Strategy & Operations · Operating model brief

Standardize intake before the new contract starts.

A three-site workforce-development nonprofit has won a state contract that requires consistent intake, eligibility and outcome reporting across all sites. The sites were built separately and run differently. Leadership has ninety days.

Illustrative work sample. Built on a synthetic organization with invented figures to show how we think and what a deliverable looks like. It is not client work and describes no achieved result.

The organizational challenge

Bridgeway Works (synthetic) runs job-readiness and placement programs from three sites with 42 staff, each grown from a different predecessor program with its own intake form, its own definition of an enrolled participant and its own spreadsheet. The new state contract is worth more than a third of next year’s budget and requires one definition set, monthly reporting from a single dataset and an audit trail from intake to outcome.

Today the finance lead reconciles three spreadsheets by hand every month, and the definitions do not agree: one site counts a participant at first appointment, another at completed orientation. The contract manager has already flagged that this will fail an audit.

The decision to be made

The board must choose one of three operating models for intake and case management across Bridgeway’s three sites, to be implemented within ninety days without disrupting participants or staff.

The scoring criteria were set by the executive director and the board treasurer before any option was evaluated: contract compliance, continuity of service, staff capacity to absorb change, first-year cost and time to compliant reporting.

The approach

Two days at each site, following intake from first contact to first appointment, with interviews of site leads, intake staff and the finance lead. Produced a first-hand map of how each site actually runs intake today.
Forms, definitions, handoffs and systems compared side by side. Nine points of difference, four of which affect compliance.
Three genuine options, not one recommendation with two straw men, scored against the agreed criteria in a working session with leadership. Produced the comparison table below.
The recommended option planned in phases, with owners, decision points and the measures leadership would use to know it is working. Produced the 90-day plan and the role assignments.

Deliverable preview

Three models, one recommendation, a 90-day plan.

Textstone LabsDecision brief · Example S-01

Options compared against the criteria leadership agreed before scoring.
Criterion (weight)	A. Site-led intake, shared reporting	B. Shared standards, site delivery, one data owner	C. Central intake team
Contract compliance (30%)	Weak. Definitions still differ by site; reporting reconciles after the fact.	Strong. One intake form, one definition set, one owner of the data.	Strong. Single process by design.
Service continuity (25%)	Strong. Nothing changes for participants.	Good. Participants still meet site staff; forms and steps change.	Weak at first. New phone and referral path; walk-ins redirected.
Staff capacity to absorb change (20%)	Strong. Little to learn.	Good. Two days of training per site; coaching for four weeks.	Weak. Three new hires, site roles redefined, a bargaining question at one site.
Cost, first year (15%)	Low. Reporting analyst time only.	Moderate. Training, form redesign, one data-owner role reassigned.	High. New team, new phone system, space.
Time to compliant reporting (10%)	Not reached. Reconciliation continues.	90 days.	150 to 180 days.
Weighted result	2.6 / 5	4.1 / 5	3.4 / 5

Recommendation

Option B: shared standards, site delivery, one data owner.

It meets the contract’s consistency requirement without breaking the relationships that make the program work. Its weakest point is discipline: if sites drift from the shared form, the reporting problem returns. The plan below is built to catch drift early.

90-day implementation plan

Phase	Weeks	What happens	Owner	Decision point
1. Standardize	1 to 3	One intake form and one definition set agreed with the three site leads and the program director. Data-owner role assigned.	Program director	Definitions signed off by the state contract manager
2. Pilot at one site	4 to 6	New form and steps run at the largest site. Weekly check on completeness, time to first appointment and staff questions.	Site lead, data owner	Continue, adjust or pause based on week-6 review
3. Roll out	7 to 10	Remaining two sites adopt the form. Two days of training per site plus four weeks of coaching. Old forms retired.	Data owner, site leads	All sites reporting from one definition set
4. First compliant report	11 to 13	First monthly report produced from shared data without manual reconciliation. Drift check: any site-level variation is logged and resolved.	Data owner	Report accepted by the contract manager

Roles after implementation

Program director: owns the operating model and approves changes to definitions.
Data owner (reassigned role, not a new hire): maintains the intake form, monitors completeness, produces the monthly report.
Site leads: own delivery and staff practice at their site; escalate exceptions rather than improvising.
State contract manager (external): confirms definitions and accepts reports.

How success would be evaluated

What we would measure.

Intake completeness: share of new participants with every required field captured on the shared form. Target set with the contract manager.
Time to first appointment: should not worsen during rollout. Tracked weekly at the pilot site.
Reporting rework: hours the finance lead spends reconciling monthly, expected to approach zero by the first compliant report.
Definition drift: count of site-level variations logged after rollout. Any non-zero count triggers a review.
Staff confidence: a short check-in at weeks 4 and 10 asking whether the new steps are clear and workable.

The engagement output is the decision brief, the scored options, the 90-day plan, the role definitions and a one-page summary the executive director can take to the board.

Practice area

Strategy & Operations

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