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Business management · Advice practices

The advice is not the business.

You were trained to give advice. You were never trained to run the company that delivers it. Countique works on that company, its plan, its proposition, its processes, its people and its numbers.

Score your practice free Talk it through

Who this is for

  • Practice principals who have grown past what one person can hold in their head
  • Advisers stepping up from employee to owner
  • AFSLs supporting a network of practices
  • Firms preparing for succession, sale or a second generation
  • Accounting and professional firms adding an advice arm

The framework

The 12 Disciplines of Business Excellence

Twelve disciplines that work like a flywheel, each push making the next one easier. Every engagement maps back to them, so you always know which part of the business you are working on and why.

ONEPurpose, Strategy and Business Model DesignWhere the business is going, and who it is for.
TWODefined Client Experience and Service StandardsThe same standard, whoever is handling the client.
THREEDocumented and Differentiated Advice ProcessThe most valuable operational asset you own.
FOUROperations, Workflow and Technology EnablementMap the workflow. Cost every step. Name who owns it.
FIVETeam Structure, Role Clarity and Ensemble ModelA solo model is a job with overhead.
SIXHuman Capital, Capability and IncentivesYour people are the engine of every other discipline.
SEVENGrowth System: Marketing, Referrals and ConversionA system, not sporadic effort and hope.
EIGHTPricing, Profitability and Capacity EconomicsThe fuel that powers everything else.
NINEMeasuring Client Outcomes Beyond InvestmentMeasure only returns and your value stays invisible.
TENGovernance, Risk Management and ComplianceBuilt in, it is an advantage. Bolted on, it is a cost.
ELEVENClient Relationship Renewal and ReframingRelationships on autopilot are relationships in decline.
TWELVESuccession, Continuity and Enterprise ValueWhat happens to all of it without you.

Each discipline carries its own self-assessment, templates and procedures, written for Australia's regulatory world. See the book.

Services

What we actually do

01

Business Assessment

A structured diagnostic of the whole business against the twelve disciplines. Interviews with the principal and key staff, a review of your plan, numbers, client data and processes, and a scored report showing where the business is strong, where it is exposed and what to do in what order.

You get: scored assessment across 12 disciplines · written findings report · prioritised 90-day action plan · presentation to your leadership team.

02

Business Planning

A working business plan, not a document that goes in a drawer. We facilitate the thinking, then write the plan: where the business is going, what it will take, who is accountable, what it costs and how you will know it is working.

You get: facilitated planning sessions · three-year direction and one-year plan · financial model · KPI set · quarterly review rhythm.

03

Marketing Planning

Most advice businesses do not have a marketing problem, they have a proposition problem. We start with who you are for and what you are worth to them, then build the plan that gets that in front of the right people consistently.

You get: ideal client definition · value proposition · positioning and messaging · channel plan and content calendar · referral and centre-of-influence strategy.

04

Workflow and process mapping

We map the workflows the business actually runs, onboarding, advice preparation, implementation, review, step by step. Each step gets the person responsible for it, the obligation it touches, the control sitting on it, and what it costs in time and money. You end up knowing what a single step costs, what the whole workflow costs, and which steps are carrying risk that nobody has looked at.

You get: current-state workflow maps · responsibility at every step · compliance and risk points identified · cost per step and per workflow · the redesigned process and an operations manual.

05

Tools, templates & procedures

Everything we build in an engagement already exists in a library, assessments, registers, procedure documents, meeting agendas, engagement letters, checklists. Subscribe and use them yourself, or have us implement them with you.

You get: access to the tool suite, versioned and maintained for Australian conditions. See what's inside.

06

Assessments

Self-assessments and team assessments that turn opinion into a number you can track: business performance, client engagement maturity, adviser capability, operational readiness, continuity risk. Run them once for a baseline, then again to prove the change.

You get: scored instruments, benchmarking against the framework, and a re-test at the end of the engagement.

How an engagement runs

No report-and-leave.

Plenty of consultants deliver a framework and a slide deck and let you work out the rest. The work only counts when something in the business is different, so we stay until it is.

Engagements are scoped to the business. Most principals start with the free Quick Diagnostic, take the full 12 Disciplines Diagnostic, and then decide whether they want help working through what it found.

Quick Diagnostic

Eighteen questions, eight minutes, free. A score, a band and three priorities.

The 12 Disciplines Diagnostic

The full assessment across all twelve disciplines, sixty questions, a written findings report and a 90-day action plan. A$475 on its own, and included in the fee if you go on to subscribe or engage us.

Plan

We agree the sequence, what gets fixed first, who owns it, what it costs and by when.

Implement

We work alongside your team. Templates, procedures and tools go in, and people are trained to use them.

Re-measure

Run the assessment again. If the number has not moved, we have not finished.

Engagements

Take stock first. Then decide what to do about it.

A diagnostic is table stakes. No business can work out a way forward without first knowing honestly where it stands, which is why it is priced as an instrument rather than as an engagement. What consulting adds is the part a report cannot do on its own: someone to hold you to it, to think it through with you, to go and find out, and to build the answer around your business rather than a template.

Fixed scope, fixed fee, stated up front. You should not have to sit through a sales call to find out roughly what something costs.

Quick Diagnostic

Self-serve · about eight minutes

Free
  • 18 questions across 6 areas
  • Score, band and three priorities on screen
  • Written report emailed to you
  • Starter templates for your priorities
  • Not the full twelve-discipline assessment
Start now

The 12 Disciplines Diagnostic

Standalone · self-serve

$475 + GST
  • Full assessment across all 12 disciplines
  • Sixty questions, three hundred graded responses
  • Written findings report
  • Prioritised 90-day action plan
  • The discipline holding the rest back, named
  • No interviews, no facilitation
Take the diagnostic

Ongoing consulting

Monthly retainer · no lock-in

from $2,500 / month + GST
  • The 12 Disciplines Diagnostic built into the fee
  • We work through all twelve disciplines with you
  • Plus the areas specific to your business
  • An accountability coach and a sounding board
  • Research and solutions built for your situation
  • Presentation to your leadership team
  • Full tool library for the whole team
Enquire

There is one diagnostic. The 12 Disciplines Diagnostic is the same instrument wherever you meet it, the same sixty questions, the same report. It is A$475 on its own, and it is built into the fee on the Practice licence and on a consulting engagement, so it is never charged twice. Take it on its own if you want to take stock before you decide which route to go.

Workshops, workflow and process mapping, and board facilitation are quoted separately. See workshops and keynotes.

Common questions

Before you enquire

How small is too small?
There is no floor. A sole practitioner with one support person gets more out of the disciplines than most large firms, because there is nothing between deciding and doing. What matters is whether you want the business to be different in twelve months.
Do you give financial advice?
No. Countique is a management consultancy. We work on your business, not on your clients' portfolios. Nothing on this site is financial product advice.
We already have a coach. Is this the same thing?
Coaching works on the principal. Consulting works on the business. They sit well together, but if what you need is someone to build the plan, write the procedure and specify the system, that is consulting.
Can we just buy the tools?
Yes. The tool suite is available on subscription with no consulting attached. Plenty of firms start there and call us later. See the tools.
Do you work outside financial services?
The disciplines are general management disciplines and translate to most professional service firms. Our depth, and the regulatory content, is in financial advice. Small businesses outside the profession are usually best served through bookkeeping and business planning.

Start with a number, not a sales call.

Take the Quick Diagnostic. If the score tells you nothing you did not already know, you have lost eight minutes. If it does, we should talk.

Take the Quick Diagnostic Contact Johann