Profitability
How to find profit leaks — the ones nobody is hiding
The problem
Profit leaks are rarely dramatic. They are unbilled hours, unapproved discounts, small overruns and one customer everyone tolerates.
Why it matters
Leaks compound quietly. Most businesses we review carry three to seven points of recoverable margin that no single person can see from their seat.
How to know if you have this
- Unbilled work is common and unmeasured
- Overtime is habitual in specific areas
- Discounting varies widely between reps
- Rework and scrap are treated as cost of doing business
How Advisory Motion solves it
- 01Run a structured leak review across billing, pricing, labor, materials and customer mix
- 02Quantify every leak in dollars and rank them
- 03Assign an owner and a due date to the top five
- 04Re-measure the same list each quarter so the recovery is proven
Illustrative example
$212K across five leaks
Unbilled change orders, one habitually discounting rep, overtime in one department, scrap on a single line and two unprofitable accounts. None were individually alarming; together they were the year's profit gap.
Illustrative composite · not a client identification
Where this connects