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Methodology

How PCI scores your business lines.

Every revenue line you operate is scored on a deterministic 100-point model across seven categories. The score determines whether to scale, keep, repair, or eliminate the line — the same call a disciplined operator would make if they had unlimited time to study each unit. The formula is the same for every customer; the answers are different.

This is the per-line score — the call on each individual revenue line. It is a separate model from your operation score, the single 0–100 read on your overall control posture across the whole operation. Two deliberate scores: one answers “how well-run is the business?”, this one answers “what do we do with each revenue line?”

The categories below are the public skeleton of the model. The internal point allocations and override rules are part of the PCI work product.

The seven categories

What we weigh — and why each matters

Revenue Quality

25 pts

How predictable, recurring, and diversified the revenue is. Contractual + repeat-heavy revenue scores higher than transactional pop-up income.

Contribution Margin

20 pts

Direct margin contribution after variable costs. The single largest weight in the model — what survives after you serve the line.

Cash Quality

10 pts

Whether cash arrives before or after the service. Prepaid contracts beat post-paid invoicing; refund-heavy lines bleed both.

Utilization Impact

15 pts

How well the line fits idle capacity vs. cannibalizing prime inventory. Filling Tuesday at 10 AM is different from booking Saturday at 6 PM.

Strategic Fit

10 pts

Cross-sell and retention value beyond the line itself. Does this customer come back and buy more, or is the relationship one-and-done?

Operational Simplicity

10 pts

Labor intensity and management complexity. Lines that require constant attention but produce thin margin are the silent killers.

Control Maturity

10 pts

Whether the line has contractual terms, reliable reporting, and exact disclosure quality. Lines you can't see clearly are lines you can't fix.

Total: 100 points. Per-category weights are public; sub-factor allocations are not.

What the score means

Scale, Keep, Repair, or Eliminate

Scale

≥ 80

Healthy across most dimensions. Invest more here — the unit economics earn it.

Keep

65 – 79

Solid contributor with one or two soft spots. Maintain and improve the gaps.

Repair

45 – 64

Borderline. Needs intervention on the lowest sub-scores before it slides into Eliminate.

Eliminate

< 45

Likely costing more than it earns once full overhead is allocated. Consider pruning.

Worked example

A youth club's tournament revenue

Tournament revenue line

42 / 100

Repair

This line lands at 42 because contribution margin is under 15% (low score on the largest weighted category), it requires prime weekend inventory (negative utilization impact), and revenue is transactional with no contractual recurrence (low revenue quality). The line isn't condemned — it's a repair candidate. Raise pricing, shift to off-peak slots, or contractualize the bigger teams, and it can move into Keep. Don't, and it slides further toward Eliminate next year.

Every operator gets a per-line scorecard like this for their actual business lines after the PCI interrogation completes.

Get your scorecard.

Every business line, scored. Specific calls — scale, keep, repair, or eliminate — based on your real numbers, not vibes.