What Ten80Ten Means

Alex Nicholson named Ten80Ten after the 10-80-10 delegation rule Dan Martell describes in Buy Back Your Time. The name divides responsibility: direction at the start, ownership through the long middle, and judgment at the end.

That is the short answer to what Ten80Ten means. The useful answer is what those numbers demand once client work begins.

The opening 10 percent is where the client and Ten80Ten agree on the result. The middle 80 belongs to the people doing the work. The final 10 brings the client back for the decisions that genuinely require their authority. It does not return a half-finished job for the client to repair.

Martell’s current explanation of the rule assigns vision and the definition of done to the first 10, team-owned execution to the middle 80, then refinement and taste to the last 10. Ten80Ten applies that shape to a service relationship, where accountability has to remain clear on both sides.

When Alex introduced Ten80Ten publicly, he described the same sequence in practical terms: set up the system and process, delegate the work, then refine what comes back. The company name keeps that operating agreement in view.

Responsibility chart / 01

The client sets direction. The team owns the middle.

Martell's model

1. 10% Define Vision and done
2. 80% Own execution The team builds
3. 10% Refine Taste and polish

Ten80Ten's client work

1. 10% Brief together Result and boundaries
2. 80% Deliver and check Ten80Ten owns execution and QA
3. 10% Client decides Judgment and approval

DirectionOwned executionJudgment

The middle eighty is the promise

Suppose you ask Ten80Ten to own the packet your team sends to every new customer, only to find that the apparently routine work turns on one exception.

The first conversation should settle more than the due date. You show which documents and customer details belong in the packet, where the source record lives, and who may approve an exception. Ten80Ten also needs to learn the tone of the welcome note and what would make the result unfit to send.

That is the opening 10. It gives the work a destination and a boundary. It also exposes missing access or conflicting instructions before somebody spends a day assembling the wrong result.

Then you should be able to step away. The VA gathers the approved details, checks the required documents, prepares the packet, updates the working record, and routes an unusual case to the right person. Ten80Ten checks the output against the agreed standard before it reaches you. Questions the team can answer from the brief or source record stay inside the middle.

This is where many delegation arrangements become disappointing. A provider accepts the task but sends every small choice back. You still have to remember the next step, notice what is missing, answer routine questions, and chase the finish. Labor moved. Responsibility did not.

In the systems I run, I look for whether the middle can move without the client becoming its dispatcher. One example is the Company Operations Hub, where owners can see the state of work without rebuilding it from messages or manually pushing every item forward.

The middle 80 is therefore not a discount version of ownership. It is the largest promise in the company name. Ten80Ten has to carry ordinary decisions through the work and keep its record current. It must catch avoidable defects before they reach you, then stop at the edge of its authority.

That gives the VA a better job too. With the whole context, a person can improve the route and recognize repetition. Practice with a complete outcome builds dependability. Isolated commands only make someone faster at waiting for the next command.

The last ten is judgment, not cleanup

The onboarding packet returns to you because one item needs business judgment. A customer requested a special payment arrangement. The VA can collect the relevant facts and compare the request with policy before recommending the safest next action. Ten80Ten confirms that the packet itself is complete. Only you can decide whether the relationship justifies the exception.

That is a proper final 10. The distinction matters because “client approval” often hides unfinished work. If the client must find missing fields, rewrite the note, correct the customer record, or explain a rule that already existed, the provider has pushed its QA obligation across the table. Calling that refinement does not make it so.

The final 10 should be small in volume but high in judgment. It may involve tone that carries the founder’s name, a relationship exception, a commercial choice, or final acceptance of a result that affects the business. The work arrives ready for that decision.

Martell’s version keeps the leader involved where taste adds value. Ten80Ten’s client version also has to protect the service boundary. The team should finish what the team can safely finish, while the client stays close to authority they cannot responsibly delegate.

That boundary can move over time. A decision that first required the client may later become a documented rule after enough examples. A common exception can gain an approved response. The next packet then stays in the middle instead of climbing back to the owner.

The opposite is also true. A routine-looking action may carry a legal, clinical, financial, or people consequence that should never become an automatic VA decision. Good delegation does not remove judgment from the work. It places each judgment with the person allowed to make it.

This is why the final 10 cannot simply mean “make it prettier.” Its real job is to bring scarce authority back at the exact point where it improves the result.

What the name asks of both sides

Ten80Ten works only when the opening brief is honest. The client needs to show the real standard, provide working access, name protected decisions, and explain what failure would look like. A vague request followed by a private standard creates guesswork, not ownership.

Ten80Ten must then resist the comfort of constant permission. The provider should ask early when a boundary is missing, but routine work cannot become a stream of approval requests. The long middle belongs to delivery, recordkeeping, follow-through, and internal QA.

The VA needs room inside that agreement. Clear ownership does not mean unrestricted authority. It means knowing which decisions are already covered, which evidence to check, which result closes the work, and where an exception goes. That combination is more useful than either micromanagement or “use your best judgment” with no guardrail.

You receive visibility without becoming the task manager. Ten80Ten remains accountable without pretending it can own decisions reserved for you. The VA gets a complete responsibility rather than a queue of unexplained errands.

That is also why shared records matter. If a private conversation changes the onboarding rule, the operating consequence must reach the place where the team works. Otherwise, the middle 80 runs on an obsolete instruction. The same transfer rule applies to decisions made in private messages: sensitive reasons can remain private, but the changed plan still needs an owner, next action, deadline, and working link.

The numbers are not a stopwatch. A difficult opening may take longer than 10 percent of the calendar, and a final approval may take seconds. The proportions name where attention belongs. They keep the client concentrated at the two high-judgment edges and give the team enough room to own what lies between them.

The test arrives on an ordinary workday, not in a logo explanation. If you still have to chase the packet through its middle, the name is only branding. When the system works, you open one reviewed exception, make the business decision, and return to your day. Ten80Ten earns its name only when the eighty feels like ownership.

Frequently asked questions

What happens if the brief changes during the middle 80?

Ten80Ten should record the change where the team works, confirm how it affects the result or deadline, and continue from the new instruction. A material change may require a new opening 10 rather than a quiet expansion of the original scope.

Can several client stakeholders share the final 10?

Yes, but the brief should name who decides each protected issue. Shared input works when one person can close the decision. An unnamed approval group can pull routine work out of the middle and leave it waiting between stakeholders.

When should a repeated exception become a rule?

Turn an exception into a rule after the client confirms that the same conditions should lead to the same response. Record the evidence that changes the route, the approved action, and any limit that still requires review.

What should Ten80Ten show before asking for final approval?

The work should arrive complete enough for one focused decision. Ten80Ten should show the relevant facts, the standard already applied, the remaining judgment, and a recommendation when the evidence supports one.