--- name: marketing-true-north-statement description: "The true north statement discipline pointed at a revenue Hoshin plan's own stated direction: which pillars have real, committed strategies moving them this year, and which — including market reach itself — have nothing tracing to them at all, flagged plainly rather than assumed covered. Use when: A revenue Hoshin X-Matrix already exists and you want to check honestly whether this year's committed strategies actually trace back to every real component of the stated direction, not just the ones already being worked. You want to know specifically whether market reach and coverage — not just win rate or deal velocity — has any real committed work behind it this year. Not for: You don't have a revenue Hoshin plan yet — build that first; this statement checks work against a direction that already exists. You're setting this year's specific revenue targets and strategies — that's the revenue Hoshin X-Matrix itself; this statement sits above it." --- # Marketing true north statement The true north statement discipline pointed at a revenue Hoshin plan's own stated direction: which pillars have real, committed strategies moving them this year, and which — including market reach itself — have nothing tracing to them at all, flagged plainly rather than assumed covered. Family: Hoshin Kanri · Format: .xlsx · Domain: commercial ## What it is A marketing true north statement is the same discipline as the core true north statement, pointed at a revenue Hoshin plan's own trueNorth field instead of a shop floor's. It breaks that stated direction into real pillars and checks each against the plan's already-committed annual objectives and strategies — including, often, a pillar every current strategy quietly assumes is already solved. A revenue plan built entirely around win rate, deal velocity, and expansion can look complete while never once addressing whether the market it's selling into is actually being reached in the first place. ## When to use it Use it when: - A revenue Hoshin X-Matrix already exists and you want to check honestly whether this year's committed strategies actually trace back to every real component of the stated direction, not just the ones already being worked. - You want to know specifically whether market reach and coverage — not just win rate or deal velocity — has any real committed work behind it this year. - You have a TAM coverage map or similar reach data and want that evidence connected directly to a stated pillar's gap, not left as a separate, disconnected number. Not when: - You don't have a revenue Hoshin plan yet — build that first; this statement checks work against a direction that already exists. - You're setting this year's specific revenue targets and strategies — that's the revenue Hoshin X-Matrix itself; this statement sits above it. ## How to fill it in - **trueNorthNotes** — In one or two sentences, what's the ideal, not-fully-reachable direction this points toward? - **pillars** — Break that direction into its real component pillars, even ones you expect have no work behind them yet. - **initiatives** — For each initiative: which pillar it's tagged to, an owner, and — if it's real committed work, not just a floated idea — which annual objective or strategy it actually traces back to. - **narrative** — Drafted from the statement's own computed coverage. ## What good looks like The example below expands Beacon Analytics' already-published FY2027 revenue Hoshin plan's own trueNorth field into four real pillars, checks each against that plan's already-committed strategies, and finds market visibility has nothing tracing to it — grounded directly in the TAM coverage map's own published 25% list coverage and 42.5% Market visibility figures for this exact segment. Full worked example, on-screen and as a downloadable .xlsx: https://www.katafacts.com/katas/marketing-true-north-statement ## Common mistakes - **Assuming market reach is covered because pipeline and win-rate metrics look healthy.** — Win rate and deal velocity are both measured against accounts already being worked — neither one says anything about the 30 addressable accounts nobody's tracking yet, or the buying-group roles with no named contact at all. - **Counting a floated idea as covering a pillar because it's tagged to the right one.** — An initiative with no real linked objective is an aspiration, not committed work — this statement flags it as unlinked specifically so it can't be mistaken for a pillar that's actually being moved on. - **Leaving a pillar out because you already suspect nothing traces to it.** — An unlisted pillar can't be flagged as disconnected — naming it and letting it come up with zero initiatives is exactly how this tool surfaces the gap plainly instead of hiding it by omission. ## What it connects to Upstream: - **Revenue Hoshin Kanri — X-Matrix** (`revenue-hoshin-kanri`) — The revenue plan's own trueNorth field is exactly the sentence this statement expands into pillars, and its annual objectives/strategies are the real, committed work each pillar is checked against. - **Total addressable market (TAM) coverage map** (`tam-coverage-map`) — A pillar about market reach with no committed initiative behind it is exactly where the coverage map's own list-coverage and Market visibility percentages belong — real evidence for the gap, not an invented number. ## Where AI helps Judgement — stays with you: - Deciding whether an initiative genuinely traces back to a real commitment or is still just a floated idea - Deciding which disconnected pillar to raise at the next catchball round Analysis — AI helps: - Tightening an initiative's wording from rough notes into a specific, checkable statement - Drafting the narrative from the statement's own computed coverage Drudgery — automated: - Identifying which pillars have no initiatives logged - Identifying which logged initiatives are still unlinked - Exporting to xlsx in the house format --- Marketing true north statement is licensed [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Attribution: Katafacts (katafacts.com). ## Using this skill Apply this method as part of whatever broader task, instructions, or deliverable you're already working on -- it's a method to use, not a standalone conversation to start. There is no generation tool for this catalogue yet, so draft the artifact's actual content yourself, following the fields above, the same way a person filling this out by hand would. The canonical guide page and a downloadable worked example (.xlsx) are at https://www.katafacts.com/katas/marketing-true-north-statement.