The Portfolio Review

Before you commit the next tranche of the value-creation plan, establish that its first lever moves

The Portfolio Review is the ownership instrument. It runs the Barking Cat Review on a holding, outside in first and then with the inside read added, either annually or at an inflection: a new CEO, a platform decision, a plan that has stopped moving. A business has one binding constraint on its plan at a time. A ten-dimension score averaged to sixty-seven is not a decision; a named constraint with the alternatives rejected in writing is.

What the house and the CEO each receive

One evidence base, two documents. A decided plan to the CEO: what is done first, what is deliberately not done, who owns each line. A board-level note to the house. Barking Cat does not stay inside the holding after the read is delivered, and the plan is written so that it does not need to. Two to four weeks.

What the house gets, and what it does not

Fixed fee, stated in writing before instruction. Scope adjusts to the target and the access available; the price does not adjust to the deal, the timetable or the answer. No execution: Barking Cat does not implement, build, deliver, select vendors on commission or place people, and does not earn from the build. No contingent reward: no success fee, no fee linked to valuation or exit, no equity, no carry, no referral arrangement in either direction. One side of a deal, with conflicts checked before instruction. A disclosure register is shared with every engagement. Reports are addressed to the instructing house, which is the party entitled to rely on them. Nothing about a target, a holding or a house appears in published work without per-instance written agreement.

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