Look at more than sales
A scorecard is a short view of the facts that need your attention.
Review safety, learning, people, customer experience, and money. Strong sales do not cancel out an unsafe operation.
Use a few measures you will act on. A large dashboard that nobody reads is not useful management.
Keep the units clear
One participant is one person.
One registration is one booked place in an offering.
One camper-week is one person booked for one full week in the defined model.
One paying household may buy several registrations.
For mixed-length camps, use a consistent unit such as participant-days or scheduled participant-hours when comparing capacity. Do not mix a two-hour clinic with a full camp week and call both one equal booking.
Use simple measures
| Measure | How to calculate or record it | What it can tell you |
|---|---|---|
| Capacity use | Sold eligible units ÷ approved available units | Whether this offering is filling. |
| Attendance | Attended participant-sessions ÷ expected participant-sessions | Whether people are using what they booked. |
| Net sales | Earned sales less the relevant discounts and refunds | What the service actually earned, before costs. |
| Planned surplus | Planned net sales less all planned costs | Whether the operating plan works. |
| Cash low point | Lowest forecast bank balance | When bills may become hard to pay. |
| Staff coverage gaps | Uncovered required roles or periods | Whether delivery must change or stop. |
| Open safety actions | Unfinished actions, with risk and due date | What must be fixed. |
| Customer issues | Themes, urgency, owner, and time unresolved | Where service is failing. |
| Learning progress | Agreed skill checks or coach observations | Whether teaching goals are being met. |
These are management definitions. Your accountant may use different formal reporting labels. Reconcile them rather than quietly mixing methods.
Measure return bookings fairly
Choose the group you are measuring and a fair next opportunity to return.
For example, if 40 eligible households from last summer were offered this summer's camp and 18 booked, the return rate for that defined group is 45%.
Do not count people who have not yet had a chance to return as failures. Record age-outs, moves, and major changes to the offer separately where useful and lawful.
Hold a weekly review
Start with urgent safety and staffing matters. Then review customer issues, learning, money, and sales.
For each problem, decide the next action, owner, and due date. Check last week's actions before adding new ones.
Compare planned costs with actual costs. Find the reason for the gap. A lower payroll bill may reflect an unfilled safety role, not a win.
Visit the real operation
Talk with staff and observe handovers, transitions, toilets, breaks, and equipment storage. Do not only watch the exciting lesson.
Ask, “What makes it hard to do this safely?”
Protect honest answers. Do not punish someone for raising a problem you asked them to identify.
Avoid harmful targets
Do not reward zero incident reports, constant full activity, or the fewest staff hours without context.
Better targets include completed safety checks, timely reporting, closed actions, safe coverage, and good teaching.
Your task: Choose a small weekly scorecard. Give every red item an owner and a decision, not just a colour.