Hey there,
Effective operators don’t bet on scale; they prove it in miniature. Meanwhile, revolutionary global leaders show how validated distribution, connected systems, & FOAK-ready teams turn that signal into durable execution.
Stand your judgement and see how standardizing one method, & staffing governance early upgrades your next move from a risky leap into a controlled, compounding step up.
In this issue:
Playbook of the Day
How to Validate Distribution Before You Scale
Goal: Get early customer traction by identifying and validating one repeatable distribution channel.
Who: The Founder, plus 1 GTM operator or trusted adviser. Same cadence every month in the early stage.
Before the meeting (10 mins):
Write a one-paragraph ICP: who buys, why they care, where they already spend time, list 10–15 possible distribution channels.
Select one channel to focus on, cross out the rest. Define one success metric (e.g., number of real ICP conversations per week).
During the meeting (15 mins)
Activity Check (5 mins): Where the ICP showed up this week (specific communities, groups, threads, or intros). What actions were taken since the last check (posts, replies, DMs, outreach). One concrete win or miss. No deep dives.
ICP Feedback Review (6 mins): Number of real ICP conversations since last check. Common questions, objections, or signs of pull. What AI helped refine (messaging, targeting, patterns).
Confirm & Go (4 mins): Continue, adjust, or stop the channel. Assign 1–2 concrete actions for the next period with a single owner. Verbal confirmation from owners.
Rules: Track real ICP conversations and learn from signal, not impressions. Build GTM only when repeatable, Use advisers and operators for guidance and introductions. Just visibility, speed, and building a repeatable distribution edge before scaling.
Latest News
✈️ Executive Move: Josh Baird Takes on Expanded COO Role at JETNET
Read the full article here »
Published: 01/12/26
JETNET, a leading aviation data and intelligence provider, has elevated Josh Baird from COO to President and Chief Operating Officer, keeping him directly aligned with CEO Derek Swaim. His expanded brief is to tighten team alignment, accelerate execution, and scale the company’s intelligence platforms for faster, more valuable customer insight.
Upside: In 2025, JETNET enhanced their data backbone, adding over 40% more verified owner, operator, and management relationships and lifting verified sale prices by 30% while pushing FAA‑linked updates into the platform within minutes. At the same time, activity‑based insight adoption climbed and JETNET AI in Marketplace Live began injecting AI‑assisted answers directly into thousands of aviation workflows to cut friction and improve decision quality.
Impact: Baird’s promotion is a reminder that in intelligence‑driven industries, COOs win by pairing operational excellence with tight cross‑functional alignment and fast, trustworthy insight delivery. For COOs running data‑heavy shops, the playbook is clear: execution, alignment, and smart tech integration are now the primary levers for creating measurable value.
🖥️ Dell Prepares for Enterprise Transformation
Read the full article here »
Published: 01/14/26
Dell is rolling out One Dell Way on May 3 as a unified enterprise platform that Jeff Clarke calls the company’s biggest transformation, built to connect data, kill application sprawl, and speed decisions across core functions. The cloud‑ and AI‑heavy ISG group will migrate onto the same standardized stack in August.
Upside: Standardizing and automating work should strip out repetitive tasks, speed operations, and wire cleaner data pipes across Dell’s major functions while setting the stage for real‑time, AI‑driven execution. Employee training kicks off February 3 to focus on hands‑on use of the new tools and workflows, not just slideware.
Impact: Dell’s move spotlights how cross‑functional alignment, simplified processes, and integrated tech give COOs real leverage in running complex enterprises at AI speed. Leaders who treat transformations as strategic redesigns, not IT projects, can lift efficiency, contain disruption, and hard‑wire long‑term competitive advantage.
⚛️ Hadron Energy powers Halo MMR rollout with FOAK-ready leadership
Read the full article here »
Published: 01/07/26
Business Wire says Hadron Energy has installed Ken Canavan as COO, Rahul Shukla as CFO, and added Dr. Lander Ibarra, Jason Christensen, and Raanan Horowitz to beef up technical, regulatory, and board firepower. The upgraded team is chartered to push its Halo Micro‑Modular Reactor program and a proposed $1.2 billion GigCapital7 deal across the line.
Upside: This is a FOAK‑to‑NOAK leadership template: an operator‑grade COO from nuclear operations and R&D, a public‑company CFO fluent in SOX and complex deals, and embedded NRC/DOE licensing depth. A board director with serious national security and infrastructure chops rounds out a team built to scale reactors, not just pitch them.
Impact: For COOs in regulated, capital‑heavy markets, the signal is blunt: investors now expect commercialization, regulatory execution, and governance talent in place before launch, not bolted on later. Org charts that bake in that depth from day one will handle the jump from plan to deployment with fewer surprises and more leverage.
Prompt of the Day
The "Human-to-AI" Prompt
Trigger Event | Action | Use Case Example |
|---|---|---|
Start of the day | Review today’s calendar, active intelligence operations, and top 3 organizational intelligence goals (e.g., threat visibility, decision speed, partner trust). | A reshuffled day that prioritizes critical missions, high‑risk investigations, and time‑sensitive briefings. |
Before leadership or cross-agency meetings | Confirm agenda, attendees, and latest intelligence summaries or dashboards relevant to the discussion. | Focused alignment questions that keep executives centered on operational risk, data quality, and mission outcomes instead of low‑impact updates. |
When new “urgent” intel or incidents appear | Capture a short description of the incident, source, confidence level, and its impact on current priorities. Decide: escalate, delegate, automate, or park. | Clear guidance on whether to treat a new alert as a true escalation, route it to an operations cell, send to an AI-analytics queue, or log it for trend |
Midday reset | Compare what has been done so far with what still matters most: top cases, critical systems, key stakeholders, and data reliability issues | A trimmed list of must‑do items that keeps attention on mission‑critical investigations, platform reliability, and inter‑agency commitments. |
End-of-day review | Log wins, misses, and unexpected issues in operations, analytics, and security; note data gaps and process friction. | A concise intelligence ops journal that feeds into tomorrow’s priorities, risk register updates, and continuous improvement experiments. |
Prompt
“Act as my AI ROI Navigator. Looking at today’s operating costs, cloud spend, and AI-driven savings, (1) identify the meetings or projects where my presence will most improve the balance between innovation and cost control, (2) compress or cancel low-impact activities so my time tracks our highest‑value AI efforts, and (3) give me 2 straightforward questions I can put to finance and data teams to verify that our AI programs are creating real, measurable value rather than just extra complexity.”
You can design and create, and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes people to make the dream a reality.
One last Thing
From JETNET’s intelligence push to Dell’s platform overhaul and Hadron’s FOAK-ready bench, the pattern is the same: clarify, concentrate, & staff the most complex areas before it becomes critical.
One ICP, one channel under test, and a running log of feedbacks tell you exactly where potential exists, & where you’re just broadcasting into empty space.
Until next edition,
Chloe Rivers
Editor-in-Chief
COO Intelligence
P.S. Interested in sponsoring a future issue? Just reply to this email and I’ll send packages!