The 5 Reports Every Ops Manager Should Review Weekly
Too many founders are running their business—without really seeing it.
They know revenue. They know payroll. But they don’t know how the field is actually performing.
They rely on gut, not data. Symptoms, not signals.
And they don’t realize how exposed they are—until a buyer starts asking real questions.
Why This Matters to Buyers
Buyers don’t just want a business that’s growing. They want one that’s in control.
That means:
Performance tracked at the crew and job level
Trends spotted before they become patterns
Margin managed in real time
Leadership making decisions off of data—not anecdotes
If you’re not tracking the right numbers weekly, your ops team isn’t managing the business. They’re reacting to it.
The 5 Weekly Reports That Anchor Control
These reports aren’t complicated. But they separate scalable operators from reactive ones. And when buyers see them, it builds trust—fast.
1. Revenue per Truck per Day
What it shows: How productive your crews are with the time, territory, and labor they have.
Why it matters:
Low revenue per truck points to poor routing, over-servicing, or undercharging. Buyers see it as a signal of bloated cost structure.
What good looks like:
In residential services, most solid operators track toward $1,200–$1,800 per truck per day. More important than the number is the trend—week over week, crew by crew.
How to act:
Start calculating it weekly. Review by team. Spot outliers and fix them.
2. Gross Margin by Job Type
What it shows: Which services are driving profit—and which ones are eroding it quietly.
Why it matters:
Blended margins mask issues. Buyers want to know which job types they can scale and which ones they’d eliminate.
What good looks like:
Build a baseline margin target—usually 35–40%+ for high-performing service work. Compare actual against quoted margin.
How to act:
Track margin per job type. Flag anything consistently underperforming. Evaluate whether to reprice, retrain, or remove.
3. Return Visit Rate
What it shows: How often you have to go back to fix, finish, or redo a job—whether the customer complained or not.
Why it matters:
Return visits kill margin and signal poor quality control. If they’re not tracked, buyers assume the worst.
What good looks like:
Less than 5% for most businesses. Under 2% if recurring work or contract-based.
How to act:
Tag all return visits in your system. Log the reason. Review weekly with ops. If you’re not tracking it, start immediately.
4. Schedule Accuracy
What it shows: Whether your crews complete jobs in the time expected—or regularly go over.
Why it matters:
When job durations slip, everything breaks: routing, profitability, customer expectations. Buyers see schedule chaos as a red flag.
What good looks like:
Track estimated vs. actual job duration. Flag any job over plan by 15% or more. Don’t just track the worst weeks—track consistently.
How to act:
Review the worst offenders weekly. Adjust scoping processes. Retrain as needed. Bring overruns back into line.
5. Escalation Count
What it shows: How often your team still needs you—or a senior leader—to step in.
Why it matters:
This is founder reliance in real time. The more decisions routed back to you, the less transferable your business is.
What good looks like:
Zero is the goal—but trend matters most. If you’re still in the loop on quoting, routing, or problem-solving, you’re not out of the core.
How to act:
Define what counts as an escalation (pricing, customer conflict, crew issue). Track them weekly. Coach your leads to handle 80% without you.
Diagnostic: Are You in Control—or Just Involved?
Ask yourself right now:
What was your revenue per truck last week?
Which job type had the worst margin over the past 30 days?
How many return visits happened—and why?
Which crews ran over schedule last week?
How many decisions hit your desk that your team should’ve handled?
If you can’t answer 4 out of 5 with actual data—not gut—you’re not running the operation. You’re buffering it.
How to Start: 30-Minute Reporting Audit
Take 30 minutes this week. Audit your reporting rhythm:
Do you have a single report covering each of these five metrics?
Is it updated every week—without you asking?
Who owns it? Is it part of their weekly cadence?
Do you act on what you see—or just observe it?
Most founders only fix reporting when a buyer requests it.
The best ones build it long before they need it—and use it to drive performance now.
Final Thought
Sophisticated buyers don’t just want to see the numbers.
They want to trust that the team behind those numbers knows exactly what’s driving them—and how to sustain them under pressure.
If your field leaders aren’t reviewing these reports weekly, you’re not managing performance—you’re hoping for it.
And hope doesn’t underwrite well.
Start simple. Build rhythm. Shift accountability to where the work happens.
Because the best operators don’t just drive margin. They defend it.
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