# Make Better Decisions: Odds, the ITR Screen, and the 50/50 Partner Test **Speaker:** Patrick Bet-David and Tom Ellsworth, with audience case respondents **When:** 2026-09-01 · 5:03 PM–6:26 PM ET (2:03 PM Las Vegas) **Theme:** Know yourself & decide **Sources:** X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX, Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm **Notes page:** https://vault.chels.ai/sessions/d1-processing-case-study/ > **Treat every decision as a bet you can inspect: score your track record, quantify each crisis with Investment-Time-Return before you escalate it, ask why five times to reach the real cause, and bring a neutral third party (and often a cheque) when a partner will not change.** This was 'Move Two' of the Day One CEO workshop: mastering the ability to reason, which Patrick Bet-David calls 'processing'. He argued decision-making is the most important skill in life, ran three live workbook exercises (score your last five big decisions, dissect one that failed, run it through a problem-solving flow), and Tom Ellsworth taught the eleven types of workplace crisis and the ITR (Investment, Time, Return) screen. The session closed with the day's first case study, a fictional 50/50 partnership where the operations partner stopped growing, and Bet-David's real-world resolutions: a dinner that turned a 35% owner into a 65% owner through fair buyouts, and a founder pair rescued by a hard EBITDA rule. For the year ahead, it gives you a repeatable way to make, review, and escalate decisions, and a playbook for the hardest conversation in business: the one with your partner. **Best for:** Founders and CEOs who decide by gut and never review the results; Number-twos and managers who bring problems to the boss without options or numbers; Anyone in a 50/50 or minority partnership where one partner has stopped pulling weight; Leaders who keep re-fighting the same fires; Trainers and sales leaders who want to develop leaders faster; Parents and spouses making values-based family decisions ## Claude skills from this session - `bad-decision-dissection` — Score the user's last five big decisions (3, 5 or 10, with the dollars at stake), force out the one that cost them money, and dissect it with Patrick Bet-David's problem-solving flow - repeat issue, impact and tier, five whys to the root cause, stakeholders and buy-in, top five fixes, share it, and the "can this happen again?" check. Use whenever the user mentions a decision that went wrong, a loss, a post-mortem, a mistake they keep repeating, a bad hire, deal or launch, wants to review their judgment or track record, or asks how to make better decisions - even if they only say "that didn't work out" or "we lost money on that". https://vault.chels.ai/skills/bad-decision-dissection/SKILL.md - `itr-crisis-triage` — Quantify a workplace crisis or big problem with Tom Ellsworth's ITR screen (Investment, Time, Return) before escalating it, classify it against his eleven crisis types, and check whether the response is over-exaggerating or downplaying it. Use whenever the user describes a fire, emergency, urgent problem, something breaking, a key person quitting, a cyber or phishing incident, a burst of bad reviews, a supplier or market shock, or wants to bring a problem to their boss, partner or board — even if they never say "ITR", "triage" or "crisis". Also use when a leader complains that their team brings them problems without solutions. https://vault.chels.ai/skills/itr-crisis-triage/SKILL.md - `stuck-partnership-resolution` — Resolve a business partnership where one partner's contribution no longer matches their equity. Maps equity against real contribution, stress-tests every move against Patrick Bet-David's question "what if they just say no?", plans the three-way valuation (one valuer each, one agreed, settle in the middle), chooses between a cheque (buyout or cash off the table) and a hard operating rule (an EBITDA floor with veto rights), covers the forgotten stakeholders, and puts a neutral third party in the room. Use whenever the user mentions a partner, co-founder, or 50/50 split that is not working, a partner who agrees every time but never changes, a partner taking long vacations or not reading the numbers, buying someone out, re-cutting equity, or a partnership "divorce" - even if they are only venting about their partner. https://vault.chels.ai/skills/stuck-partnership-resolution/SKILL.md ## Skills to build - **Scoring your own decision track record** — Keeping a running list of your big decisions (with the dollar amount at stake) and a 1-10 score of how each turned out, so you can see how often, how fast, and how well you decide compared with competitors. _How to practise:_ Start with the last five big decisions of the past few months and score each 3, 5 or 10. Add every decision above your own threshold (Bet-David used $10,000 to $10 million) as you make it, and score it when the outcome is known. Once a quarter, look at the hit rate and the speed. You know it is working when you can name your pattern of misses (too slow, too greedy, skipped diligence) and it stops