Make the recommendation
the evidence can support.
Building earning power through leadership starts with a more useful contribution. This sample shows how to replace a progress update with a recommendation the evidence can support.
The situation
A finance operations team has tested a reconciliation process for one month-end close. It took 28 staff-hours, compared with 40 for the previous close. Customer disputes fell from 10 to 6. Staffing and payroll have not changed. The team has not yet checked whether the lower time will persist when transaction volume rises.
Your director asks whether the process should be rolled out to the other three teams next month. What can you responsibly recommend?
“The new process cut costs by 30% and reduced customer disputes by 40%. We should roll it out across all teams immediately.”
The arithmetic describes a change in this observation. It does not establish a recurring cash saving or prove that the process caused every improvement.
Why this matters at leadership level
A director may use your statement to change a budget, reduce staffing or promise a result elsewhere. An imprecise claim can become a commitment long after the context is forgotten.
Your responsibility is to make the size and limits of the evidence visible. You can recommend action without pretending the uncertainty has disappeared.
“I recommend testing the process with one additional team for the next close, before committing to all four. In the initial team, reconciliation time fell from 40 to 28 staff-hours. That released 12 hours of capacity during this close; payroll did not change.
“Disputes fell from 10 to 6, although we have not established whether the process caused the reduction. The extension would test whether the time benefit persists at a different transaction volume without increasing reconciliation errors.
“The finance operations manager would own the trial. We need approval to move the internal reporting refresh back by one week so the same specialist can support it. At the next-close review, we would compare time, volume, errors and disputes, then decide whether to expand, adapt or stop.”
What changed in the reasoning?
- The recommendation is visible. The reader knows what decision is needed: a bounded extension rather than a full rollout.
- The outcome is accurate. Twelve hours of released capacity is useful. It becomes a cash saving only if an actual expense changes.
- The uncertainty is named. One close does not establish a durable effect across other teams. A fall in disputes does not by itself establish causation.
- The trade-off has an owner. The reporting refresh moves only with approval. The specialist is not expected to absorb both commitments.
- The review supports another decision. It asks whether to expand, adapt or stop using named evidence.
Now make the case harder.
Your director says: “We are over budget. Can I book those 12 hours as savings this quarter?”
Before opening the answer, write two or three sentences that explain what you know, what would have to change for a cash saving to exist, and what you propose to do next.
Open the reference answer
“We have released 12 staff-hours during this close, but payroll and other spending have not changed, so I would not book a cash saving yet. If the process allows us to avoid planned overtime or an external cost, we can verify that expense against the budget. For now, I propose tracking the time benefit and how we use it, while testing whether it holds in the next close.”
The useful move is to answer the budget question directly, preserve the operational benefit and identify what evidence would support a different claim.
The connection to the course: Module 1 builds the outcome statement. Module 3 examines the recommendation. Modules 4 and 7 clarify the displaced work and ownership. Module 8 brings the parts into one decision.
Your one-page
leadership brief.
Choose a bounded decision. Aim for a few clear sentences under each prompt. Nothing you type here is submitted or saved by the site; download it before leaving or reloading.
One useful example.
A twelve-lesson course.
The full course builds the reasoning across different functions and situations, with more exercises and reference answers. The cohort adds discussion and feedback on your attempt.