The Pipeline Leak Audit

I want you to help me find where deals actually disappear in
"a pipeline I have not named yet (ask me first)." The decision this needs to inform: not decided yet — ask me before continuing.

Your job is not to predict my close rate or quote industry
conversion benchmarks. Your job is to work out which deals in my
CRM export are genuinely stalled, why, and what should happen to
each one, being exact about what the data can and can't support.

I will give you a stage-history or activity export from my CRM,
and a walkthrough of how the pipeline actually runs.

Work through these stages, in order, as your working:

1. SET THE FRAME AND INVENTORY THE EVIDENCE
Read back the pipeline or segment, the period, and the decision
this is for. If I haven't told you one of these, ask. Then list
what I gave you: each file, its columns, its row count and date
range, and anything the stages below need that isn't there. Do
not proceed as though a missing field is a zero.

2. BUILD THE LEDGER
One row per deal: current stage, every transition with its
timestamp, re-entry count, days from creation to the first
logged activity, last and next activity dates, and loss reason
if closed. Flag anything the data can't confirm as its own list:
a skipped stage, a transition after a gap of more than twice
that stage's normal time with no logged activity, a blank or
generic loss reason.

3. SET THE THRESHOLD
Compute the normal time in each stage for this segment from the
closed-won deals in my export: the median days per stage, and
the longest gap between two logged activities on any deal that
still closed. If there are fewer than ten closed-won deals in
the segment, stop and ask me for a normal instead. Do not assume
a companywide number. A deal is stalled if it is open, has no
future task, has no logged activity inside that longest gap, and
its stage age is past the segment's median.

4. NAME THE CAUSE
For each stalled deal, check for a missing next step first. If
one exists, classify it as one of: no dated next step, budget
or authority unconfirmed, indecision, champion turnover, or
competitor selected. Require evidence for each classification:
a named competitor, a confirmed sign-off contact, a bounced
email, not an inference from silence. Where the evidence doesn't
support a classification, list it as open rather than guessing.
Where the walkthrough says a rep's activity goes unlogged,
silence on that rep's deals is not evidence: list them as open
and say what the rep needs to log.

5. TEST IT
For deals with a complex or multi-stakeholder sale, apply
MEDDIC. For simpler or shorter-cycle deals, apply BANT. Name the
criterion that is failing for each stalled deal.

6. DECIDE, PER DEAL
One action per stalled deal: book a next step, multi-thread,
requalify, disqualify and reclaim the rep's time, or escalate.
Disqualify only where the sole evidence is silence for more than
twice the Proposal-stage median after a logged outreach that
asked for an answer, and nothing in the walkthrough suggests the
contact went unlogged. Justify any escalation; it should be rare.

7. FIND THE PATTERN
Where the same cause recurs across deals, reps, or months, treat
it as one process finding rather than several deal findings.
Include slow first contact if the ledger shows it.

8. DECIDE THE PROCESS FIX
For any pattern, the cheapest fix that would remove it: fixing
the stage definition, adding a required field or gate, naming an
owner for the stalled-deal queue, or changing what reps are
measured on. Only recommend automation if you can say why the
other four would not work.

9. SIZE IT
Three numbers, kept separate: pipeline value at risk (every
stalled deal you did not disqualify), the value of the deals you
did disqualify, and rep hours reclaimed by disqualification.
Where the hours come from someone's own estimate in the
walkthrough, label them as that. One deal gets one cause: do not
build totals by stacking multiple causes onto the same deal.

HOW TO REPLY
Do the stages above as your working. Do not show me the working.
If a stage needs an answer from me, ask that one question and
stop. Otherwise reply with the headline and the brief alone, in
the shape below, and lead with the headline every time, even
when the news is that nothing needs to change.

Keep the writing under 900 words and the whole reply, table
included, under 1,200, and count both before you send it.

THREE THINGS ARE OUTSIDE THAT BUDGET AND CANNOT BE SHORTENED,
MERGED AWAY, OR DROPPED TO MAKE ROOM: the headline's four lines,
the required lines in section 1, and the rows of the table.
Write those first, then spend what is left of the budget on the
prose. If you are over, tighten sentences and cut adjectives
everywhere; if that is not enough, shorten sections 3, 6, 8 and
9, in that order. Never buy words by dropping a finding, a row,
a number, or a required line.

Inside the table, every cell is a phrase rather than a sentence,
about a dozen words at most; anything that needs a sentence to
be fair belongs in "What to change" or "Still to confirm".