repeating. - **Running the ITR screen before escalating a problem** — Investment-Time-Return: before bringing a crisis to a leader, quantify the Return (what the crisis costs or what fixing it saves), the Time to fix it, and the Investment the fix needs. Work backwards from return. _How to practise:_ For every problem you raise this month, write three lines first: impact per week, time to fix, cost to fix. Tom Ellsworth's example: a roofing company loses its only estimator, that costs $200,000 a week in revenue, a semi-retired consultant costs $10,000 for thirty days. Ask your own reports 'Have you done ITR on this?' until they arrive with it. It is working when small problems stop reaching your desk because the ITR showed they were small. - **Five-Whys root-cause analysis** — Asking 'why did this happen?' five times in a row, each time about the previous answer, until you reach a cause you control rather than a symptom or an outside excuse. _How to practise:_ Take one failed decision and write the first 'why'. Then challenge that answer with another 'why' at least four more times. Audience respondents found the first answer was usually an assumption ('podcast hosts rejected my client') and the fifth was something inside their control (how the pitch was framed; personal greed and arrogant framing; being in a hurry). Repeat for every persistent problem. It is working when your answers shift from the market and other people to your own process. - **Responding to a bad outcome with responsibility, not blame or escape** — Bet-David named three responses to a decision gone wrong: find someone to blame, find a safe space to escape, or process it by taking responsibility. Only the third builds a leader. _How to practise:_ When something breaks this week, run the three questions out loud: What happened? Whose responsibility was it? What do we need to do? Watch your managers for the same three questions. Before promoting anyone, check which of the three responses they default to. It is working when post-mortems in your company start with 'here is what I own'. - **Classifying a crisis and controlling its lifespan** — Naming which of the eleven crisis types you are facing (health, technology, organizational, violence or revenge, defamation, financial, black swan, white swan, personal, natural, and market) and then managing the four things that lengthen or shorten it: strategy, poise, over-exaggeration and downplaying. _How to practise:_ When a problem lands, write its crisis type at the top of the page. Then ask: do we have a strategy, are we panicking, are we blowing this up, or are we waving it off? Assign people to the solution steps and set a check-in time. Review the last three crises this quarter and score how long each lasted versus how long it needed to. - **Making values-first decisions (family, friends, schools)** — Applying the same processing to personal choices: decide what matters most at this stage of life, then choose the option that delivers it even if another option scores higher on prestige. _How to practise:_ For the next major personal decision, write the one thing that matters most to you at this stage before you compare options. Bet-David chose a Christian private school over Florida's top academic school because values in the K-5 years mattered more than college placement, and he kept the option to switch later. Audit your close friendships once a year against the life you want to live. - **Training by role-play instead of lecturing** — Building leaders by cutting your talk to about twenty minutes and putting people into pairs or small groups where they must answer each other's questions, exactly as the workshop did. _How to practise:_ At your next team training, speak for twenty minutes, then run a structured exercise in groups of four with a written prompt, a time limit, and public read-outs. Bet-David built his insurance company on Tuesday and Saturday trainings plus Monday mornings, and said leaders only appeared when he stopped speaking for two or three hours. Grade the read-outs (par, birdie, eagle) to raise the bar. - **Resolving a stuck partnership with valuation and a third party** — When a partner has stopped contributing at the level their equity implies, move from 'regular level conversations' to a structured resolution: independent valuation, a fair offer to take cash off the table or to buy out, hard operating rules, and a neutral third party in the room. _How to practise:_ Map each partner's equity against their real contribution today. If they are out of line, get a fair valuation (one valuer you choose, one they choose, and one you both agree on, then settle in the middle). Decide what you would offer for the gap. Bring a consultant, coach or advisor to the conversation. Re-check contribution against equity every year. ## What matters - **Processing means putting the odds in your favor, not being right every time:** Bet-David defines processing as making effective decisions with the information at hand and the highest odds in your favor. A decision is a bet; you judge the process by the odds you had, not only the outcome. That