The Method — Orient
Questions to ask yourself during orient
Five questions to ask yourself during Orient, starting with the hardest: what would have to be true for your current plan to be wrong?
7 min read · Reviewed by both partners
These are diagnostic, not rhetorical. Answer them in writing and the phase largely runs itself.
Orient exists to produce a written constraint and a 90-day plan. Each question below moves you toward it.
Step by step
What would have to be true for me to be wrong?
The single most useful question in the phase, and the one owners skip because it is uncomfortable.
Which number would change my mind?
If no number would, the belief is not a conclusion and this phase cannot test it.
What am I measuring because it is easy?
Convenient metrics crowd out decisive ones and they look identical on a report.
Who disagrees, and have I actually heard them out?
Someone in the business usually knows. They are rarely in the meeting.
Is a written constraint and a 90-day plan written down?
If not, the phase is unfinished regardless of how much thinking has happened.
Common mistakes
Answering them out loud and moving on
Spoken answers feel complete and vanish. Written ones can be checked next quarter.
Asking them after the decision
Used retrospectively these become justification. Used first they are a diagnostic.
Frequently Asked Questions
Questions to ask yourself during orient?
These are diagnostic, not rhetorical. Answer them in writing and the phase largely runs itself.
What happens if a business owner ignores this?
It sits under The Orient Phase in the Growth Scaling Method. The next step for an owner is the $1,500 Assessment, which reads your own numbers against everything described above.
Is pricing published?
Yes, and it does not move: $1,500 per Foundation step, $4,500 for all three, and a $5,000 monthly minimum for recurring programs.
Who works on the account?
The two founders, directly. David Mitroff, Ph.D., handles strategy; Steven Lockhart handles systems and measurement. Nothing is passed to a junior team.
References
- www.data.gov — primary source
- www.usa.gov — primary source
- www.bls.gov — primary source
Answer these with someone outside the business
That is most of what the Assessment is: two hours of exactly these questions, asked properly.
Growth-Scaling is a marketing and business-scaling firm. It is not a licensed practitioner in any client vertical and does not provide medical, legal, financial, or contracting services; all industry content on this site is marketing and growth guidance for owners in those fields. Figures describing past engagements refer to specific businesses under specific conditions and are not a prediction of any future result. No outcome is promised.
Written by Steven Lockhart, reviewed by David Mitroff, Ph.D. Figures and regulatory details reflect the cited public sources; requirements vary by state and situation. Growth-Scaling is a marketing and business-scaling firm, not a licensed practitioner in any client vertical.