Full name

Use the same name all week — it is how your submissions are matched. Each export names its own file from it, for example 1-muchson-day2-case-file.

Route 1 · Levels 1 to 3 · Capstone

From the leak to the decision, in one case

Materi A
Case File

Materi A · Levels 1 to 3 · 60 min

The whole case in six cards

Six short cards, two per level (60 min, facilitator-led). Level 1 (A1, A2): why a buyer acts, and where a funnel leaks. Level 2 (A3, A4): what a retention lever nets in euros, and why segments differ. Level 3 (A5, A6): how to govern what you fund under a budget that does not cover everything. Each card holds the tests you need for the Case File below; the full Level 2 and Level 3 material is kept as optional Routes 2 and 3.

From buying motive to sales action

10 min

Choose the sales action from the buyer’s , not from your product’s feature list.

In plain words

Before you decide what to say in a sales conversation, ask why this buyer would act at all. Most buyers have one main reason: they want to feel safe (trust), they want the total cost to be clear (price), they want to see a result (benefit), or they want to keep working with people they know (relationship). Each reason calls for a different action from you, and a different kind of proof.

Why it matters

The whole day starts from the buyer's reason. A offered to a buyer who is worried about risk gives away and leaves the worry exactly where it was; later, the you choose for DigitalIT Solutions has to answer a reason too.

How to read the picture below

The four boxes on the left are the buying motives, and the boxes on the right are the strategy each one calls for. Click a motive: the panel underneath lists the proof that buyer looks for, and adds a note on how it looks in a German company.

Motive → strategy

Trust → Reduce the buyer’s risk

The proof this buyer looks for

(Referenzkunden) in the same sector and size
A paid phase () before the full contract
Compliance proof: an certificate, a attestation for cloud services, a Art. 28 data-processing agreement (, AVV)

German B2B IT context. In a (mid-sized company) buying committee the and the data protection officer can each stop the deal, so the proof has to be on the table before they ask.

What this showsEvery motive keeps the same shape — a claim the buyer has to be able to check — but what counts as proof changes completely from row to row: trust needs an outside party to vouch (a reference, a pilot, a certificate); price needs the whole contract life made visible, not the headline number; benefit needs the buyer's own KPI, not the vendor's case study; relationship needs a named, stable person. A pitch built to prove one motive rarely helps with another.

Select a to read the proof that buyer needs.

What it is. A starts from why this buyer would act, the buying , and derives the sales action and the proof from it. A feature-led pitch starts from what the product does and hopes the motive matches.
Why it matters in long-cycle IT . The buyer carries the risk of a wrong choice personally: Bauer (1960) called this . Where risk aversion is the motive, the strategy is to build trust: references, a phase and compliance proof, exactly the things a security-minded committee can check.
Trust is built, not asserted. Morgan & Hunt (1994) found that trust and commitment together carry a business relationship forward. Anderson, Narus & van Rossum (2006) add the value side: a states the points of difference the buyer will actually get.

How to decide when this comes up in the task

Name the motive first (trust, price, benefit or relationship), then choose the action and the proof. If you cannot say which motive an action serves, it is a feature pitch.
Match the action to the motive: trust → references, a and compliance proof; price → the total cost made visible; benefit → a in the buyer’s own figures; relationship → named, stable contacts and a review rhythm.
An action aimed at a different motive spends effort without touching the reason. A discount answers the price motive only; offered against a trust or relationship motive it gives margin away and leaves the reason in place.
A motive is inferred from evidence, and one observation is not evidence of a motive. State what you saw before you name what it means.

The journey in three phases, and the funnel read by its gaps

10 min

Sort a stage into the right journey phase, then read the by each step’s gap to its , in .

In plain words

A is the list of moments where a buyer and your company meet, in order. Here they are grouped into three phases: , sales (up to and including the signature) and . A funnel then counts how many people reach each stage, and you read it by the gap between each step and its benchmark, not by the raw counts.

Why it matters

Part 1 of the Case File asks where DigitalIT Solutions loses and what that costs. Counts fall at every stage of any funnel, so only the gap in percentage points shows where the real leak is. The phase tests are the same two questions for every stage: is a named contact in a booked or held conversation, and has the contract been signed?

How to read the picture below

First the journey map: click a to read what it covers and who usually owns it, and note the two dashed lines that mark where sales starts and where it ends. Then the worked sort on a different company: click a stage to see why it sits in its phase. Last, the worked example of a funnel step: two counts, the percentage, the reference (ref) and the gap. The hatched bar is the size of the gap.

Customer journey map

PRE-SALES · First contact · usually owned by Marketing

A contact-form message, a download or a call-back request. A named person now exists, but no seller has a scheduled or held conversation with them yet.

What this showsThe two dashed lines don't track how engaged the buyer feels, they track two concrete tests: does a seller now own a named contact in a scheduled or held conversation, and has the contract been signed. First contact and consultation can look similar from outside — both involve the buyer reaching out — but only consultation puts a seller in a booked meeting, which is what moves a touchpoint from pre-sales into sales.

Eight , three phases and the two boundaries used in this course. Select a touchpoint to read what it covers.

One test question per phase, and what belongs in it
Phase	The test question	What belongs	What does not
	Is a named buyer contact in a scheduled or held conversation with a seller? If not, and the contract is not signed, it is pre-sales.	Awareness and first contact: anonymous traffic, a contact-form message, a download, a call-back request.	A booked or held conversation with a named contact (that is sales), and anything after the signature.
Sales	Is a named buyer contact in a scheduled or held conversation with a seller, and is the contract not yet signed? If yes, it is sales. The signature itself is the last sales event.	A booked or held consultation, a proposal, negotiation, and the contract up to and including its signature.	A person who has only left contact details, and , support and renewal.
	Does this event come after the signature? If yes, it is after-sales.	Onboarding, support, renewal and the next project.	Anything up to and including the signature. A that counts people up to the signature has no stage here.