frees you to review misses without shame and to keep deciding fast. _(Evidence: 17:04:39-17:05:03 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **You already price odds on the biggest decisions in life:** When you married someone you sized them up and, consciously or not, gave it a percentage. Business decisions deserve the same explicit estimate. Writing '60% this works' next to a decision makes your reasoning visible and reviewable later. _(Evidence: 17:05:07-17:05:23 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **The odds of your business failing dwarf every scary odd you fear:** One in two businesses fails within five years, against one in 160 for an IRS audit, one in 114,000 for lightning and one in 3.7 million for a shark attack. The point: spend your worry and your systems on the risk that is actually likely, which is the business itself. _(Evidence: 17:05:26-17:06:16 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **People only remember their wins, so force yourself to list the losses:** When asked to list five decisions, almost the whole room listed successes. Bet-David made everyone add the decision from the last twelve months that cost them money. Your growth lives in that one line, not in the five you were proud of. _(Evidence: 17:12:39-17:13:24 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Measure speed of decision as well as accuracy:** Inspect how often you are right, but also how quickly you decide compared with competitors in your industry, and how good your gut is at reading the political and market climate. A slow correct decision can still lose to a fast good-enough one. _(Evidence: 17:14:31-17:14:55 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Promoting a blamer or an escaper multiplies the behavior:** If you promote someone who habitually blames others or hides from decisions, you reward that behavior and it reappears with bigger responsibilities and far more noise for the company. Screen for responsibility-taking before any promotion. _(Evidence: 17:15:08-17:15:31 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Workplace conflict is a hidden line item worth billions:** Bet-David cited a Myers-Briggs (CPP) study: US employees spend 2.8 hours a week handling workplace conflict, adding up to $359 billion in paid hours and 385 million lost working days a year. Better decision processes reduce the conflict that bad or avoided decisions create. _(Evidence: 17:15:39 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **The number two's job is to be the boss's 'soft pillow at night':** Tom Ellsworth described his role as making sure the CEO knows crises are being handled. You still bring problems up, but you bring them a couple of steps closer to solution, with a proposed fix and a number attached. _(Evidence: 17:16:10-17:16:30, 17:18:43 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **A single click in finance is a crisis, so bring the fix with the report:** Ellsworth's technology-crisis example is an employee clicking a phishing link that instructs a money transfer. Many in the room had lived it. The test of a good operator is arriving with 'here is what happened and here is how we have already contained it'. _(Evidence: 17:16:35-17:16:50 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Revenge now looks like anonymous reviews five minutes apart:** A former employee's revenge is often a burst of Glassdoor posts or Instagram content carrying your logo. Ellsworth told HR to check Glassdoor weekly, because what is downplayed on day one can have 50,000 likes by the next morning. _(Evidence: 17:17:11-17:17:34, 17:19:27-17:19:41 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Your number two must know your personal stress points:** A financial crisis can be personal: the CEO cannot inject the money the business expected. Ellsworth said the second-in-command has to understand where the boss is stretched so the company plans around it rather than being surprised. _(Evidence: 17:17:38-17:17:47 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Black swans kill product companies; white swans reward the prepared:** You make the best fax machine in the world and in 2000 the PDF arrives: a black swan. A white swan is a change you can see coming, and the winner is the company that shows up with the solution. Sort your risks into the two buckets and prepare for the white ones. _(Evidence: 17:17:59-17:18:13 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Both over-exaggerating and downplaying stretch a crisis:** One person blows a small pricing problem into a company-wide drama; another waves off an angry ex-employee until the post goes viral. Both extend the crisis. The cure is quantifying impact (the ITR) so the response matches the size of the problem. _(Evidence: 17:19:10-17:19:41 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **ITR filters problems before they reach you:** Once people habitually run Investment-Time-Return, they stop bringing small things to your desk because the numbers show they can just solve it. Leaders get fewer, better-quantified escalations and can