Work  /  Miscellania

Running on memory and whoever was in the room.

The vision and the culture were strong. The machinery underneath wasn't keeping pace. The first job was finding out how the place actually ran.

Client Miscellania, Melbourne
Engagement Operations phase 1, 8 weeks
Year 2026 · In delivery
Disciplines Operational design · Accountability · Reporting
The Miscellania Cockpit calendar: a month view of the venue's programme, each night colour-coded by status with an owner and an open-task count.
The Cockpit calendar: the whole programme on one page, colour-coded by how ready each night is. Anonymised: programme and staff names are invented.
01 / The situation

Growth had outrun the operating model.

A club that had grown faster than its operations.

Miscellania had the hard part sorted: a real vision and a genuine culture. The machinery underneath hadn't kept pace. Too much of the club ran on memory, goodwill, and whoever happened to be in the room.

Issues got recycled instead of resolved. No function had a named owner on the hook for its numbers, and there was no single honest picture of where money came in and where it leaked.

02 / The approach

Small enough to be judged on results.

Five workstreams, eight weeks. Prove it, then scale it.

Phase 1 was scoped small enough to be judged on results before anything bigger was committed, with quick wins landing inside the phase. The deal was simple: most of the legwork on my side, honest input and a standing weekly meeting on theirs.

  • Map how the club actually operates. Time in the venue, plus the real numbers from POS, the books and rostering. One shared view of how money moves. No assumptions.
  • Build the accountability chart. Every function the club runs on, from bar to production, against one named owner.
  • Find the issues and rank them. Everything in the way, plotted impact against effort. A short do-first list, not a long report.
  • Stand up the weekly leadership rhythm. A short, structured meeting where the numbers get looked at and decisions get made. I sit in for the first weeks to set the cadence, then it runs without me.
  • Leave a tool behind. A lightweight shared dashboard carrying the weekly numbers and the live issue register.
Nothing heavy to maintain; something the team will actually use. From the Phase 1 proposal, June 2026
03 / What lands, and when

Weeks 1–3 observe. Weeks 4–8 deliver.

Six deliverables on a fixed clock

  • Week 1: the weekly leadership meeting, live. Running from day one, with me in the room setting the format.
  • Week 3: operations map and financial baseline. How the club actually runs, and one honest view of the numbers: money in, money out, where it leaks.
  • Week 4: the accountability chart. Every function against one named, accountable owner.
  • Week 4: the issue register. Ranked by impact against effort, with a clear do-first shortlist.
  • Weeks 4–6: quick wins implemented. Fixes shipped inside the phase, starting with bar ownership and the weekly bar number, then rostering and labour.
  • The Cockpit, deployed. The operations dashboard the whole phase runs on. Practical, low-maintenance, built to keep running after the engagement ends.
A single night in the Miscellania Cockpit: marketing and operations task lists, each task with a named owner and a due date, plus key contacts and line-up.
One night, fully owned: every task carries a name and a date. Anonymised.
04 / The outcome

What used to be memory is now a page.

The club on one page.

The Cockpit is live and carrying the real programme. Every night shows its status at a glance, and every task behind it has a name and a date. What used to live in people's heads now lives where the whole team can see it.

The weekly leadership meeting runs on those numbers. It's built to keep running without me. That's the test of the whole phase.

Sound familiar?

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