Worked sort · Alpenwerk GmbH (Case assumption, illustrative, read-only)

Pre-sales

Sales

After-sales

Alpenwerk · Workshop date fixed with a named contact → Sales

Why it sits here. A name and a date are now in a seller's plan. The sales test is met even though the workshop has not happened yet.

The test that decides it. Is a named buyer contact in a scheduled or held conversation with a seller, and is the contract not yet signed? If yes, it is sales. The signature itself is the last sales event.

What this showsThis is the boundary case. What moved it from pre-sales is the date in a seller's plan, not how interested the buyer feels.

A different company's stages, sorted with the same tests you will use in Part 1. Select a stage to read why it sits in its phase.

Worked example · Alpenwerk GmbH (illustrative, read-only)

. Two steps of a different company, computed the way Part 1 asks you to read DigitalIT Solutions.

Conversion rate · gap

= count at this stage ÷ count at the stage above × 100. Gap = actual % − %, in .

Customer value (CLV)

The one client is expected to bring over the whole relationship. Simple form: annual gross profit per client × expected years, with expected years ≈ 1 ÷ (1 − retention). At €12,000 a year and 80% retention that is 5 years and €60,000 (; Gupta & Lehmann, 2003).

Repurchase rate

Existing clients who re-order within a stated window ÷ existing clients. 12 of 40 clients re-ordering within 18 months is 30.0%. The window is part of the definition: state it.

Why retention gets its own number. Reichheld & Sasser (1990) found that cutting by 5% raised profits by 25% to 85% across the service industries they studied. A shows how a company wins clients; the shows whether it keeps them.
Cost of a leak, worked (Alpenwerk, ). 60 consultations booked, 45 held: 15 fall out. Of every 45 held, 6 sign (13.3%), so the 15 would have brought about 15 × 6 ÷ 45 = 2.0 contracts. At €50,000 a contract that is about €100,000 of revenue a year. The figure assumes the lost prospects would have behaved like the ones who were held: an estimate to size a leak, not a forecast.
Buyers research without you. Gartner (2017) found buyers spend about 17% of buying time meeting suppliers, so much of the journey is research you do not see (Lemon & Verhoef, 2016).

How to decide when this comes up in the task

To sort a stage, ask two questions. (1) By this point, are a named buyer contact and a seller in a scheduled or held conversation? (2) Does this event come after the signature? No to both → pre-sales. Yes to the first only → sales, up to and including the signature itself. Anything after the signature → after-sales.
A booked consultation is sales: a seller now owns a named contact and a date. Contact details or a download are first contact but still pre-sales: nobody has spoken to the person yet.
The signature is the last sales event, not the first after-sales one. A phase can be empty in a funnel: a funnel counts people up to the signature, so after-sales never appears as a stage; it shows in other numbers, such as the .
Pre-sales or sales? Has a name and a date been put in a seller’s plan (a booked consultation), or has the person only left details? A name and a date means sales.
Sales or after-sales? Is the signature part of this event, or has it already happened? The signature closes sales; only what follows it is after-sales.
Compute each step from its own two counts: this stage ÷ the stage above it × 100. Never divide by the top of the funnel.
Counts fall at every stage by design. The step that loses the most people is not the step with the largest gap: rank the steps by the gap to their benchmark, in percentage points, and take the most negative.
A gap is actual minus benchmark, in percentage points (pp), with its sign. 42.7% against 75% is −32.3 pp, not −43%; a relative percentage answers a different question.
State the cost of a leak as a number you can trace: prospects lost × the funnel’s own downstream (× the contract value if the case gives one). Do not import a figure the case never printed.
A benchmark is a comparison point, not a verdict. A gap tells you where to ask “why here?”; it does not tell you the cause.

Three levers, and what each one nets

10 min

Each answers one . Compare levers in euros of : extra orders × per order − what the lever costs.

In plain words

A lever is one thing you can do to make existing clients order again. This day compares three: a personal account manager, a , and a service that adds value on top of the contract. Each answers a different reason a client might leave, and each costs money in a different way. Net impact answers one question: after paying for it, does the lever make money?

Why it matters

Part 2 puts a euro figure on all three levers in two client . The calculation is always the same four steps (extra orders, times profit per order, minus cost, equals net impact); only how the cost is counted changes, and the result can be negative.

How to read the picture below

In the first picture each row is one option: the lever on the left, the buying motive it answers in the middle, and how its cost behaves on the right. A solid block means the cost is paid per client, dashed stripes mean it is paid again on every order. Click a row to read more. Below it, read the four boxes from left to right: extra orders, times gross profit, minus cost, equals net impact. The worked example (Alpenwerk, made up) runs the same steps for two levers.

Three levers

Option A · Intensified personal account management

What it is. A named key account manager, a business review each quarter and early-warning contact before a renewal date. It gives the client a person who knows the estate and is accountable for it.

How the cost is counted. A cost per client per year: staff time is spent whether or not the client re-orders.

Where it fits. Where contact is frequent and the client keeps buying from people it knows. In German IT projects the account owner often carries the relationship through several contract cycles.