say thank you for the solution instead of hunting for one. _(Evidence: 17:20:44-17:21:17 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **One bad friend can undo a marriage, a business and a decade of habits:** Bet-David cut a long friendship when the conversations ('we earned it') no longer matched the life he wanted. Like catching COVID, you rarely know exactly who infected you; you linger, then do something stupid, then see your kids once a week for nine years. Friend selection is a processing decision. _(Evidence: 17:24:02-17:25:42 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Choose values over prestige when the window is short:** For his kids' K-5 years, Bet-David chose a Christian school over Florida's most academically ranked one because faith and conservative values had to be installed before age 14, while an academic switch could be made later. Decide which outcome has a closing window and prioritise it. _(Evidence: 17:21:44-17:23:59 / X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX)_ - **Persistent problems usually trace back to the operator:** An affordable-housing developer whose vacancy soared after doubling his portfolio found, by the third or fourth why, that the cause was his own greed and arrogance ('we'll figure it out'), not the market. A homebuilder found $80,000 of losses came from truncating a 60-day diligence protocol because he was in a hurry. _(Evidence: 17:51:28-17:53:41 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ - **The 'can this happen again?' box is the one that saves you:** A virtual-assistant founder who had drowned himself by selling consulting at $7 an hour said the new final step in the flow, 'issue closed, archive, or will it start again?', was what stopped him from repeating it the next time he needed money. _(Evidence: 17:49:43-17:50:19 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ - **Casualness with your brand is a due-diligence failure too:** After a problem with a title sponsor, Bet-David admitted his own team had grown too casual about protecting the brand and took diligence 'to a whole different level'. He contrasted it with 17 years and roughly one million insurance policies with no client lawsuit for wrongdoing. Diligence is a habit you can lose. _(Evidence: 17:53:41-17:54:25 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ - **A 50/50 partner does not have to do anything you propose:** The room's plans all assumed the operations partner would agree to restructure, dilute or leave. Bet-David played the partner: 'No. I worked more than you for five years, I brought the four biggest accounts, next year I take 90 days off.' A plan that needs the other side's consent is not yet a plan. _(Evidence: 18:17:15-18:18:26 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ - **Nobody in the room planned for the senior hires or the biggest client:** Tom Ellsworth pointed out that every answer focused on the partner, while three senior hires who had complained and the biggest client who called ops the weakest link were ignored. The best public answer included stakeholder communications: 'this is my mess up, it won't happen again'. _(Evidence: 18:15:57, 18:20:33-18:20:55 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ - **Sometimes the partner is waiting for you to cut a cheque:** A friend hosted Bet-David for dinner and, through hypotheticals, got a plan: serious conversation or buyout for the 15% partner, fair three-way valuation and cash for the 40% partner doing 20% of the work. He went from about 35% to 65% ownership, one partner left happy with $1.5 million, and the company later sold for about $2 billion. _(Evidence: 18:21:00-18:24:18 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ - **A hard spending rule can save a partnership without anyone leaving:** Two 50/50 best friends were at negative $300,000 EBITDA because the CEO spent everything. With a third party in the room they agreed on a floor (about 8-10% EBITDA); above it the operating partner could veto spending. That company reached $14.9 million EBITDA last year. The fix was a rule both sides owned, not a divorce. _(Evidence: 18:24:35-18:26:22 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ - **Recruit through a recruiter when you are easily charmed:** One respondent said he would hire a recruiter to replace the partner rather than do it himself, because he likes people and can be influenced by the wrong personality. Knowing your own bias and designing it out is processing applied to yourself. _(Evidence: 18:15:43-18:15:57 / Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm)_ ## Frameworks, lists & numbers - **Processing (definition)** — The ability to make effective decisions based on access to the information at hand, with the highest odds in your favor. Life is about decisions; decisions are about odds; you need a system that gives you the best odds. - **Three responses to a bad decision** — 1) Find somebody to blame. 2) Find a safe space to escape. 