Every plan rests on a few lines nobody checked.

Calx is an independent strategy company. We find the assumptions a decision cannot survive losing, and check those first.

How we work
Five-year plan, 2026–2030
  1. 01Revenue grows 7% a year through 2030, in line with the market.Holds
  2. 02Sourcing stays in three regions, on current terms.Decision changes
  3. 03Headcount follows volume with an eighteen-month lag.Holds
  4. 04The new plant reaches full rate within a year of commissioning.Holds
  5. 05Pricing holds against the two largest competitors.Holds
  6. 06Working capital stays near 14% of sales.Holds
  7. 07The regulator’s position on licensing does not move.Decision changes
  8. 08The acquired business is integrated within eighteen months.Holds
  9. 09The legacy line is run for cash and declines 10% a year.Holds
  10. 10Energy costs stay inside the budgeted band.Holds
  11. 11The largest customer renews in 2028 on similar terms.Decision changes
  12. 12Financing remains available at current spreads.Holds

Twelve assumptions. Three of them carry the decision.

Most of a plan does not matter. The parts that do are rarely the parts a board spends its time on.

Which parts of this plan would have to be wrong before the decision changes, and has anybody checked those parts?

What we work on

Approach

  1. Direction

    Where a company is pointed, and what it has to stop doing to get there.

  2. Decisions

    The single call that does not come round again.

  3. Execution

    Where a strategy meets the organisation that has to carry it.

  4. Environment

    Capital, regulation, technology and competitors, each on its own clock.

Calx is not a consultancy.

We do not sell days, staff workstreams, or write the paper that justifies a decision already taken.

There is no client list here and no case studies. The notes are argument about method, and the fairest way to judge how we think.

Notes

All notes

  1. Waiting is a decision

    A board that defers a call for two quarters has not kept its options open. It has chosen the option that decays slowest, and paid for it with two quarters.

  2. The plan that assumed the tariff schedule

    Almost every five-year plan written two years ago carried one line nobody examined: that the terms of trade would hold.

Write to us, and say roughly what the question is.

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