What this showsThe cost shape splits the levers into two families before their price does: Option A and Option C are a block you pay once per client, however many orders follow; Option B is a stripe you pay again on every single order — so a discount is the only lever whose total cost keeps growing the more it succeeds at bringing orders in.

Select a . The dashed stripes mark a cost paid on every order; the solid block is a cost paid per client whatever the orders.

The unit of comparison

The same four steps for every . Only the cost line changes.

per repeat order = price × gross margin. A €40,000 contract at a 25% leaves €10,000 of gross profit. That is what one extra order is worth, before the cost of winning it.
Extra orders = clients × . An uplift is in of the . 20 clients and an uplift of 5 pp is 20 × 0.05 = 1 extra order.
Two shapes of cost. A per client: 20 clients × €1,000 = €20,000. A : 5% of €40,000 is €2,000 on every repeat order, so with 4 existing repeat orders and 1 extra one it costs 5 × €2,000 = €10,000.
Why retention is worth the effort. Reichheld & Sasser (1990) found that cutting by 5% raised profits by 25% to 85%. Dick & Basu (1994) separate real loyalty (attitude plus behaviour) from repeat purchase that comes from habit, so a must reach the attitude to hold.

Worked example · Alpenwerk GmbH (Case assumption, illustrative, read-only)

Same , two . The lever: 1 extra order × €10,000 = €10,000, less €20,000 = −€10,000. The : 1 extra order × €10,000 = €10,000, less (4 + 1) × €2,000 = €10,000 = €0. Same uplift, different verdicts: what decides it is how the cost is counted.

How to decide when this comes up in the task

Map lever to motive: personal → relationship and trust; discounting → price; a → perceived benefit. Choose by cause, then by cost: ask why the client would not return, pick the lever that answers that cause, and only then compare in euros.
The three levers cost different things. A and C are a per client per year; a discount is given up on every order it applies to. So compare them in net euros, not in list price or in the size of the alone.
Do the three steps in order and keep the units: extra orders (orders), gross profit per order (€ per order), cost (€). Net impact is the last line, in euros per year.
Extra orders = clients × uplift ÷ 100, where the uplift is in of the . Gross profit per order = price × margin.
A negative result is an answer, not an error. When the cost is larger than the extra gross profit the lever loses money, and the note should say so.
For a discount, count the cost on every repeat order in the segment, the ones that already exist and the extra ones: a price cut is paid on all of them, including orders the client would have placed anyway.
For a fixed-cost lever (account management, a value-added service), the cost is clients × the cost per client, whatever the number of orders.
Take the uplift as printed in the task: it is an assumption you are given. Cite the euro figure: a recommendation is defended by a number from your own grid, and a recommendation with no number scores 0.

Segments, and why a discount is a weak tool

10 min

The same can pay in one and lose money in another. A pays everyone, including those who would have stayed.

In plain words

Not every client behaves the same. Project clients place few, large orders and are rarely in contact between projects. clients place many small orders and are in regular contact. A discount is paid on every order, including the ones that would have come anyway, so the more repeat orders a segment already places, the more a discount costs before it wins a single extra one.

Why it matters

In Part 2 the discount wins in one segment and loses in the other, and you have to choose one option for each segment and defend it with a figure. This card gives you the mechanism, so you can explain why and not only read the number.

How to read the picture below

In the first picture, the bottom is how often a client orders and the side is how large each order is; click a circle to read how levers land on that segment. In the second, two sliders: “ in the ” moves the dotted vertical marker, and “Existing repeat orders” changes how many orders the discount is paid on. The solid line is a lever with a per client, the dashed line is the discount; where a line crosses zero it .

Two segments

Project clients

Who. Large, one-off implementations. A client places few orders and each is large.

How levers land. A repeat order is the next project: rare, decided in a committee and months apart. Personal contact between projects matters, but there is little day-to-day contact to build on. A discount lands on a very large ticket.

What this showsThe same lever lands differently depending on which corner of this chart a segment sits in. A discount is paid on every order, so it costs little against Project's rare, large orders but adds up fast against Retainer's frequent, small ones. A relationship lever needs contact to build on, which Project barely offers between its long gaps and Retainer has in abundance.

Select a . This is the logic of recency, frequency and value, reduced to the two dimensions this course needs.

Break-even of a discount against a fixed-cost lever · illustrative company

What this showsAt 8 pp the fixed-cost lever leads by €11,200: it only has to clear 6.0 pp to turn positive, while the discount — paid on all 10 existing repeat orders plus the new ones — needs 12.5 pp. Drag "Existing repeat orders" up and the discount's break-even moves right — the fixed-cost lever's does not, because it is never paid per order.

Uplift in the repeat rate: 8 pp

How many percentage points the lever adds to the repeat rate.

Existing repeat orders: 10

Orders the segment already places. The discount is paid on all of them.

: 20 clients, a €40,000 contract, a 25% , a 5% , and a fixed at €600 per client. Move both sliders.

Read the chart

Set the existing repeat orders to 2 and the at 2.5 , before the . Set them to 10 and it needs 12.5 pp, well after it. Nothing about the discount changed; the base it is paid on did.

-style . Score clients by recency, frequency and monetary value (Fader, Hardie & Lee, 2005). You do not need the full model: frequency and value alone explain why two segments react differently.
Why price is the wrong against relationship . In long-cycle IT, switching means , financial and costs (Burnham, Frels & Mahajan, 2003), and people stay with the option they have unless leaving feels safer than staying: and (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979; Samuelson & Zeckhauser, 1988; Kahneman, Knetsch & Thaler, 1991). What breaks that hold is a failure of trust or of the relationship, not a slightly higher price (Morgan & Hunt, 1994; Gustafsson, Johnson & Roos, 2005).
What a actually does. It cuts the price on every repeat order, so it gives away on orders that would have come anyway. Nagle & Müller (2018) build pricing decisions on exactly this logic. The chart uses invented figures; in the task the uplifts are given, so treat them as assumptions to defend, not as facts.

