Your Nine Keys result

Two clients pay most of your bills.
That is the risk.

Loading Rates is your weakest Key. Revenue looks healthy until you ask where it comes from, how far ahead you can see it, and how long clients take to pay for it. One bad debt or one lost account is all it takes.

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150+ IT services founders coached. 6 exits worth a combined $230M.

Weakest Key

Loading Rates

Revenue mix, pricing strategy and reducing the financial risk of depending on a few large clients

  1. Loading Growth
  2. Loading Sales
  3. Loading Clients
  4. Loading Rates
  5. Loading Services
  6. Growing IP
  7. Growing A Team
  8. Growing Leaders
  9. Growing Market
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What is likely going on

You have probably said this: "They are a great client. They have been with us for years. They are not going anywhere." Then a new CIO arrives, or procurement runs a panel, and 40 percent of your revenue is up for tender.

One significant bad debt can take an IT services firm down. Three months of losses can bring it to its knees. The firms that survive those moments are not luckier. They have a revenue mix no single client dominates, a forecast they trust twelve weeks out, and a collections habit that keeps debtor days short.

When Loading Rates scores lowest, it usually means one or two clients are more than a quarter of revenue, the pipeline lives in people's heads rather than against delivery capacity, and invoices are chased by whoever remembers.

The three levers below are about seeing the risk clearly and then shrinking it, one quarter at a time.

The three levers to pull first

These come from the Loading Rates Key of the Loading Growth Wheel. Each one has an action you can complete this week.

Lever 29

Diversify your revenue mix

Small IT services firms often have one or two clients bringing in most of the revenue. As the firm grows that gets riskier, however loyal the client. The working rule is that no single client should contribute more than 25 percent of annual revenue.

This week: pull last twelve months' revenue by client. Mark anyone above 25 percent. For each, write down the two new clients or two new divisions of existing clients you will open this quarter to bring that share down.

Lever 36

Use the 12 week forecast as your litmus test

Profit growth depends on knowing how your backlog relates to delivery capacity. Twelve weeks out, every consultant should be booked at a known level, 100, 80, 50, 10 or zero percent, driven by your sales data laid over your resource data. It tells you whether the firm is ready to scale or about to stall.

This week: build a one sheet grid: consultants down the side, the next twelve weeks across the top, booked percentage in each cell. Fill it from signed work only. The white space is your real sales target.

Lever 38

Get tough on client debts

Clients who do not pay for delivered work are as old as trade itself. The firms that get paid meet their clients regularly and keep collection on the agenda, rather than relying on contracts and lawyers, because even when you win in court you lose the work.

This week: list every invoice past 30 days. Phone, do not email, the sponsor on each one this week. Then set a rule: senior managers' bonuses are withheld while debtor days exceed 45.

Levers 30 (75 percent of revenue from existing clients, 25 percent from new), 34 (benefits based pricing) and 37 (tying senior management bonuses to client payments) come next.

Five signs this Key is costing you

Tick the ones that are true of your firm this quarter. The count tells you how exposed the firm is to one bad quarter.

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  • Signs you recognise0 of 5

Guides for this Key

Read every guide on Loading Rates

Your Everest fit

Loading Rates is the Key that protects every other gain. There is no point improving margin on revenue you could lose in a quarter.

Up to 10 staff

Everest Basecamp

Set up the revenue mix report, the 12 week forecast and the collections rhythm, alongside the lead generation system that brings in the new clients.

$150 per month, capped at 100 firms

Talk to Ian about Basecamp

10 to 40 staff

Everest Ascent

Regular group sessions and one to one time with Ian on diversification, benefits based pricing and preferred supplier status, with the 90 Day Sprint holding the team to it.

Pricing on the call

Talk to Ian about Ascent
Ian Markram, founder of Loading Growth

Who is telling you this

I am Ian Markram. I built and sold an IT services firm, and for the last decade I have coached founders of IT services and systems integrator firms who compete with the global consultancies every week.

  • 150+ IT services founders coached
  • 28 years in IT professional services
  • 6 founder exits guided
  • $230M combined exit value
Ian has coached our executive team for the past 18 months and has helped us transition from our roles as technical leads within the business to acting as business owners to focus on growth. This has helped us to exceed our growth and profitability targets.
Athol HillDirector and Cofounder, Chrome Consulting
He and his team help drive continuous improvements in my business in practical steps of a manageable size. His advice has been invaluable in helping me mature as a business leader.
James BeresfordCEO, Talos

Get the Loading Rates playbook by email

Five short emails over two weeks: the three levers with a seven day action each, what they looked like for one founder, and a 45 minute call with Ian if you want to work through them together. Then take the six minute scorecard for your scores across all nine Keys.

Questions founders ask at this point

Our biggest client is 40 percent of revenue and growing. Is that a problem?
It is a risk, not a problem, until the day it becomes both. Keep serving them well and grow the rest of the firm faster, so their share falls without their revenue falling. Pluralising your relationships inside that client, a Loading Clients lever, also helps.
Chasing invoices will damage the relationship.
Silence damages it more, because resentment builds on your side. A short call from a senior person, asking whether anything is holding the invoice up, is normal business. Clients respect firms that run their own house well.
We cannot forecast twelve weeks. Our clients do not commit that far.
Then your forecast will show white space, and that is the point. The grid is not a prediction. It is a picture of the gap between booked work and capacity, and it is the most honest sales target you will ever set.
We are a systems integrator, not an MSP. Does this apply?
Yes. This is built for IT professional services and SI firms that sell project and advisory work against the global consultancies. We do not coach MSPs. If your revenue is mostly managed services contracts, this is not the right program for you.
What happens on the strategy call?
Forty five minutes with Ian. You bring your result and your rough numbers. You leave with the one lever to pull first and a view on whether Basecamp or Ascent fits. No pitch deck.

Find out which lever to pull first

Bring your Loading Rates result to a 45 minute strategy call with Ian.

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