What goes unmeasured in a commercial team.

What a commercial team leaves unrecorded still has a measured size. A Diagnosis reads the interviews against the records so that what is missing gets a number.

  1. 01

    44%

    The contacts sellers deal with that never reach the CRM; 26% of the missing ones are decision-makers. What is not recorded cannot be forecast, coached or costed.

    Ebsta with Pavilion, GTM Benchmarks Report 2025, 655,000 opportunities at 387 companies, vendor survey, March 2025

  2. 02

    42.3%

    The share of their team’s working time that sales leaders put down to fighting technology: downtime, manual data entry, rebuilt reports. An estimate, because none of it sits on a timesheet.

    monday.com, The State of Sales Technology 2025, 500 sales leaders in the US and UK, vendor survey, March 2025

  3. 03

    37%

    Organisations that lose revenue as a direct result of poor CRM data quality. The revenue is counted; the cause rarely is.

    Validity, The State of CRM Data Management in 2025, 602 CRM users and administrators in the US, UK and Australia, vendor survey, July 2025

  4. 04

    51%

    Revenue leaders who name unknown reasons for their win rates as a factor stopping them from closing pipeline. Half cannot say why they win or lose, so the cost of losing has no cause attached.

    Clari, The 2024 Revenue Leak Report, 420 senior revenue leaders in the US and UK, vendor survey, 2024, p. 28

What happens next

The Diagnosis gives you the cause. You choose how to close the leak.

  1. 01

    Operation

    Ready to make the fixes? Operation makes them with your own team over nine months, each change owned and dated inside your company. The Diagnosis is included in its price.

    Explore Operation →

  2. 02

    Partnership

    On its own or after Operation, when your commercial organisation keeps changing shape: a standing seat that re-reads the system each cycle, carries the next fix through, measures it, and builds the skill into your own leaders.

    Explore Partnership →

  3. 03

    Build

    Nothing stable enough to diagnose yet? Build writes the first version of your commercial system down, with an owner for each part.

    Explore Build →

FAQ

Diagnosis FAQs.

How long does it take, and how much of our team's time does it need?
Two months from the day we get access to the leadership briefing, fixed at scoping. Your team's time is mostly the interviews themselves, plus whoever pulls the documents and records we ask for.
What do we need to prepare, and who gets interviewed?
Useful records are the org chart, role descriptions, pay plans, how meetings and reviews run, how work passes between teams, forecasts, performance data, CRM and pipeline history, how customer success works and what marketing hands over. The interviews cover people in each role along the way a deal travels: marketing, sales, customer success, operations, finance and leadership where it matters. The list is agreed with you before we start.
How much does a Diagnosis cost?
€15,000 flat. That covers interviews across sales, marketing, customer success and the teams they depend on, the records you already keep, the five outputs and the leadership briefing. It is a flat price, not a starting price. Operation then costs €50,000 more if booked within 30 days of the Diagnosis briefing, or €65,000 with the Diagnosis included.
Can I buy the Diagnosis on its own?
Yes. It is built to be useful on its own, and what you get stays usable whether you make the fixes with Kihon Labs, on your own or with someone else. You are not obliged to act on it. An AI tool or a benchmark report cannot stand in for it: the Diagnosis is built from interviews with your own people, read against your own CRM, pipeline and finance records, and the figure is priced at what the time costs you, not at an industry average. A benchmark tells you what others pay, not where your own money goes.
Get started

Know where it leaks. Know what to fix first.

Use the call to test whether a Diagnosis fits your situation and which records it would need. If it does not fit, you hear it before anything is written.

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