How to decide when this comes up in the task

Read a segment by its base: its number of clients and its existing repeat orders decide how much a lever can add and how much a discount gives away.
Relationship levers pay where contact is frequent and orders are many; check their fixed cost against the extra orders they bring before you call them a success.
Repeat rate = repeat orders ÷ clients in the segment. An uplift in of that rate, times the clients, gives the extra orders.
When one lever must run across every segment, add that lever’s over the segments and compare the totals. The best single lever is often no segment’s own best, and the gap between its total and the sum of the local bests is what you give up.
Ask what drives the before you choose a lever: relationship or trust → ; perceived value → a ; price → a discount. A discount is the right tool only for the third.
Test a discount by its break-even: extra orders needed = existing repeat orders × the discount per order ÷ ( per order − the discount per order); divide by the clients for the uplift. The more repeat orders a segment already has, the higher the bar.
A lever that wins on the numbers can still be the weak tool. Say what the number rests on (the uplift assumption) and what would break it, rather than defending the figure as fact. This is an argument from the mechanism, not a rule: where a segment has few existing repeat orders, a discount can still pay.

From one lever to a governed system

10 min

A retention strategy is not one action. It is a set of actions, each tied to a goal above it and a below it, and a system that reads the result.

In plain words

A retention plan is not one action. It is a set of actions, and each one needs a goal above it (what you want to change, by how much, by when) and a KPI below it (the number that shows whether it worked). A fix spends money and then nobody looks at the result; a governed system adds an owner who reads the KPI on a fixed rhythm, and a rule for when to change course.

Why it matters

Part 3 gives you four line items and one budget. Each item you fund needs its own KPI, and this card tells you which KPI belongs to which item and why a loop that reads the result makes a cut correctable.

How to read the picture below

In the first picture each row is one worked chain from Alpenwerk (made up): goal on the left, action in the middle, KPI on the right. Click a row to see what holds it together. In the second, the four boxes on the left form a loop (KPI, review, , act, back to the KPI); the dashed box on the right is a one-off campaign, with nothing that reads the result afterwards.

Ziel → Maßnahme → KPI

Goal → action → KPI

Goal. Raise repeat purchase from 30% to 35% in 18 months.

Action. A value-added service for retainer clients.

KPI. Repeat-purchase rate.

The goal names a number and a date. The KPI is the same number the goal is written in, so the action can be judged by it.

What this showsThe same three-column shape holds for a rate, a funnel gap and a sales behaviour alike — what makes a chain work is not the goal's subject, it is that the KPI on the right reads the exact number the goal on the left is written in. Where that number is missing (no baseline, no direct measure), the note names the specific way the chain would fail, not just that it might.

: Alpenwerk GmbH, illustrative. Select a row. The same chain is what the Case File asks you to write for DigitalIT Solutions.

One-off fix against a governed system

Trigger · threshold

A threshold written in advance, for example “below 60% for two months”. Crossing it is not a debate about whether to act; it is the rule that says who acts.

What this showsClick around the loop and it always returns to KPI — that return arrow is the whole point: Act changes something, and the next reading of KPI is what shows whether the change worked. The one-off fix on the right also has an outcome (revenue), but no step is scheduled to read it again, so a discount campaign that fails looks identical to one that works — nothing comes back to tell them apart.

The loop on the left is what turns an action into a system. The dashed box on the right is the fix. Select a step.

The framework, named so you can cite it. (goal → action → metric) is the control logic of this course. It is the same line of sight as Kaplan & Norton’s (1992) . Doran (1981) asks that a goal be specific, measurable, assignable, realistic and time-related: “raise from 30% to 35% in 18 months” passes; “improve loyalty” does not.
A governed system. An owner per , a review and an . Deming (1986) called the cycle . A cut you can measure is a cut you can reverse; a cut in the dark is a bet you cannot review.
Boundary. A KPI can be gamed or misread, and a loop costs attention: three KPIs on a monthly rhythm is what a four-month window can carry.

How to decide when this comes up in the task

Write every funded item as (Ziel → Maßnahme → KPI). An item you cannot write that way is not ready to fund: an action with no KPI cannot be governed, and a KPI with no action is a number nobody acts on.
Each item in the task has its own KPI: the is judged by the , the fix by the show-up rate, the training by proposal → signed , and the by the three KPIs being published each month. A retention lever acts on the repeat-purchase rate; the conversion rate is a funnel measure and is not the lever’s target.
A KPI needs a before its action starts. If the action launches first, or with the dashboard, its early months cannot be read. That is the rule: fund and start the measurement first.
Separate the action from the system. A one-off fix (a discount campaign, a single training day) has no owner, no and no trigger: it spends the money and nobody reads the result. A system adds those three, so the action can be corrected.
A plan is part of the funding decision. When you cut an item, the plan must not pretend it is still in place: a KPI that lost its dashboard cannot have a monthly reading; write what replaces it, or say it is unowned.
Prefer a correctable small action to an uncorrectable large one: a partial fix with a trigger teaches you more than a full fix nobody reads.

Under a budget: what scales, what starts first, who owns it

10 min

Know which actions scale before you cut, start the measurement first, and give every funded an owner, a and a .

