Free health check · Updated 20 October 2026
Twelve questions, about four minutes, and a score out of 24 across compliance, quality and operations. Your answers never leave your browser.
I took these twelve from my 56-point founder's checklist, which you can download free further down this page. Answer for how things are today, not how they will be once the new system is in. If you are not sure, pick partly.
Your score
0 out of 24
This is a self-check for your own use, not an audit, a certification or legal advice. Nothing you ticked has been sent anywhere.
The health check is a quick read. When I sit down with a founder for the first time, I ask roughly the 56 questions in the full checklist, and it goes further than the twelve above: rhythm and decisions, processes and documents, money and numbers, people and competence, suppliers and outsourcing, compliance, risk and quality, and AI and automation. Each area has eight checks, so each scores out of 16.
The spreadsheet adds the scores up for you. It also has two extra columns, so one or two of your managers can answer separately. Where their answers differ from yours, the row turns yellow, and in my experience that is usually where the problem sits.
10 pages, 56 checks, about 20 minutes. If you came here from my email, this is your copy.
The four bands below match the bands in the full checklist, scaled to 24. They are a rough guide drawn from founder-led firms I have worked with. A score tells you where to look first. It does not tell you what you will find.
| Score | Band | What it usually means |
|---|---|---|
| 20 to 24 | A well-run operation | Keep the weekly and monthly meetings going as you take on more people, and get someone from outside to look at it once a year. |
| 14 to 19 | Solid, with gaps | Take the area where you scored lowest and put your energy there first. |
| 8 to 13 | Running on effort | Give each gap an owner and a date over the next 90 days, and you will usually notice the difference within a quarter. |
| 0 to 7 | Founder-dependent | Start with operations, and the weekly meeting in particular. The other fixes will not last unless there is a regular meeting to check them. |
I picked the four questions in each area that tell me the most in a first conversation. In compliance, I want to know whether anyone has written down what the business is obliged to do, and whether the risks are scored. In quality, I want to know whether work is checked before the client sees it and whether a mistake changes the process or just the mood. In operations, I want to know whether the business has a weekly rhythm and whether it still works when the owner is away.
None of these needs software or a consultant to answer. They need an honest look at how the week actually goes. If you find yourself answering partly to most of them, that is common in firms of ten to 150 people, and it is the gap a fractional COO is there to close.
About four minutes. There are twelve questions and three answers to each: yes, partly or no. If something only happens when somebody remembers, the honest answer is partly.
No. The score is worked out in your browser and nothing you tick is sent to me or stored. If you want to talk about the result, you tell me as much or as little as you like.
Yes scores 2, partly scores 1 and no scores 0. Each area has four questions, so the most an area can score is 8, and the total is out of 24. The bands come from what I have seen in founder-led firms, not from a published study.
The twelve questions are taken word for word from the full checklist, which covers seven areas, including suppliers, money and AI. The health check gives you a quick read. The checklist and its scoring spreadsheet give you the whole picture, and you can ask your managers to fill them in too.
No. It is a self-check for your own use. It is not an audit, a certification or legal advice. If you want someone to look at the business properly, that is what the Operations Diagnostic is for.
If you asked for the checklist by email, how I use your details is explained in my privacy notice, and every email I send has an unsubscribe link.
