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Free minibook · PDF, 25 pages
Turn Your Three-Letter Signature into a Named Diagnosis and the Right First Move
Put three senior leaders in a room with the same income statement and you'll often get three diagnoses. Sales sees momentum, finance sees health, operations sees a capacity problem. This free minibook ends that meeting: calculate the three numbers, read the signature, name the type, then argue about the treatment, not the disease.
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By Todd Hagopian, who has led business transformations at Berkshire Hathaway, Illinois Tool Works and Whirlpool.
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Who it's for
Leaders of a business or a division whose team doesn't agree on what's wrong with it. Revenue velocity, profit velocity and flow-through give you a three-letter signature. Eleven signatures carry one of twelve named business types; sixteen carry none. A name points to a likely failure pattern and a first move to test.
Not for you if you don't have two years of revenue, gross profit and operating profit for the business you're diagnosing.
What you'll learn
- The Wrong Name Picks the Wrong Cure
- Get the Letters Right Before You Argue
- The Twelve Types
- Twins and Look-Alikes
- Read the Path, Not the Snapshot
- From Name to First Move
Plus a final action plan and a worksheet you can use the same week.
Key takeaways
- A list of numbers starts an argument. A named type starts an investigation, because it points to a likely failure pattern and a first move.
- Watch for Diagnosis Drift: choosing the type you'd like to be instead of the type your numbers support.
- Three bands on three metrics make 27 possible signatures; the framework names twelve types across eleven of them.
- When two types look alike, find the letter that separates them and check it twice.
- Start with the type's upgrade priority, test its cause as you go, and rerun the signature every quarter.
From the book
Put three senior leaders in a room with the same income statement and you will often get three diagnoses.
Sales sees growth and calls it momentum. Finance sees a rising operating margin and calls it health. Operations sees overtime and calls it a capacity problem. Each one is reading a real number. Each one is prescribing from it.
They can't all be right. Usually none of them is, because each is reading one layer of the business and treating it as the whole.
So the meeting runs on rank and volume. Whoever argues hardest picks the cure. And a cure picked by argument is a cure picked by luck.
There's a better way to end that meeting. Calculate the three numbers. Read the signature. Name the type. Then argue about the treatment, not the disease.
That's what this book does.
Todd Hagopian, Which Business Are You?, from the prologue "Three Diagnoses, One Business"
Frequently asked questions
We know the numbers. Why do we need a label?
Because a list of numbers doesn't tell anyone what to test first. A type names a likely failure pattern and a first move. It's a working hypothesis, not proof. Three figures show where the income statement is moving, not why.
What if our type is close to another one?
Then find the letter that separates them, and check that letter twice. The book lists five pairs that are easy to confuse, each with a deciding question.
We've named it. What do we do on Monday?
Start with the type's upgrade priority, and test the type's cause as you go. The framework prescribes five structural upgrades, in a different order for each type.
Related free minibooks
ATM or Money Pit?
Is your growth making money, or eating it? A ten-minute income-statement test.
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The First 90 Days of a Turnaround
Pick your path on Day 1, then run the 90 days week by week.
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Plug the Profit Leaks
Find the customers and products quietly draining your margin, then fix, reprice or exit.
Read moreRelated reading on the blog
- The 12 Business Types: A 10-Minute Diagnostic
- Business Health Check in 10 Minutes: ATM Test
- Free Business Diagnostic Tools That Are Real
Go further
This minibook is one piece. 10-Minute Transformation: Diagnose and Destroy Your Profit Killers (Koehler Books, out February 23, 2027) carries the full ten-minute diagnostic, the twelve business types, the five structural upgrades and a complete 90-day playbook.
The full library
Two ways to get it. Preorder now and it ships on release. Or buy on launch day, February 23, 2027, and get three free audiobooks (10-Minute Transformation, Stagnation Assassin and The Unfair Advantage) plus the full minibook library, on the honor system. Preorders don't include the launch-day bonuses.
About the author
Todd Hagopian, The Stagnation Assassin, is VP of Product Strategy and Marketing. He has led business transformations at Berkshire Hathaway, Illinois Tool Works, and Whirlpool Corporation, with $3B+ shareholder value across five turnarounds. He speaks to leadership teams on business transformation, turnarounds, and breaking stagnation.