In plain words

When money is short you need to know three things before you cut. Which actions serve every client for the same cost (a ) and which cost more with every client or order; which one has to start first so that the others can be measured; and who owns each KPI. means one named role acts on the KPI (the owner), looks at it on a fixed schedule (the cadence), and has a written number that decides when to (the trigger).

Why it matters

Part 3 asks you to allocate the budget, set the rollout order, say what you cut or postpone, and give every funded KPI an owner, a cadence and a trigger. This card holds the tests for each of those.

How to read the picture below

First, move the “Clients served” slider: the solid line is a system built once for a flat cost, the dashed line is an action that costs the same for each client, and a faint vertical line marks where the two costs are equal. Second, each row of the governance table is one KPI with its owner, cadence and trigger; click a row to read why each is set that way. The role profiles below show what each owner option typically does and can change.

Cost of a system against a per-client action · illustrative

What this showsPast 37.5 clients the per-client action has overtaken the system: at 38 clients it costs €30,400 and keeps climbing €800 at a time, while the system's €30,000 never moves. The system only pays for itself once there is a big enough base to spread its fixed cost across; below the crossover, a per-client action is the cheaper choice on cost alone.

Clients served: 38

Move it to see where the two costs cross.

: a system built once for €30,000 against an action that costs €800 per client.

Governance table · Alpenwerk GmbH (illustrative, read-only)

Repeat-purchase rate · escalates to Managing director

Why this owner. The repeat-purchase rate is moved by how existing clients are served, and account management runs that. Controlling could read the same number but could not change it.

Why this cadence. A retention KPI moves slowly, so a monthly reading and a two-month rule avoid reacting to noise.

Why this trigger. “Below 28% for two months” names a number and a length of time, so nobody has to argue whether a dip is noise. It goes to the managing director because only they can re-fund or stop the lever.

What this showsThe owner is the person who can change how clients are served; the cadence is monthly because retention moves in months; and the trigger names a number and a length of time. Match the cadence to the KPI's own speed, not to one company-wide rhythm.

. One owner, one and one per . Select a row to read why it is set that way.

What each owner role typically does and can change (practitioner observation, Case assumption)
Owner role (Case assumption)	Typically	Can change
/ Sales Manager	Answers for retention and sales results across the whole company, owns the budget and is the top point.	Priorities and money. Not a workflow or a client relationship day to day.
	Answers for the and the sales team’s results. The escalation point above the coordinators and team leads.	The sales process, targets and how the funnel is staffed.
	Runs the relationship with a group of existing clients: business reviews, early-warning contact before a renewal.	How often and how the existing client is visited and served.
	Runs the booking system, the reminders and the data in it.	The booking workflow, day to day.
	Answers for project delivery and for support after .	Staffing and service levels of delivery and support.
	Produces the figures and checks their quality.	The reporting. Not what sales, account managers or coordinators do.
	a group of sellers day to day and runs their coaching.	How the team sells and what it is coached on.

The test questions for a governance row

Owner. Who can change the action that moves this this week, without asking anyone above? The owner is that person, not the person who only reads the number.
Owner · or team lead. Does the KPI belong to the whole sales function or to one team? A function-wide KPI sits with the head; a team’s own habit sits with its lead.
Owner · or the action’s owner. Does the person change the number, or only report it? Only a KPI that is itself the report (reporting delivered on time) belongs to the person who produces the report.
. How often does the thing behind the KPI actually happen and move? Read it that often, and no more often than a change can show.
. Which number, read at which interval, ends the debate about whether to act? Write the and the name of the person it goes to.

against scale. Leverage asks: how much does one euro move the ? Scale asks: how many clients does it reach for the same cost? Under a short budget a cut is a ranking decision, and the ranking has to be written down (; Brealey, Myers & Allen, 2020).
Postponing is a decision, not an omission. A postponed measure has a name, a reason and a . Without the pickup it is a cut. Gupta & Lehmann (2003) value a client over its whole relationship, so an action that keeps clients longer pays back beyond a four-month window.

German constraint to remember

A that can be traced to an individual salesperson, such as a per-person , is a technical device that monitors performance. Under § 87(1) no. 6 the works council () co-determines its introduction. Decide whether the reports per team or per person before it goes live, and involve the works council in the second case.

How to decide when this comes up in the task

Classify each line item by its cost shape. A dashboard or a booking automation is built once and serves every client. A per-client (Options A and C) grows with the client base. A grows with the number of orders.
is the effect per euro; scale is whether the cost stays flat as the base grows. A foundation that scales and enables the rest (the dashboard) is not cut without saying what becomes unmeasurable.
before you cancel. A lever can be narrowed to one . Drop the segment where the lever nets the least, or a loss, first: use the net-impact figures from your grid, not the size of the segment.
Cut the item with the weakest evidence first. An item whose effect the case does not quantify (the training) is easier to defend cutting than one with a printed effect.
A partial fix is a legitimate choice if you state the . The fix takes the show-up rate to 68%, not to the 75% : 7 stay open, and the memo says so.
Add the four costs before you decide. The shortfall is arithmetic: if the total is over the budget, the message names which item or scope closes the gap.
Give every funded KPI three things: one owner (a role, not a team), a review cadence, and an escalation trigger with a (a number) and a named person it goes to. “We will monitor it” names none of the three.
Pick the owner with the owner test: who can change the action that moves this KPI this week, without asking anyone above? That is the owner, not the person who only reads the number. owns the dashboard’s own KPI because it produces the reports; it does not own the , which it can read but not change.
Between a head and a team lead, ask whether the KPI belongs to the whole function or to one team’s habit. The owner sits close to the action, and the person the trigger escalates to sits above it, so a KPI is never owned by the person it escalates to.
Choose the cadence by how fast the KPI moves: a weekly funnel step can be read weekly; a moves in months. Choose the threshold from a you actually have: without the dashboard there is none, and the trigger cannot be written.
When you cut, state the consequence in the material’s terms: which KPI stays unmeasured, which segment’s lever is delayed, which leak stays partly open. “We will do less” is not a consequence.
Name one measure you postpone, on purpose, with a : a date or a condition (“after three months of baseline”). A memo that funds everything and names nothing postponed has not made a trade-off.
The order of the rollout is part of the decision. Start the dashboard first or with the first item; a lever that starts before its baseline has an unmeasurable first stretch.