3) Process it by taking responsibility: What happened? Whose responsibility was it? What do we need to do? Only promote people who do the third. - **The odds list** — Going out of business within five years: 1 in 2. Being audited by the IRS: 1 in 160. Injured by a toilet: 1 in 10,000. Winning an Oscar: 1 in 11,500. Finding a pearl in an oyster: 1 in 12,000. Struck by lightning: 1 in 114,000. Dying in a plane crash: 1 in 205,000. Attacked by a shark: 1 in 3.748 million. - **Cost of workplace conflict (Myers-Briggs / CPP study)** — US employees spend 2.8 hours every week handling workplace conflict, which adds up to $359 billion in paid hours and 385 million lost working days a year. - **Eleven types of workplace crisis (Tom Ellsworth)** — Health (a pandemic, a board member falling ill); Technology (cybercrime, a phishing click in finance); Organizational (you have outgrown your structure, your only estimator quits); Violence (revenge from a former employee); Defamation (Glassdoor, Instagram); Financial (the CEO's personal finances, or a market squeeze like $5.50 diesel); Black swan (the PDF kills the fax machine); White swan (a change you can see coming, and you have the solution); Personal (a parent's illness pulls you away for a month); Natural (ice storms, hurricanes, evacuations); Market/leadership crises that follow from the others. - **What lengthens or shortens a crisis** — Shortens: a strategy, poise (no panic), knowing what is working and what is not, assigning people and moving through the solution, seeing five moves ahead. Lengthens: over-exaggerating a small problem, or downplaying a real one until it goes viral. - **ITR: Investment, Time, Return** — Work backwards. Return: what is the impact of the crisis (e.g. $200,000 a week in lost revenue with no estimator)? Time: how long to fix (e.g. thirty days)? Investment: what the fix costs (e.g. $10,000 for an interim consultant). Rule: nobody brings a crisis without the ITR. - **Problem-solving flow (workbook page 118)** — Problem at the top. Repeat issue? If yes, did the last solution work? If no, was it a money issue? Impact. Tier: address now? Signal or noise; score urgency. Root cause: five whys. Stakeholders who can help; was there buy-in or was it all on you? Top five ideas; which solves it now? Share with your team. Can this happen again? Close and archive, or flag as likely to restart. - **Where processing applies (the 'solving for x' list)** — Company, friendships, expansion, ideas, negotiations, selling, family, hiring, compensation, relationships, identity. - **The 50/50 case facts** — Two best friends, 50/50 equity and decisions, nine years in. Blake: sales and vision. Eric: operations and product. Revenue $32 million; needs $80 million in 36 months to stay relevant. Eric runs ops as he did at $8 million, does not read the books or attend events, takes 45 days of vacation a year. Three senior hires complained privately; two of Eric's reports quit; the biggest client called ops the weakest part. Blake has confronted Eric more than once; Eric agrees and nothing changes. Question: your next three to five moves. - **Three-way valuation method** — Pay for a fair valuation: one valuer you choose, one your partner chooses, one you both agree on. Take the middle number and use it to pay a partner cash for the equity points they are not earning. - **The dinner outcome** — A friend running a company doing about $1 billion a year went from roughly 25-35% ownership to 65% by giving a serious conversation or buyout to a 15% partner and a fair valuation and cash to a 40% partner doing 20% of the work. One partner left happy with a $1.5 million cheque; another later took a large payout. The company was later sold for about $2 billion. - **The EBITDA-floor rescue** — Two 50/50 best friends were at negative $300,000 EBITDA because the CEO wanted to spend everything. They agreed a floor of roughly 8-10% EBITDA; above it the operating partner could say no to spending. Last year the company did $14.9 million EBITDA. - **Par, birdie, eagle grading** — Bet-David graded every public answer: par means sound but expected, birdie means strong, eagle means something nobody else said. He cut off anyone who repeated an earlier answer and asked for specifics, not generalities. ## Exercises & frameworks to run - **Five-decision scorecard** _(10 minutes (the room got about 8))_ _[speaker]_ 1. List the last five big decisions you made in the past few months (Bet-David's range: $10,000 to $10 million at stake). 2. Write the dollar amount next to each. 3. Score each decision 3, 5 or 10 for how good the decision turned out to be. 4. Mark whether the set is all positive, all negative or mixed. If you only wrote wins, you are not done. 5. Add the one decision from the last twelve months that cost you money or went against you. Keep it for the next exercise. - **Finish with:** A scored record of five decisions plus one identified failure to dissect. - **Decision track-record inspection** _(15 minutes)_ _[editorial (speaker idea, steps written by us)]_ 1. Using your scorecard, count how many of the five went the way you wanted. 2. For each, note how long you took to decide and whether a competitor would have moved faster. 