Logic in the Numbers

Mid-market boards make $50M+ decisions on gut feel and spreadsheets. We build the analysis that shows what they're actually risking.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Your board is about to make a major capital decision. The analysis behind it is a spreadsheet, gut feel and sometimes a fancy presentation.

That's not good enough for what's at stake.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Hard disagree on the advisory market being in trouble.

AI is a powerful analytical tool. But a tool is only as good as the questions and intel you feed it.

"Tell me what to do with my business" gets you garbage. Every time.

The advisors who know how to ask the right questions, frame the right problems, and interpret what comes back? They're more valuable now, not less.

AI doesn't replace judgement. It amplifies it... if you have it.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

If your organisation's revenue depends on the success of its own work, and that work isn't demonstrating results... you're not in a revenue problem!

You're in a reflexive dependency trap.

And the balance sheet won't warn you until it's too late.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

There's a type of business where revenue depends on the success of the work it does.

If the work fails, revenue falls. Which constrains investment in the work. Which makes the work more likely to fail.

It's the most dangerous loop in business. Thread. 🧵

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

The only way out is to break the dependency.

Diversify income so you're not 100% tied to the thing you're trying to fix. Build revenue streams that don't decline when your core mission struggles.

Easier to say than to do when 75% of your income comes from one mechanism.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Most acquisitions fail not because the target was bad, but because the buyer didn't model integration properly. Cultural fit, system compatibility, customer overlap, and the real cost of making two businesses work as one. The purchase price is just the beginning.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Simpler isn't automatically better. Sometimes it's just smaller.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Before settling on a decision, model the worst case. Not the version where synergies arrive on schedule. The version where integration takes twice as long and costs twice as much. If the deal still works, it might have merit.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

A fortress balance sheet is only useful if you deploy it.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

You can be perfectly solvent while slowly winding down.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Margin improvement during a revenue decline is mathematically inevitable. It's also meaningless. The board celebrates the percentage while the earnings engine loses real money.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Margins are a useful diagnostic. They are a terrible strategy metric on their own.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Ratios lie when the denominator shrinks.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

An acquisition target has landed on the table. Revenue is growing. The team is strong. The strategic fit looks obvious. Everyone is excited. Nobody has asked the three questions that kill most deals after they close. Any ideas on what they may be?

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

@ConnorAbene The real test of a financial system isn't the dashboard, it's whether anyone changed a decision because of what it showed them.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

The best time to have the hard conversation is when you still have choices. Not when the market or the numbers force it on you. Strategy isn't just what you decide to do. It's what you decide to stop avoiding.

[Logic in the Numbers @LogicInNumbers]

Avoided conversations don't go away. They compound. The longer a strategic question goes unaddressed, the more the business drifts from where it should be. By the time the conversation finally happens, the options are narrower and the stakes are higher.