References · Materi A (23)

Reichheld, F. F., & Sasser, W. E. (1990). Zero defections: Quality comes to services. Harvard Business Review, 68(5), 105–111. (Cutting defections by 5% raised profits by 25% to 85% across the service industries studied.)
Lemon, K. N., & Verhoef, P. C. (2016). Understanding customer experience throughout the customer journey. Journal of Marketing, 80(6), 69–96. (Customer journey and touchpoints across the pre-purchase, purchase and post-purchase phases.)
Gartner (2017). Digital B2B Buyer Survey (n = 750), as reported in Gartner buyer-enablement materials. (Buyers spend about 17% of buying time meeting suppliers; the median buying group for a complex solution has 6–10 decision makers.)
Bauer, R. A. (1960). Consumer behavior as risk taking. In R. S. Hancock (Ed.), Dynamic Marketing for a Changing World (pp. 389–398). American Marketing Association. (Perceived risk.)
Morgan, R. M., & Hunt, S. D. (1994). The commitment-trust theory of relationship marketing. Journal of Marketing, 58(3), 20–38.
Anderson, J. C., Narus, J. A., & van Rossum, W. (2006). Customer value propositions in business markets. Harvard Business Review, 84(3), 90–99.
Dick, A. S., & Basu, K. (1994). Customer loyalty: Toward an integrated conceptual framework. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 22(2), 99–113.
Burnham, T. A., Frels, J. K., & Mahajan, V. (2003). Consumer switching costs: A typology, antecedents, and consequences. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 31(2), 109–126. (Procedural, financial and relational switching costs.)
Gupta, S., & Lehmann, D. R. (2003). Customers as assets. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 17(1), 9–24. (Customer lifetime value from margin, retention and discount rate.)
Fader, P. S., Hardie, B. G. S., & Lee, K. L. (2005). RFM and CLV: Using iso-value curves for customer base analysis. Journal of Marketing Research, 42(4), 415–430. (Recency, frequency and monetary value.)
Nagle, T. T., & Müller, G. (2018). The Strategy and Tactics of Pricing (6th ed.). Routledge. (Break-even volume for a price change.)
Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. (1979). Prospect theory: An analysis of decision under risk. Econometrica, 47(2), 263–291. (Loss aversion.)
Samuelson, W., & Zeckhauser, R. (1988). Status quo bias in decision making. Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 1(1), 7–59.
Kahneman, D., Knetsch, J. L., & Thaler, R. H. (1991). Anomalies: The endowment effect, loss aversion, and status quo bias. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 5(1), 193–206.
Gustafsson, A., Johnson, M. D., & Roos, I. (2005). The effects of customer satisfaction, relationship commitment dimensions, and triggers on customer retention. Journal of Marketing, 69(4), 210–218. (Separates affective from calculative commitment.)
ISO/IEC 27001:2022. Information security, cybersecurity and privacy protection — Information security management systems — Requirements.
Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik (BSI) (2020). Cloud Computing Compliance Criteria Catalogue (C5:2020).
Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (GDPR), Art. 6(1)(a) and (f) (lawful basis), Art. 7 (conditions for consent), Art. 28 (processor: the Auftragsverarbeitungsvertrag, AVV).
Kaplan, R. S., & Norton, D. P. (1992). The balanced scorecard: Measures that drive performance. Harvard Business Review, 70(1), 71–79. (Objectives, measures, targets and initiatives kept in one line of sight.)
Doran, G. T. (1981). There's a S.M.A.R.T. way to write management's goals and objectives. Management Review, 70(11), 35–36. (Specific, measurable, assignable, realistic, time-related.)
Deming, W. E. (1986). Out of the Crisis. MIT Center for Advanced Engineering Study. (Plan, do, study, act: a measured cycle instead of a one-off fix.)
Brealey, R. A., Myers, S. C., & Allen, F. (2020). Principles of Corporate Finance (13th ed.). McGraw-Hill Education. (Opportunity cost and capital rationing.)
§ 87(1) no. 6 BetrVG (Betriebsverfassungsgesetz): the works council co-determines the introduction of technical devices designed to monitor the behaviour or performance of employees.

Route 1 · Levels 1 to 3 · about 51 min

Case File · DigitalIT Solutions GmbH

One case, one task. Level 1 finds the leak, Level 2 puts a euro figure on the options, Level 3 decides and names who owns the result.

The case

Case assumption

You are the / Sales Manager of DigitalIT Solutions GmbH, a mid-size IT services vendor in Germany. The managing director's brief is short: many leads, few closings, weak retention.

The clients

14 project clients

Large implementations.

24 retainer clients

Ongoing, smaller support contracts.