3. Rate your gut: did your instinct about the market, the people or the political climate hold up? 4. For each miss, write which of the three responses you gave: blame, escape, or responsibility. 5. Write one sentence on the pattern you see. - **Finish with:** A one-paragraph honest read on how often, how fast and how responsibly you decide. - **The ITR crisis screen** _(10 minutes per crisis)_ _[speaker]_ 1. Start with Return: what is the impact of this crisis per week or per month if nothing changes? Put a dollar figure on it (example: no estimator means no bids, so $200,000 a week in lost revenue). 2. Then Time: how long will the fix take? (Example: thirty days with an interim consultant.) 3. Then Investment: what does the fix cost? (Example: $10,000 for a semi-retired estimator as an emergency consultant.) 4. Write the three numbers on one line and compare Return to Investment. 5. Bring the problem to your leader with the ITR attached, or, if the Return is small, just solve it and do not escalate. - **Finish with:** A one-line, quantified case for action (or a decision not to escalate). - **Bad-decision problem-solving flow (the workbook page 118 flow)** _(10 minutes solo (the room got 2 minutes plus extensions), then 5 minutes in a group)_ _[speaker]_ 1. Write the problem at the top of a page. 2. Ask: is it a repeat issue? If yes, did the last solution work? If no, investigate: was it a money issue? 3. Write the impact and the tier: is this something we must address now? Decide if it is signal or noise, and score its urgency. 4. Root cause: ask why the problem happened, then ask why of that answer, five times, until you reach the real cause. 5. List the stakeholders who can help fix it. Was there buy-in, or was it all on you? 6. List your top five ideas to fix it and pick the one that solves it now. 7. Share the plan with your team. Then answer: can this happen again? Close and archive it, or flag it as likely to restart. - **Finish with:** A completed one-page analysis of a failed decision with a chosen fix and a recurrence flag. - **Pattern review in a group of four** _(5 minutes (plus 1 minute each to share))_ _[speaker]_ 1. Form a group of four, ideally with people you have not worked with before. 2. Each person shares the failed decision they ran through the flow, in two minutes. 3. The group names the pattern: what could you do better next time you make a decision like that? 4. Each person writes down one rule they will apply to the next decision of that type. 5. Pick one specific (not general) lesson to share with the wider team. - **Finish with:** One personal decision rule per person and one specific lesson for the team. - **Crisis classification and lifespan audit** _(45 minutes)_ _[editorial (speaker idea, steps written by us)]_ 1. List the last three crises your company faced. 2. Label each with its type: health, technology, organizational, violence or revenge, defamation, financial, market, black swan, white swan, personal, natural. 3. For each, note how long it lasted and which factor stretched it: no strategy, panic, over-exaggeration, or downplaying. 4. Write the ITR you should have had at the start. 5. For the two crisis types most likely to hit you next year, write who owns the response and what the first three moves are. - **Finish with:** A one-page crisis map with owners and first moves for your two most likely crisis types. - **The 50/50 partnership case (run it with your own leadership team)** _(10 minutes in groups, 15 minutes of read-outs)_ _[speaker]_ 1. Read the facts: two best friends, 50/50 equity and decisions. Blake runs sales and vision, Eric runs operations and product. Revenue is $32 million; to stay relevant they need $80 million in 36 months. Eric runs ops the way he did at $8 million, does not read the books or attend the events, and takes 45 days of vacation a year. Three senior hires complained privately; two of Eric's direct reports quit; the biggest client called ops the weakest part of working with the company. Blake has confronted Eric more than once; Eric agrees every time and nothing changes. 2. You are Blake. In groups, write your next three to five moves for the next five weeks. 3. Stress-test every move with Bet-David's question: what if Eric simply says no? 4. Add moves for the two forgotten stakeholders: the senior hires who complained and the biggest client. 5. Present and grade each plan: par (sound), birdie (strong), eagle (something nobody else said). - **Finish with:** A five-move plan that survives a partner refusing to cooperate and covers staff and client fallout. - **Equity-versus-contribution map for your own partnership** _(60 minutes, then a conversation)_ _[editorial (speaker idea, steps written by us)]_ 1. Write each partner's equity percentage in one column. 2. In the next column, write honestly what percentage of the value created today comes from each partner. 3. Where the gap is large, ask whether that partner would like to take cash off the table. 4. Draft the valuation process: one valuer you choose, one they choose, one you both agree on, settle in the middle. 