I start by listening and validating the operating facts. I prioritise a few changes with measurable outcomes before I commit the team to a large transformation.
Before I start
- An executive sponsor and access to service owners, finance, security, and delivery leads.
- The service catalogue, supplier contracts, incident history, and current project list.
- A shared register for decisions, owners, dates, and evidence.
Step by step
Days 1–10: listen to service owners
I ask what work must never stop, where users lose time, and what a successful quarter looks like. I map critical services to a business owner and technical owner and list the top dependencies.
Days 1–15: establish the operating facts
I reconcile headcount/capacity, support coverage, budget, supplier renewals, asset ownership, and admin access. I note uncertainty explicitly rather than turning assumptions into a dashboard.
Days 10–20: test the recovery assumptions
I pick one critical service and run a controlled restore or recovery exercise. I compare elapsed time and recovered data against the agreed recovery-time and recovery-point objectives. I record the gaps and a funded owner.
Days 15–30: agree the top five risks
I build a risk register with likelihood, business impact, current controls, treatment, owner, due date, and residual risk. I take the acceptance decisions to the person authorised to accept them.
Days 20–30: set the service contract
I agree support hours, a usable priority matrix, escalation ownership, and baseline service metrics. I use the SLA builder as a starting proposal and confirm staffing before making promises.
Days 30–45: cut the project list to capacity
I score current initiatives by outcome, risk reduction, effort, dependency, and available owner. I explicitly stop, defer, or fund work rather than expecting every team to absorb another priority.
Days 45–75: deliver two visible improvements
I choose one reliability improvement and one user-facing improvement. Each gets a starting measure, target, accountable owner, rollback plan, and evidence of the result.
Days 75–90: agree the next-quarter rhythm
I establish weekly operational reviews, a monthly service/risk review, and a quarterly roadmap decision. The board update explains outcomes, risks, money, and requested decisions in plain language.
How I check the result
0 of 4 checks completed
Checklist progress stays in this browser. I use it to track checks, not to certify a deployment or compliance.
If something does not work
Too many priorities
Show the available capacity and ask the sponsor to choose the trade-off.
Risk discussions go nowhere
Assign an authorised decision owner and a deadline.
Status updates are lists of activity
Connect each update to a service outcome, risk, or requested decision.
My working templates
I turn priorities into owned outcomes and decisions that fit the available capacity.
Download CSV ↓I record likelihood and impact separately, then assign a treatment and acceptance owner.
Download CSV ↓I connect supplier obligations, dependencies, access, evidence, and renewal decisions.
Download CSV ↓I compare an actual recovery with the recovery-time and recovery-point objectives.
Download CSV ↓About this playbook
These are my practical operating recommendations and example targets. I adapt them to business requirements, staffing, contracts, and risk decisions.