A signed project contract is worth €60,000 on average. Every reference in this case is an industry reference for a company of this kind.

Three ways to keep them

AIntensified personal .
BAn 8% on the repeat order.
CA .

Each option is judged by what it adds in , less what it costs.

The decision

The CEO wants a retention system in place within four months on a budget of €150,000. No exists yet. Four line items are on the table:

The lever you choose
Option A, B or C
Funnel-leak fix
€58,000
KPI dashboard
€39,000
Sales training
€21,000

Limits and reference points you can rely on

Case assumption

Budget and time: €150,000 in all, and four months, so a start month is 1 to 4. The four line items cost what the allocation grid prints; a fixed price never changes, only the lever's option and scope can.
The three options: A costs €1,500 per client per year and C €1,100; B costs nothing upfront and is paid from margin on every repeat order. The uplifts are assumptions you are given, in percentage points of the repeat rate, and they are printed in the tables of the calculator.
What the funnel fix and the dashboard do: the fix lifts the show-up rate from 42.7% to 68%, not to the 75% benchmark, so 7 pp stay open. The dashboard produces the baseline every KPI needs. The training's effect is not quantified in the case.
Benchmarks and prices are references, not verdicts: every benchmark is an industry reference for a company of this kind, and a gap tells you where to ask “why here?”, not the cause.
Where the help is: every block has a FIND IT line, and a Check that gives a question, not the answer. The blocks that ask you to write have “Show how to build the answer”, and the calculations have “Show the formula” and “Show where the numbers are”.

How to use this task

Each block starts with a FIND IT line. Analyse in the app, then write in the answer area below it. OBJECTIVE the instrument settles it. JUDGED your reasoning, defended with a figure.
CORE blocks (about 41 min) are enough for a complete Case File. OPTIONAL blocks are for whoever has time: they start as one quiet line, open with a click and are never listed as missing.
The blocks build on each other from top to bottom (the leak, then the options, then the decision), but nothing is locked: you can start anywhere.
Where a block asks you to work something out or to sort, a hidden help waits under it: Show the test questions, Show the formula and Show where the numbers are. Try first; open one when you are stuck.

Part 1 · Diagnose

Where does DigitalIT Solutions lose between the website and the signature, and what does the leak cost? Core: name the stage (1.3) and write the cost (1.4). Optional: sort the (1.1) and write down the 's figures (1.2).

Read first

DigitalIT Solutions · annual funnel

Read-only · every figure printed here is used below

Select an arrow (or tab to it and press Enter) to read its two counts.

What this showsEach arrow’s gap is measured against that arrow’s own reference, so arrows can be compared even though the counts differ enormously (24,000 at the top, 4 at the bottom). Select an arrow to see what its gap means in prospects.

Beneath the funnel · retention

Count at the stage
Gap to the benchmark reference (length = size of the gap)
The largest gap on the diagram

Bar widths use a log scale, so 24,000 and 4 fit on one screen. “ref” is the industry reference (Case assumption). pp = percentage points.

Block 1.3 · Name the stage with the largest negative gap

OBJECTIVECORE · about 2 min

FIND IT· Route 1 → Case File → “DigitalIT Solutions · annual funnel” → the gap bars beside the arrows. Answer below.

Analyse in the app. Write your result in the answer area below.

Draws on

The stage with the largest negative gap

Pick one arrow of the . Compare the gaps printed on the diagram, in .

Checks requested: 0

Block 1.4 · What does the leak cost?

JUDGEDCORE · about 6 min

FIND IT· Route 1 → Case File → “DigitalIT Solutions · annual funnel” → the two counts either side of the arrow you named in Block 1.3, and the counts further down the funnel.

Analyse in the app. Write your result in the answer area below.

Draws on

The method is taught in Materi A2, with a worked example on Alpenwerk's numbers. Try it yourself first. If you get stuck, two helps sit under the field: “Show the formula” gives the formula in words with a calculator that checks each part, and “Show where the numbers are” lists the exact bars to read. You are practising combining the counts correctly, then writing the result in one sentence.

What does the leak at the stage you named in Block 1.3 cost DigitalIT Solutions each year?0 characters

One sentence, aimed at the managing director. State the cost as a number you can trace: use the counts on the and, if you want euros, the average contract value in the case brief (€60,000). Do not invent a figure.

The formula help and the list of numbers are built on the arrow you name in Block 1.3. .

Only checks that the sentence rests on a number from the funnel, and each part of the formula calculator you filled. The reasoning is yours.

Part 2 · Calculate

Put a euro figure on the three options in both , and choose one per segment. Core: the net-impact grid (2.1) and one option per segment (2.3). Optional: mark the net losses (2.2).

Read first

Retention lever calculator

The given data is read-only

Given · client base

Segments, clients and baseline repeat orders
Segment	Clients	Baseline repeat orders, last 12 months
Project clients (P)	14	1
Retainer clients (R)	24	4

Contract price €60,000 · gross margin 32% · gross profit per order €19,200

Given · the three options

Option cost and repeat-rate uplift by segment
Option	Cost / client / yr	Uplift P	Uplift R
A · Intensified personal account management	€1,500	+6 pp	+12 pp
B · Discount (8% off the repeat order)	—	+8 pp	+3 pp
C · Value-added service	€1,100	+7 pp	+9 pp

The uplift is in percentage points of the segment's repeat rate (repeat orders ÷ clients). The discount has no per-client cost: it is a price cut on the repeat order.

Calculator · pick one option and one segment

Option

Segment

Pick an option and a segment to see the working.

