Queue / Priority Service

CEO RESOURCE LLC • CHIEF IMPLEMENTOR™

QUEUE / PRIORITY SERVICE

I work directly with every consulting client myself. I do not hand your company to a junior consultant, offshore team or anonymous analyst. My available consulting time is therefore finite, and the queue system is how I allocate that time fairly while still giving clients with genuinely urgent timing a way to move ahead.

Standard • Priority • Top Priority — same consultant, same judgment, different scheduling priority.

WHY IS THERE A QUEUE AT ALL?

There is a simple reason: you work directly with me.

After more than 4½ decades of building companies, raising capital, mentoring founders and advising startup and emerging-company CEOs, I am semi-retired. My primary professional focus is now the Five Year Life™ publishing program, while I continue to accept a deliberately limited number of consulting engagements.

Consulting work does not arrive in neat, predictable one-hour packages. One client may send financial projections requiring several hours of analysis. Another may return redlines or investor materials. Another may suddenly face a time-sensitive decision. Some assignments pause while I wait for client information and become active again when that information arrives.

The queue gives me a transparent method for handling that constantly changing workload without pretending I can manufacture unlimited hours or promise completion dates that depend on facts neither of us can know in advance.

BEFORE YOU CHOOSE A SERVICE LEVEL, PLEASE UNDERSTAND THIS

Being first in the Standard queue does NOT guarantee that I will work continuously on your assignment from the moment I start until that assignment is finished.

If I am actively working on a Standard assignment and ready Priority or Top Priority work arrives, I may temporarily stop the Standard assignment at the next practical stopping point and move to the higher-priority work.

I continue servicing the higher-priority work in accordance with its queue until the then-ready higher-priority work has been handled. I then return to the Standard queue and resume the interrupted Standard assignment from the point where I stopped.

If additional Priority or Top Priority work subsequently becomes ready, a Standard assignment can be interrupted again. In other words, Standard Service means FIFO within the Standard queue — it does not mean uninterrupted use of my calendar.

Priority Service works similarly in one important respect: Priority clients are ahead of Standard, but an active Top Priority client remains above the Priority queue. Therefore, Priority work can itself be temporarily interrupted by ready Top Priority work.

This distinction is important. Your place in a queue determines the order in which ready work is handled. It does not reserve an uninterrupted block of future calendar time.

New work continually becomes ready. Clients return answers. Revised documents arrive. Financial models come back. A transaction develops a new problem. An investor meeting gets scheduled. A Priority client may submit something after I have already started Standard work.

The queue therefore continually adjusts to the work that is actually ready for me to perform while respecting the hierarchy of Top Priority first, Priority second and Standard third.

THE BASIC RULE: FIRST IN / FIRST OUT

For Standard Service, CEO RESOURCE LLC uses a FIFO queue — First In / First Out. Ready Standard work is generally handled in the order it is received.

The same principle operates inside the Priority queue: Priority Client A does not automatically jump Priority Client B simply because A is louder, sends more emails or believes the situation is more important.

The hierarchy is therefore straightforward: Top Priority first → Priority FIFO queue second → Standard FIFO queue third.

A REALISTIC EXAMPLE

Assume I have been working for two hours on a Standard client’s financial model.

A Priority client then returns a completed worksheet and revised projections that are ready for review. At the next practical stopping point, I preserve the Standard work exactly where it stands and move to the Priority queue.

While I am working on that Priority matter, my single Top Priority client sends material requiring immediate analysis. Top Priority now moves ahead of the Priority work.

After the ready Top Priority work is handled, I return to the Priority queue. After the then-ready Priority work is handled, I return to the Standard queue and resume the original financial model where I left it.

STANDARD SERVICE

$2,500 / 10 Hours • $250 Per Hour

Standard is the default service level and is generally appropriate for clients whose work is important but does not justify paying a premium for scheduling priority.

Standard work is handled FIFO after then-ready Top Priority and Priority work has been serviced.

PRIORITY SERVICE

$3,750 / 10 Hours • $375 Per Hour

Priority clients have their own separate FIFO queue, and all ready Priority work is handled ahead of Standard work.

Priority does not displace another Priority client outside the FIFO order, and Priority remains subordinate to the single Top Priority client.

