Aperture Compass™ · the Focus Plan
You have more ideas than time. Which ones actually matter?
The Focus Plan scores every opportunity against value, complexity and risk, then sequences the few that move the business. Fixed fee of $8,500.
By Fenwick How, Founder
BBA in Project Management, certified PMP, currently pursuing an MBA at Texas A&M. He does the work himself, start to finish.
What is a Focus Plan?
A Focus Plan is a one-page roadmap that comes out of scoring every opportunity in front of you against value, complexity, risk and impact on the thing actually holding the business back. The winners are stress-tested against different futures and sequenced into Now, Next and Later, so the plan says what to stop as clearly as what to start.
The problem
Why does the list keep growing and the needle not move?
Ask an owner what they could be doing and you will get twenty answers inside ten minutes, most of them good. That is the problem. Twenty good ideas competing for the attention of one management team is not a strategy, it is a queue, and the things that get done are the ones with the loudest advocate rather than the largest return.
It gets harder when people disagree, because there is usually no shared way to compare a pricing change against a new hire against a second location. Each is argued on its own merits by whoever cares most about it, so the argument is settled by seniority or by fatigue.
And then there is the version of this that costs the most: a plan that cannot be defended. A bank, a board or a family member asks why this and not that, and the honest answer is that it felt right. Which may well be true, and is not a reason anyone can fund.
Strategy is mostly subtraction. The hard part is not finding opportunities, it is choosing which ones to refuse.
The solution
How does a Focus Plan fix that?
By making the comparison explicit. Every opportunity on the table, including the ones already underway, is scored against the same criteria in the same matrix, weighted by what matters to you rather than what matters in general. The shortlist is then run against downside scenarios, because a plan that only works in the good case is not a plan.
The analysis behind it
- 01
Strategic option generation
Widen the set before narrowing it.
- 02
Weighted decision matrices
Scored against what matters to you, and defensible afterwards.
- 03
Risk assessment
What could go wrong, and how likely.
- 04
Scenario analysis
How each option holds up in a downturn.
- 05
Hypothesis-driven validation
Test a big bet cheaply before scaling it.
- 06
Now / Next / Later roadmapping
A clear order of operations.
What you walk away with
- The Opportunity Matrix: every option scored on the same criteria
- Scenario stress-testing of the shortlist, including the downside
- A one-page Focus Plan: Now, Next and Later, with owners and dates
- A written rationale you can hand to a lender, a board or a partner
It runs on the findings from earlier phases plus a working session with the people who will actually have to do the work. One to two weeks. The plan fits on one page on purpose.
The proof
What does this look like on a real business?
A worked example, with the matrix and the resulting plan shown in full inside the report.
Lumina Medical Aesthetics
Every option on Lumina's list was scored, including the one the owner arrived wanting: a fourth clinic. The plan that came out sequenced it differently. Fix retention first, then expand, and expand where the mapping pointed rather than where the opportunity happened to appear. The expansion was not refused, it was ordered.
Lumina is a worked example built to demonstrate the method, not a client engagement, and it is labelled that way everywhere it appears.
Why the plan fits on one page
Because a roadmap nobody can hold in their head is a roadmap nobody follows. The matrix behind it runs to as many pages as the analysis needs, and it is included in full so the reasoning can be checked. The plan itself is one page, and it names what to stop as explicitly as what to start.
The alternatives
Why not just run a planning offsite?
Because an offsite surfaces opinions, which is genuinely valuable, and then asks the same room to rank them without a shared basis for comparison. Here is the whole landscape, side by side.
| Dimension | The Aperture Method | Large consultancies | Local advisors & CPAs | GIS & data vendors |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Quantitative depth | Graduate level | Graduate level | Rarely the quantitative work | Data, not analysis |
| Spatial and market intelligence | Yes, tied to the decision | Seldom offered at your size | No | Maps and lists, no strategy |
| Who does the work | Fenwick How, start to finish | A team you did not meet | Your advisor, part time | A platform or a vendor |
| What it costs | Fixed fee, from $4,500 | Enterprise retainers | Hourly or per filing | Per report or subscription |
| What you keep | Models, dashboards and working files | The deck | Your accounts | A file export |
| After the recommendation | Stays until the strategy is running | The engagement ends | Ongoing, but not strategic | No follow-through |
The price
What does it cost?
$8,500, fixed, agreed before anything starts.
That covers the full Opportunity Matrix, the scenario testing and the Focus Plan. Compass works best after the numbers and the market have been looked at properly, because scoring opportunities against guesses produces a confident-looking plan built on nothing.
Not sure this is the right component? The $4,500 Business X-Ray will tell you, and it counts in full toward the Method if you continue within 60 days.
Not ready to book? Ask a question first. Asking does not begin an engagement.
Before you book
Questions owners ask about the Focus Plan.
Can I do this without the earlier phases?
You can, and sometimes it is right: if you already have solid numbers and a clear read of your market, Compass is the piece that turns them into a decision. What it cannot do is manufacture the evidence. Scoring opportunities against assumptions produces a plan that looks rigorous and is not.
Who needs to be in the room?
The people who will have to do the work, and anyone who can veto it. That is usually three to six people. The session is short and structured, and the point of it is disagreement surfacing early rather than after the plan is published.
What if we do not agree at the end?
Then the matrix shows exactly where the disagreement is, which is more useful than a consensus nobody believes. Usually it turns out people are weighting the criteria differently rather than reading the evidence differently, and that is a conversation you can actually finish.
Is this just a prioritisation workshop?
No. A workshop ranks the ideas in the room on the day. This scores them against evidence gathered beforehand, stress-tests the shortlist against downside scenarios, and produces a written rationale you can hand to someone who was not there.
What if the plan says do nothing new?
That happens, and it is a legitimate result. A business already at the edge of its capacity does not need another initiative, it needs the constraint removed first. A plan that says finish what you started is worth as much as one that says start something.
Will it hold up with a bank?
That is one of the things it is built for. Every option carries its score, its assumptions and its downside case, so the question why this and not that has a written answer rather than a recollection.
Last reviewed . Fees and timings on this page are current as of that date.