THE LIBRARY

Nineteen years of it, shelved properly.

Not a feed. Six shelves, each one a path you can follow start to finish — in the order that makes sense, rather than the order I happened to publish it.

223PIECES

6SHELVES

’07SINCE

START HERE If you read three things, read these.

THE WHOLE ARGUMENT What 19 Years of Support Leadership Actually Taught Me The one to send someone who asks what you do. MOST ARGUED WITH Support Is Not a Cost Center — But Pretending It Isn’t Gets You Defunded The commercial case, made honestly. MOST USEFUL ON MONDAY SLA Design That Actually Works: Tiered Service Levels Your Team Can Hit Sit down with this and a spreadsheet.

THE SHELVES

The curation happens inside each shelf, as numbered sections with a reading order.

I CX & OperationsRunning a support function that holds under load. 12 PIECES · 3 SECTIONS

SECTION 1

Quality & Improvement — a seven-part run A complete Six Sigma curriculum, published across 2026. Read in this order.

1Six Sigma for Support Leaders— start here even if you think it is a manufacturing thing

2DMAIC Explained— the loop everything after assumes

3Control Charts Explained— measure

4Root Cause Analysis: 5 Whys, Fishbone, 7 Tools— analyse

5The 80/20 Rule in Support Operations— where to point it

6Four Problems. One Root Cause.— the method on one messy situation

7The Control Phase— control, so the fix actually sticks

SECTION 2

Measurement & SLAs The numbers that decide things, and the one everybody misuses.

1SLA Design That Actually Works— tiered service levels a team can hit

2Average Handle Time— the most misused metric in the contact centre

3The 80/20/30 Rule— where the extra 30 comes from

SECTION 3

When It Goes Wrong Chronic outages, unplanned work, and holding a team together through it.

1What Do You Do When Your Company Is Constantly Having Outages?— two years of living it

2The Impact of Unplanned Work— what firefighting actually costs you

See the CX & Operations hub

II AI in SupportWhat earned its place in the stack, and what got ripped out. 6 PIECES · 2 SECTIONS

SECTION 1

Where it stands now The current read, from running this in live queues.

1AI in Your Support Stack— what to buy, what to build, what to skip

2Agentic AI in Your Contact Centre— a practitioner’s reality check

3I Wrote About This in 2018— what I got right, and what surprised me

SECTION 2

The earlier calls Kept deliberately. Read them against the 2026 pieces above.

1Separating Hype from Reality— 2019

2How AI Will Transform IT Service Management— 2019

3Is the Terminator Our Eventual Fate?— 2018, and the title has aged better than the argument

See the AI in Support hub

III Leadership & CareerThe biggest shelf. The hard parts of leading support teams. 7 PIECES · 2 SECTIONS

SECTION 1

Managing people, day to day The conversations nobody warns you about.

1From Agent to Team Lead— what no one tells you about your first 90 days

2The Feedback Conversation You’re Avoiding— and how to actually have it

3The Talk You’re Avoiding Is Getting Expensive— the cost of waiting

4Your Calendar Is the Problem, Not Your Employee— before you blame the person

5Stop Taking Notes for Your Team— where accountability quietly leaks

SECTION 2

Getting the job Two guides, rewritten in 2026 to replace everything I had written about job hunting since 2008.

1How to Land a CX or Support Leadership Role— the search, the resume, and getting past the ATS

2How to Interview for a CX Leadership Role— the phone screen through to the offer

See the Leadership & Career hub

IV Business CraftThe P&L, the RFP, making the case. Thin on purpose — growing. 3 PIECES

SECTION 1

The commercial side The part most support leaders learn too late.

1Support Is Not a Cost Center— but pretending it is not gets you defunded

2How to Write an RFP for a Support Tool— that actually gets you the right answer

3Beyond the Price Tag— why discounting rarely delivers

See the Business Craft hub

V The Director TrackOperating-model thinking for the level up. 3 PIECES

SECTION 1

Operating-model thinking For leaders aiming a level up.

1What 19 Years of Support Leadership Actually Taught Me— the whole argument in one piece

2Support Is Not a Cost Center— the funding conversation

3How to Land a CX or Support Leadership Role— from someone who has hired for them

See the Director Track hub

VI ITIL & Service Management NEWIncident, problem and change — brought into companies that had never heard the word. 9 PIECES · 3 SECTIONS

SECTION 1

Start here If you have never had to implement it, in this order.

1Unlocking the Power of ITIL— the comprehensive guide

2ITIL 4 Foundation— an introduction to a new way of thinking

3Incident Management vs Problem Management— the distinction everything else rests on

SECTION 2

Service strategy The layer above the ticket queue.

1Service Strategy: An Introduction— where to start

2The 4 P’s of Service Strategy— perspective, position, plan, pattern

3ITIL’s Definition of Services— duller than it sounds, and load-bearing

SECTION 3

Building the function NOC, help desk, and whether to outsource any of it.

1How to Build a NOC— from nothing

2Building a NOC or Outsourcing— the decision, honestly

3How Your Help Desk and NOC Connect— where handoffs break

See all 15 ITIL pieces

SERIES Written to be read in order.

The Barbershop Leadership Series COMPLETE · 5 PARTS

01I Went for a Haircut. Got Into a Leadership Conversation 02Your Calendar Is the Problem, Not Your Employee 03Stop Taking Notes for Your Team 04Four Problems. One Root Cause. 05The Talk You’re Avoiding Is Getting Expensive

The Mentorship Series PARTS 1–2 LIVE

01From Agent to Team Lead: Your First 90 Days 02The Feedback Conversation You’re Avoiding

OR JUST SEE EVERYTHING All 223, newest first →