TOP PRIORITY SERVICE

$5,000 / 10 Hours • $500 Per Hour

There can be only one active Top Priority client at a time. Ready work for that client sits ahead of both other queues.

If the Top Priority position is already occupied, the service is unavailable until that position opens.

WHAT DOES THE PREMIUM ACTUALLY BUY?

It does not buy a better version of my judgment. It does not unlock some secret level of analysis unavailable to Standard clients.

Every tier gives you direct access to me and to the Compound Knowledge™ accumulated across nearly five decades.

The premium compensates for the scheduling consequence of moving your ready work ahead of other clients whose work may already be waiting — or may already be underway.

Because otherwise the words “Top Priority” would be meaningless.

If five clients could all purchase Top Priority at the same time, none of them would actually be at the top. I would merely have created another queue and given it a more impressive name.

The scarcity is intentional. The promise only means something if there is genuinely one client occupying that position.

THE CONSULTING SERVICE OFFERED ON THIS SITE IS FUNDED IN PREPAID 10-HOUR BLOCKS

That structure lets us concentrate on solving the problem rather than repeatedly stopping to renegotiate whether the next hour, document review, analysis or follow-up should be authorized.

The current SOW specifies that Standard Service is billed in quarter-hour increments. Billable consulting time can include meetings, calls, email, document review, analysis, research, reporting, correspondence and other work requested by or performed for the client.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE FUNDED BLOCK IS USED?

You then decide whether the value justifies funding another 10-hour block. If you want to continue, you replenish the applicable retainer. If you do not, you stop.

Because some of the most useful consulting happens when we are not talking.

A meaningful assignment may require reviewing documents before a meeting, thinking through alternatives afterward, checking assumptions, researching an issue, reviewing revised materials, building or testing a financial model, preparing written recommendations or comparing the current situation with previous business experience.

The funded-block structure lets the work continue wherever the problem requires my attention rather than treating the engagement as nothing more than scheduled calls.

YOUR RESPONSE TIME ALSO AFFECTS THE CLOCK

A queue can determine when I work on material that is ready. It cannot make missing information appear.

If I need answers before I can responsibly proceed, that portion of the work pauses until the answers arrive. If I need redlines, revised assumptions or other client decisions, the next stage cannot begin until they are returned.

Completion time therefore depends on both of us — as well as the complexity of the assignment and the service tier selected.

WHY I DO NOT PROMISE ARTIFICIAL COMPLETION DATES

The SOW intentionally does not guarantee a precise completion date or interim milestone because consulting is not an assembly line.

Timing can depend on complexity, information supplied by the client, revision cycles, new facts, changing priorities, the work already in the queues and the service level selected.

I would rather explain those realities before you hire me than give you an attractive deadline that cannot responsibly be guaranteed.

CAN I CHANGE SERVICE LEVELS AFTER WORK BEGINS?

A client can request an increased service level after work has begun, subject to availability and agreement by CEO RESOURCE LLC.

The applicable premium pricing then continues for the duration of that work. Top Priority can only be selected if the single Top Priority position is available.

Choose Standard if the assignment is important but does not justify paying a premium for calendar precedence. Standard is appropriate for most clients — provided you understand that higher-priority work may interrupt it.

Choose Priority when timing has enough business value that being ahead of Standard work justifies the additional cost — while recognizing that the one Top Priority client still remains ahead of you.

Choose Top Priority when timing is genuinely important enough to justify occupying the single highest-priority consulting position available.

THE QUEUE IN ONE SENTENCE

Top Priority ready work is handled first; Priority ready work is handled FIFO ahead of Standard; Standard ready work is handled FIFO after both — and work already underway at a lower tier may be temporarily paused when higher-tier work becomes ready.

THE APPLICABLE STATEMENT OF WORK CONTROLS THE ENGAGEMENT

This page explains the queue and public service levels in plain English. It is not a substitute for the applicable Statement of Work.

The SOW contains the complete terms governing billing, retainers, scheduling, confidentiality, expenses, limitations and other engagement provisions.

The current SOW states that payment for services constitutes acceptance of that agreement. If you want to review the applicable SOW before funding an engagement, contact me first.

Best wishes for stellar success,

CEO & Chief ImpleMentor™

CEO RESOURCE LLC