BEFORE YOU SEND IT, CHECK ALL FIVE:
- the headline is four labelled lines, under 120 words, and
  names the specific thing rather than a category;
- section 1 carries every required line, with "none" written in
  where one does not apply;
- every finding you named has a size, or a stated reason it
  cannot be sized;
- every row you merged says that it is merged;
- both word counts are inside their limits.
If any of these fails, fix it and take the words from the prose.

If I say "show your working", show the ledger and every rule you
applied.

THE HEADLINE
Open with this. Four labelled lines, under 120 words in total,
before any scope, method, or description of what I sent you.
Someone who reads only these four lines has the answer.

- The finding. One or two sentences naming the specific thing
  that is holding the business back, or where the money is
  going. Name the thing, never the category: not "a process
  issue" but the step, the channel, the queue, the person's
  calendar. Where the records disagree with what I believed,
  that contrast belongs here and nowhere else.
- What it costs. The single number that sizes the finding, with
  its period and unit, and the one line of arithmetic behind it.
  If the evidence cannot put money on it, size it in the unit it
  can - hours, days waiting, deals, seats - and say plainly that
  money isn't available and why.
- Do this first. The cheapest fix, what it costs, and who does
  it. Then, if I asked you to decide something, the answer in
  one line, labelled a judgment where it is one.
- How sure. "High confidence: from your own records", "Medium:
  your records plus what you told me", or "Low: mostly what you
  told me" - then the single thing that would most change the
  answer if it turned out otherwise.

THE BRIEF
Everything below supports the headline for a reader who wants
more. Expand it; do not restate it in the same words.
1. What this ran on. Labelled lines, not prose. These are
outside the word limit and none of them may be dropped; write
"none" where one does not apply.
- Scope and period.
- The decision this is for.
- Scored: what you included, and how many.
- Excluded: how many, why, and what they were worth.
- Evidence pulled: the date the records were pulled.
- Computed with: the tool you used and the rule you applied, or
  that you had no tool and worked from summary figures.
2. What the evidence covered. Three to five bullets: what I gave
you, the period it covers, and what was missing that would have
changed the answer.
3. What we found. One paragraph, under 150 words, in plain
words: how the work actually runs and what the evidence shows,
in enough detail to make the headline's finding stand up.
4. The numbers. Pipeline value at risk, the value disqualified,
and rep hours reclaimed, kept separate. For each: how it was
computed and which rows it rests on.
5. The ledger. One table, one row per stalled deal: stage and
age, cause with its evidence, the failing criterion, and the
decision.
A finding too small or too uncertain to act on still gets its own
row, marked as such. Where the table is long, you may merge rows
only when they are the same kind, and the merged row has to say
so. Never drop one.
6. What to change. Every fix, cheapest first, the headline's
included, with one line each on why the more expensive ones
aren't needed yet.
7. How you'd know it worked. For each fix, in this order and
always these four: the measure, named the same way you would
name it again next time; its baseline today, with the date the
evidence was pulled; the target; and the result that would mean
the diagnosis was wrong. Write them so someone re-running this
in a month can line their numbers up against yours without
having to interpret anything.
8. Still to confirm. Up to four things the evidence couldn't
settle, each with exactly what would settle it.
9. Not claiming. Up to five claims you are refusing to make, one
line each.

RULES THROUGHOUT
- If you have a code or data-analysis tool, use it for every
  count, median, and total, and state the rule you applied. If you
  don't, say so and ask me for summary tables instead of raw
  exports.
- Never invent a number that is not in my evidence. Where a
  value is blank, say so and leave it out of the totals rather
  than estimating it.
- Numbers I gave you in the walkthrough count as evidence: use
  them where the records have nothing, and label each one as my
  estimate.
- Never quote an industry benchmark, average, or percentage from
  outside my data, even if I mention one. If I ask how I compare
  to one, tell me plainly that you are not going to and why,
  rather than leaving the question unanswered.
- My exports often cut the same figures more than one way.
  Before adding two numbers together, check they come from the
  same cut; if they do not, report them side by side and say which
  values may be counted in both rather than summing them.
- Where I have told you something happens off-system or goes
  unlogged, silence in the records there is not evidence of
  anything. Say what would need to be logged.
- Where you nest one finding under another as its cause, the
  parent carries the rolled-up total of everything beneath it,
  labelled as a roll-up so no figure is counted twice. Every item
  you size belongs to exactly one total, and no finding you name
  is left without a size unless you say what is missing to size
  it.
- Keep observed facts, inferences, and unknowns separate. It is
  fine, and often correct, to conclude the evidence cannot settle
  something.
- If I push you for a verdict on the decision afterwards, give
  your best read, label it a judgment rather than a finding, and
  say what would change it.