What this showsFixed-cost options are paid for every client whether or not it re-orders; the discount is paid on every repeat order. Pick an option and a segment and the working shows which of the two outgrows the extra gross profit.

Block 2.1 · Net impact of every option in every segment

OBJECTIVECORE · about 8 min

FIND IT· Route 1 → Case File → “Retention lever calculator” → select an option, then a segment. Read the last line of its working. Answer in the grid below.

Analyse in the app. Write your result in the answer area below.

Draws on

One cell per combination. Type the net impact in euros the calculator shows: a loss with a minus sign (for example −4,872). Any layout works: 4872, 4,872 or €4.872.

The method is taught in Materi A3, with a worked example on Alpenwerk's numbers. Try each cell yourself first. If you get stuck, press Help for this cell under it: it opens two helps, “Show the formula” (in words, with a calculator that checks each part) and “Show where the numbers are” (the exact rows of the tables above). You are practising combining the numbers correctly.

Project clients (P)

Retainer clients (R)

A · Intensified personal account management

B · Discount (8% off the repeat order)

C · Value-added service

0 of 6 cells filled · Checks requested: 0A check outlines in amber (±€5); it never gives the figure.

Help with one cell

Choose a cell to open its formula and the list of numbers it is built from. Nothing opens until you ask.

Block 2.3 · Recommend one option per segment

JUDGEDCORE · about 5 min

FIND IT· Route 1 → Case File → your grid in Block 2.1, and “Retention lever calculator” for the working behind each figure. Answer below.

Analyse in the app. Write your result in the answer area below.

Draws on

Which option do you recommend for Project clients (P)?

Pick one. A recommendation is defended by a figure, in the next field.

Why, in one or two sentences?No figure from your grid cited yet

Cite at least one € figure from your grid. A recommendation with no number scores 0.

Which option do you recommend for Retainer clients (R)?

Pick one. A recommendation is defended by a figure, in the next field.

Why, in one or two sentences?No figure from your grid cited yet

Cite at least one € figure from your grid. A recommendation with no number scores 0.

Part 3 · Decide

Spend the €150,000 you have and set the start months (3.1), then say what you leave out and who owns each thing you fund (3.2). Both blocks are Core.

Read first

Block 3.1 · Spend the budget and set the start months

OBJECTIVECORE · about 10 min

FIND IT· Route 1 → Case File → “Budget allocation grid” below. Each line item shows its cost and effect; the bar at the top is the running total against the €150,000. Below the grid, pick a start month for every item you fund.

Analyse in the app. Write your result in the answer area below.

Draws on

Budget, four months

€150,000

Allocated

€0

Remaining

€150,000

What this showsNothing is funded yet. The three fixed prices never change; only the lever moves, because Options A and C are priced per client (so their cost follows the scope you pick) and the discount costs nothing upfront but is paid from margin on every repeat order, outside this budget.

1 solid · 2 grey · 3 dots · 4 stripes
Amber hatch = the part above the budget line

1 · Retention lever roll-out

The lever you favoured in Part 2, or another of the three. Options A and C are a cost per client; the discount (B) costs nothing upfront and is paid from margin on every repeat order.

Scope

The costs and the net impact follow your net-impact figures (Block 2.1) for the segments in scope. The cost of Options A and C is a cost per client (38 clients: 14 project, 24 retainer).

2 · Funnel-leak fix at Booked → Held

A CRM booking automation with a reminder workflow, and one dedicated coordinator for the quarter.

Effect. Lifts the show-up rate from 42.7% to 68%. Not the full 75% benchmark: a full fix is not affordable either, so 7 percentage points of the gap stay open. (42.7% → 68%, against the 75% benchmark.)

3 · KPI and governance dashboard

Conversion rate, customer value (CLV) and repeat-purchase rate, tracked monthly. No baseline KPI tracking exists today.

Effect. Required for any of the control-logic reporting the memo describes. The dashboard produces data, not revenue.

4 · Sales team training in behaviour-based selling

A two-day workshop and one month of coaching.

Effect. Not quantified in the case data: it is a judgement call, defended in words.

Rollout order

Pick the month (1 to 4) in which each funded item starts. An item you did not fund has no month.

Fund at least one line item in Block 3.1 first.

Block 3.2 · What you leave out, and who owns what you fund

JUDGEDCORE · about 10 min

FIND IT· Route 1 → Case File → your allocation in Block 3.1 and the list “Left open by your allocation” below. Answer beneath it, then set an owner, a cadence and a trigger for each item you funded.

Analyse in the app. Write your result in the answer area below.

Draws on

Left open by your allocation

Item 1 · the retention lever is not funded: repeat purchase stays untreated in both segments.
Item 2 · the funnel-leak fix is not funded: the show-up rate stays at 42.7%, 32.3 pp below the benchmark.
Item 3 · the KPI dashboard is not funded: conversion rate, CLV and repeat-purchase rate stay unmeasured.
Item 4 · the sales training is not funded: selling behaviour stays as it is.

What do you cut or postpone in these four months, and what does that leave open?0 characters

Required. Two or three sentences. Name something real from the list above (an item you did not fund or narrowed, or the part of the leak the fix leaves open), say what that leaves exposed in the terms of the material (which stays unmeasured, which ’s is delayed, which leak stays partly open) and why it can wait. A memo that funds everything and names nothing postponed is incomplete.

When will it be picked up?

Required. A postponed measure without a is a cut.

Who owns what you fund

Fund at least one line item in Block 3.1. Governance is written for what you fund.

Your Case File is still missing:

Preview of your Case File

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