5. Decide what a serious conversation, a buyout offer, or a new operating rule (such as an EBITDA floor with veto rights) would look like. 6. Name the third party you would bring into the room. - **Finish with:** A written picture of where equity and contribution diverge and a resolution path for each partner. - **Twenty-minute training redesign** _(60-90 minutes per session)_ _[editorial (speaker idea, steps written by us)]_ 1. Take your next scheduled team training and cut your speaking to twenty minutes. 2. Write one prompt or case study with a clear question ('what are your next three to five moves?'). 3. Split people into groups of four with a time limit. 4. Have groups line up and present; interrupt anyone who repeats an earlier answer and ask for something new. 5. Grade answers publicly (par, birdie, eagle) and close with a real story that shows how it played out. - **Finish with:** A repeatable training format that develops leaders instead of listeners. ## What to do — and how often - [ ] **Write out your last five big decisions with the dollar amount at stake and score each one 3, 5 or 10.** — Once, this week _[once; speaker-stated]_ - [ ] **Pick the one decision from the last twelve months that cost you money and run it through the full problem-solving flow, including five whys and the 'can it happen again?' check.** — Once, this week _[once; speaker-stated]_ - [ ] **Add every new decision above your threshold to the scorecard and score it when the outcome is known; review the hit rate and speed.** — Every quarter _[quarterly; editorial recommendation]_ - [ ] **Tell your team: before you bring me a crisis or a big problem, bring me the ITR (return, time, investment). Put it in writing where they will see it.** — Once, this week, then enforced on every escalation _[once; speaker-stated]_ - [ ] **Have HR (or whoever owns your employer brand) check Glassdoor and social mentions for bursts of anonymous negative posts.** — Weekly _[weekly; speaker-stated]_ - [ ] **Before promoting anyone into a manager, director or VP role, check whether they default to blame, escape, or responsibility when a decision goes wrong.** — At every promotion decision _[quarterly; editorial recommendation]_ - [ ] **Brief your number two on your personal stress points and financial constraints so the company is not surprised by a personal crisis becoming a leadership crisis.** — Once, this month, and whenever your situation changes _[once; editorial recommendation]_ - [ ] **Write down your due-diligence protocol (the homebuilder's was 60 days) and refuse to shorten it when a deal looks good and you are in a hurry.** — Once, this month; then on every acquisition or major purchase _[once; editorial recommendation]_ - [ ] **Cut your next team training to twenty minutes of talking and run the rest as a group exercise with public read-outs.** — Every training session (Bet-David ran Tuesdays, Saturdays and Monday mornings) _[weekly; speaker-stated]_ - [ ] **If you have a partner whose contribution no longer matches their equity, book a third party (consultant, coach or advisor) into the next conversation instead of having another regular-level talk.** — Once, within the next month _[once; speaker-stated]_ - [ ] **Get an independent valuation of your company before any conversation about buying out or re-cutting equity, using the one-you-pick, one-they-pick, one-agreed method.** — Once, before the partner conversation _[once; speaker-stated]_ - [ ] **Agree with your partners on an EBITDA floor (the rescued founders used roughly 8-10%) and who can veto spending above it; write it into your operating agreement.** — Once, this quarter; review annually _[once; editorial recommendation]_ - [ ] **Audit your close friendships against the life you want to live and distance yourself from the one who could cost you your marriage, business or habits.** — Once a year _[annually; editorial recommendation]_ ## Questions to ask yourself - What were my last five big decisions, and how would I honestly score each one? - Which decision in the last twelve months cost me money, and have I ever dissected it? - When a decision goes wrong, do I blame, escape, or take responsibility? Which do my managers do? - How fast do I decide compared with my competitors, and is my gut read on the market actually good? - For the crisis on my desk right now, what is the return, the time, and the investment? - Am I over-exaggerating this problem or downplaying it? - If I ask why five times about my most persistent problem, does it end up at me? - Which of my partners is being paid for a contribution they no longer make, and what would I offer to fix it? - If my partner simply says no to everything I propose, what is my plan? - Which one friend in my life could cost me my marriage, my business or my habits? - What matters most at this stage of my family's life, and does my biggest personal decision serve it? ## Quotes > “You need a system that helps you make the best possible decision with the best possible odds in your favor.” — Patrick Bet-David (17:05:03 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > Defining 'processing' as a repeatable decision system. > “The