Inside
Use it in the next meeting.
Find the constraint
Check whether the person needs practice or whether the job is withholding authority, opportunity, time, exposure or cover.
Fund 90 days of real work
Name the assignment, decision boundary, protected hours, displaced work and a mistake the person is allowed to make.
Give the manager a job
Record what they must hand over, open or protect, then put the review date in both calendars.
Editable templates included
Growth map, quarterly plan, stretch brief, pairing agreement, development signals and funded development, plus a worked example.
Where to start
Bring the last review to a quarterly conversation. Use the growth map to choose one move and write the assignment and manager commitment together.
“Renn’s model puts evidence, judgment and decision in the same conversation, where research and design can change an outcome instead of decorating one.”
Jenny Lo · Head of User Research, Harvey AI
Across the three workbooks
Run the cycle with People and Finance teams.
Functional leaders
Write the roles, bring the evidence and make room for the next assignment.
People
Keep the standard consistent and give disputed evidence somewhere to go.
Finance
Set the limits, check the cost and approve the final numbers.
One case through all three books
Follow a fictional team through calibration, an over-budget pay proposal, an approved timing change and a development plan with protected time.
The evidence stays put
If a pay proposal exceeds the budget, change the amount or its timing. Do not rewrite the assessment.
“Renn understands that clarity and humanity are not opposites. This system makes scope, pay and growth discussable without reducing creative people—or their ambition—to boxes on a ladder.”
Li-Anne Dias · Executive Creative Director, Brex
Written by Renato Valdés-Olmos
Built from running the cycle.
I have run leveling, compensation and development cycles at companies of 25, 250 and 2500 people. These workbooks turn those mechanics into documents you can use with your team. The shared six-level framework is new in v1.
More about my work
One complete chapter · No email required
Read section two.
02Find the constraint before writing the plan
A development plan is useful only when it changes the work somebody is allowed and able to do. Start with the last assessment, choose one axis, then ask what is actually stopping the next move. The answer is often authority, opportunity, capacity, exposure or cover. Only one of those is mainly a skill gap.
| Constraint | Who acts first | What changes this quarter |
|---|---|---|
| Authority | The manager | Hand over one named decision, write the escalation boundary and do not take the decision back when it becomes uncomfortable. |
| Opportunity | The manager | Put the person on live work that needs the judgment. A side project with no consequence does not count. |
| Capacity | The manager and planning owner | Remove or delay other work. Protected time is a budget decision expressed in hours. |
| Exposure | Shared | Open the relevant room, name a partner and place feedback close enough to the decision to change the next one. |
| Cover | The manager | Name an affordable miss and say publicly that the person is allowed to make it. |
| Practice or knowledge | The person, with supplied repetitions | Use repeated work with feedback. Add a course when missing knowledge is genuinely the constraint. |
If the person cannot act because the manager has kept the decision, the development plan belongs to the manager.
Use the six axes to choose the work
| Axis | How it moves | Quarter-sized assignment | Common false fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| Decision rights | Granted | Own one named decision from framing to consequence. | “Take more ownership.” |
| Judgment density | Repeated exposure | Recommend a course of action on three live decisions before seeing the senior answer. | A general leadership course. |
| Opinions held | A view plus cover | Write a position before a consequential decision and keep what changed it. | Asking for candour while punishing wrong calls. |
| Range | Adjacent work | Own a real contribution with a trusted partner in another discipline. | Reading or shadowing without responsibility. |
| What survives them | Encoding | Turn one repeated lesson into a standard another person can use alone. | Adding documentation on top of a full delivery load. |
| Ownership | Conditions and repetition | Carry one commitment to a clear close in an environment where bad news can travel early. | Feedback about attitude without changing the conditions. |
The 90-day opportunity contract
The plan fits on one page. Both sides leave with work. If one line is blank, the opportunity is not ready to start.
