Operations work is easy to describe and hard to picture

So here is what an engagement actually produces — the documents your team keeps using well after our work together is finished.

Decision-rights map — excerpt Illustrative sample · not client work

Decision	Recommends	Decides	Consulted	Informed
Budget shift under $10k	Program lead	Dir. of Programs	Finance	ED
New grant application	Development	ED	Programs, Finance	Board chair
Vendor contract over $25k	Operations	ED	Finance	Board
Public statement on policy	Comms	ED	Programs, Board chair	All staff
Hiring below director level	Hiring manager	Dept. director	People ops	Finance

⁂ Every row names exactly one decider. The temptation is to write “ED and Dir. of Programs” for the contested ones, which is how a decision-rights map becomes a record of the ambiguity it was meant to end.

What you end up with

Durable infrastructure someone can easily pick up, delivered in editable formats that live in your systems. Grouped by the service that produces them; we agree which ones your engagement includes before any work starts.

From Diagnostics & Audits

Findings memo

Solves

Knowing something is wrong without knowing where to start.

What I found, ranked by cost and effort, with the tradeoffs stated so you can decide what to leave alone.

8–15 pages · editable doc

Systems & tools map

Solves

Four tools doing the same job, badly.

What you have, what each is actually for, what overlaps, and what the team can stop maintaining.

1–2 pages · table or diagram

Findings memo — prioritized list Illustrative sample · not client work

01No named owner for grant reporting; three people partially cover itHigh costLow effort
02Program updates live in Slack threads, not retrievable after 90 daysHigh costMed effort
03Two project trackers running in parallel; neither is authoritativeMed costLow effort
04Contract approvals route through the ED regardless of valueMed costMed effort
05Onboarding is verbal; each new hire receives a different versionLow costHigh effort

⁂ Ranked by cost against effort, not by severity. Item 05 is the one people usually raise first, and it sits last because fixing it well is expensive and nothing downstream is waiting on it.

From Program & Systems Design

Decision-rights map

Solves

Decisions that stall, or get made twice.

A plain record of who decides, who is consulted, and where approval actually sits — written down instead of assumed.

1–2 pages · table

Workflow map

Solves

Work that moves fine until it reaches a handoff.

How a process really runs, step by step, with the stalls and rework marked rather than smoothed over.

1 page per process · diagram

Operating procedures

Solves

Recurring work that runs differently every time.

Documented steps for the things you do repeatedly, written to be followed by whoever is holding the work next.

2–4 pages each · editable doc

Program delivery model

Solves

A program that is designed but not yet runnable.

Each stage of the program with its owner, its decision point, and what has to exist before it can start.

1–2 pages · table

Program delivery model — excerpt Illustrative sample · not client work

Stage	Owner	Decides	Must exist first
Scope & design	Program lead	Dir. of Programs	Problem statement, budget envelope
Intake	Program associate	Program lead	Eligibility criteria, baseline questions
Delivery	Program lead	Program lead	Facilitator guide, confirmed cohort
Measurement	Evaluation	Dir. of Programs	Baseline captured at intake
Report & renew	Development	ED	Spend reconciled with finance

⁂ The last column is the one that earns its place. Most program plans list stages and owners; what breaks them is a stage starting before its input exists. Baseline is the usual casualty — captured after delivery begins, which means it is no longer a baseline.

Workflow map — grant reporting Illustrative sample · not client work

Program leadDrafts narrative

FinancePulls spend data

UnassignedReconcile the two — stalls here, 4–9 days

EDReviews and signs

DevelopmentSubmits to funder

⁂ The stall is not a capacity problem. No one owns reconciliation, so it waits for whoever notices first.

From Interim & Fractional Operations

Interim work is mostly doing the job: running the day-to-day, finishing what stalled, keeping the team moving. These are what’s left behind when I hand the role on.

Role handover guide

Solves

A new hire starting from scratch, or from one person’s memory.

How the role actually runs: the recurring work and its calendar, who to go to for what, what’s open, and what I’d do first.

5–10 pages · editable doc

Roles & handoffs

Solves

Coordination falling to a few “glue people.”

Named ownership for each stage, including the invisible coordination work that usually goes unassigned.

1–3 pages · table

Roles & handoffs — board meeting cycle Illustrative sample · not client work

Work	Owner	Hands off to	Done when
Set the agenda	ED	Board liaison	Agenda shared, 3 weeks out
Collect program updates	Board liaison was unassigned	Program leads	Requests sent, 2 weeks out
Chase late updates	Board liaison was unassigned	ED	All updates in, 10 days out
Assemble the board packet	Operations	ED	Draft packet, 1 week out
Send follow-ups after the meeting	Board liaison was unassigned	Staff owners	Action list out within 48 hours

⁂ Three of these five steps had no owner. They were getting done by whoever noticed first, which is the glue work this table exists to name. Naming it is also how it gets counted in someone’s job.

Want to see one?

I can walk you through an anonymized example, or talk through relevant past work and references.

info@hibiscuscollaborative.com