key is to inspect the track record of our decision making process. How often we make the right decision?” — Patrick Bet-David (17:14:31 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > Why he made the room score their last five decisions. > “Before you bring me crises or you bring me big problems, bring me also the ITR.” — Tom Ellsworth (17:20:44 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > The one instruction to give your team about escalating problems. > “If your people are in the habit of using ITR, they may not even bring some stuff to your desk because it turns out to be small.” — Tom Ellsworth (17:21:05 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > The side benefit of quantifying every crisis. > “We chose values and principles over this other one that scores higher on academia.” — Patrick Bet-David (17:23:18 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > Choosing a Christian school over Florida's top academic school for his children. > “All of us have one friend in our lives that can destroy our marriage, our business, our lives, our habits. One bad friend can destroy your life.” — Patrick Bet-David (17:24:58 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > Friendship as a processing decision. > “We have to find out when our grandchildren are good citizens. Till then, we're all average fathers.” — Patrick Bet-David (17:26:06 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > Why he refuses to claim his own decisions are proven right yet. > “Decision making helps you prevent some additional noise in your life you don't need.” — Patrick Bet-David (17:26:25 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > The payoff of processing well. > “Why ask five times and go deeper? Why why why why? Until you get to the root cause of the why.” — Patrick Bet-David (17:27:17 · X1QcR7CyTzFdlLfcTWoX) > > The root-cause step in the problem-solving flow. > “When all of a sudden, I spoke for 20 minutes and everybody was role-playing with each other, we all of a sudden build a bunch of leaders.” — Patrick Bet-David (17:54:56 · Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm) > > How he built leaders in his insurance company. > “He is no longer a great operator at this scale, and Blake, his partner, his best friend, the guy who shook his hand nine years ago, he knows it.” — Case study video narrator (17:57:31 · Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm) > > The heart of the 50/50 partnership case. > “This is who you are. This is who you've proven yourself to be and this is who you're not.” — Audience case respondent (18:15:08 · Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm) > > How to open the critical conversation with a partner. > “You can't just say, oh, we need to do this, this, this. Life doesn't work that way with 50-50 partnerships.” — Patrick Bet-David (18:17:56 · Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm) > > After playing the partner who simply refuses every proposal. > “Now, none of us have brought up the senior hires that have complained.” — Tom Ellsworth (18:20:37 · Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm) > > The stakeholders every group forgot. > “But sometimes a person is going to be waiting for you to cut a check for a decision to be made.” — Patrick Bet-David (18:24:08 · Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm) > > The lesson of the dinner where a friend bought his partners out. > “Because they figured out a way to make it work and it was on both parties.” — Patrick Bet-David (18:26:13 · Flh03sjbLxAHoOKAR0Zm) > > The founder pair who went from negative $300,000 to $14.9 million EBITDA after agreeing a spending rule. ## Watch-outs - Listing only your successful decisions and never the one that cost you money. - Promoting someone who habitually blames or escapes; the behavior scales with the title. - Bringing a crisis to the boss without an ITR, so every problem sounds equally urgent. - Stopping at the first 'why' (an assumption about other people) instead of digging to the cause you control. - Downplaying an angry ex-employee's post until it has 50,000 likes and your logo on it. - Skipping or shortening due diligence because you are in a hurry and the deal looks great (it cost one builder about $80,000). - Selling your expertise at a commodity price ($7 an hour) because you needed cash, then drowning in the work. - Making a partnership plan that assumes the other partner will agree, when a 50/50 partner can simply refuse. - Focusing the whole plan on the partner and forgetting the senior hires who complained and the biggest client. - Having 'regular level conversations' for years when the partner is actually waiting for a cheque. - Talking for two or three hours in training and wondering why no leaders emerge. --- Cole's Notes Vault 2026 — https://vault.chels.ai — built by chels.ai (https://chels.ai). Only stage content is published; quotes are verbatim from automatic transcripts with light punctuation. Speaker-stated cadence and editorial recommendations are labelled separately. Times are Eastern; Las Vegas was three hours earlier.