| Record | The question it answers |
|---|---|
| Assessment input | Which calibrated mark or piece of evidence made this the chosen axis? |
| Real assignment | What live work will require the next behaviour? |
| Decision boundary | What can the person decide alone, and what must be escalated? |
| Manager commitment | Which authority, room, partner or protection will the manager provide? |
| Protected capacity | How many hours, and what existing work will stop? |
| Affordable miss | What may go wrong without the decision being taken back? |
| Evidence and date | Who will observe the work, what will count and when will both sides review it? |
Three plans that change after the constraint is named
| Assessment | The tempting plan | The useful 90-day opportunity |
|---|---|---|
| D3 designer Above on judgment, below on decision rights. | Presentation coaching and a request to be “more strategic.” | The manager hands over the onboarding experiment decision, including the right to reject an option. The designer records the decision and result; the manager may intervene only at the written escalation boundary. |
| E3 engineer At on craft, below on range. | Read product strategy and attend more roadmap meetings. | Pair with a product manager on a live migration choice. The engineer owns the technical option and contributes a costed recommendation to the product decision. Four hours a week are removed from sprint capacity. |
| MK3 product marketer Strong launch work, nothing survives them. | Run another launch and write documentation afterward. | Encode the launch decision standard, test it with a second marketer and revise it from where they get stuck. Delivery work is reduced for the quarter; success is independent use, not document completion. |
Courses have a narrow, useful place
Use a course when the person lacks knowledge they need for the assignment. Do not use one to compensate for missing authority, missing work, a full calendar or a manager who will not tolerate a mistake. Those are operating constraints, and the company has to change them.
Try it
Turn a review into a 90-day opportunity.
Import a Leveling result or choose an axis yourself. The tool identifies what is blocking growth, splits the person’s work from the manager’s obligation and produces a brief for the next quarter.
Axis to grow
Before you start
Your entries stay in this browser.
Choose a volume
Start with the decision in front of you.
Leveling
For EPD leaders who need Engineering, Product, Research, Design and Marketing to use the same level structure. People gets a standard it can run and audit.
Compensation
For CFOs and Finance teams setting pay across Engineering, Product, Research, Design and Marketing. Functional leaders bring the role and market evidence.
Development
For EPD and Marketing leaders working with People. Turn review evidence into live work, protected time and a manager commitment for the next 90 days.
The new standard
Leveling, compensation and development in the age of AI.
One standard for levels, pay and growth. The set includes three printable workbooks, 24 editable templates and reference sheets, and three worked examples. Save $18 compared with buying separately.
$117$99
Team license
All three workbooks and their templates for one leadership team or function at one company. Already bought a single copy? Its price is credited toward the team license. License details.
Enterprise license
Company-wide, multi-division or portfolio-company use, with the licensed entities and rollout scope agreed before purchase. Suitable when procurement, legal, security or implementation support needs to be part of the work. License details.
From $2,500
Contact about enterpriseThe thinking behind the tools
Read the related essays.
Before you buy
A few practical questions.
What do I receive?
You can read the workbook on this site and download a printable PDF and editable .xlsx templates. The set includes all three. No physical book is shipped.
Do I need the other workbooks?
The growth map uses the six axes defined in Leveling. Start with Leveling, or get the set, if those axes are new to your team.
Will this work with our HRIS and AI tools?
Yes. Map the spreadsheet fields into your HR system and use a stable employee ID. Keep private notes out of the approved record. An AI client or MCP connection can read the exported JSON through your own file or drive connector, check for missing fields and prepare drafts. A person still approves every level, pay decision and development commitment.
Why not use the framework built into our HR package?
You may be able to. HR software handles forms, permissions, workflow and storage well. This set helps the leadership team decide what the fields mean, which evidence counts and who may make an exception. If the package can preserve those choices and keep assessment, pay and development separate, configure the process there.
How do I get access?
After checkout, an email goes to the address you paid with. Its private reader link opens the complete workbook. You can also open the reader from this page and enter the access key from the email. The sample remains a separate public chapter.
Can I use it with my team?
A single purchase covers one person, with sharing permitted with your own manager and managers who report to you while running a cycle. The $499 team license covers one leadership team or function at one company. Company-wide, multi-division or portfolio-company use needs an enterprise license. A single purchase can be credited toward the team license. Read the license.
What if we need an enterprise rollout?
Enterprise licenses start at $2,500 for company-wide, multi-division or portfolio-company use, procurement requirements and an agreed rollout scope. Contact me with the organizations, approximate audience, countries and timing for a quote.
Can I get a refund?
Read the complete sample chapter before buying. Because the workbook, PDF and editable files are delivered immediately, checkout asks you to acknowledge that the purchase becomes final when digital access begins. Duplicate charges, persistent access failures, material differences from the description and mandatory legal remedies remain covered. Read the access and refund terms.
Are updates included?
Every revision of v1 is included and sent to the address you paid with. Your purchase does not subscribe you to the essay newsletter.
Can I get a company invoice?
Stripe sends a receipt after purchase. Reply to it with your company name and tax number if you need a company invoice. Any applicable tax is shown at checkout.
Turn performance reviews into funded development plans.
Functional leaders supply real decisions and stretch work. People makes the time, funding and follow-through visible. Both can see whether the plan happened.
One payment · Immediate digital access · v1 updates included
Read the sample before buying · Access and refund terms
© 2026 Renato Valdés-Olmos