One Moonshot. Three live Missions. A quarter at a time.
Pick one big goal two or three years out. Break it into an ordered roadmap of Missions. Work on no more than three at once. Every quarter, stop and look at what worked, what got in the way and what comes next.
The Moonshot method is how founders and their teams get more of the right things done. Mission Control is built around it. This article explains the thinking. For the buttons, see Get started with Mission Control.
How it fits together
| Layer | The question it answers |
|---|---|
| Moonshot | Where are we going? One number and a date, two or three years out. |
| Roadmap | Which Missions get us there, and in what order? |
| Live Missions | What matters most right now? Never more than three. |
| Projects and numbers | What work will move it, and what evidence shows it's working? |
| The quarter | A weekly pulse, a monthly check-in and a review to close it out. |
The method in six steps
- Set your Moonshot. Choose a measurable stage on the way to your long-term ambition: revenue, customers, deals won, or something else you can count. Give it a target and a date. When you land it, celebrate, then set the next one.
- Build the roadmap backwards. Stand at the Moon and ask what has to be true right before you land. Each answer is a Mission, written as an outcome that's either true or false, not a list of tasks. Keep going until you reach today. Put them in order.
- Give every Mission a Captain. One person answers for each outcome. A Mission can't go live without one.
- Link the work and the evidence. Projects and their tasks are the work. A number from Reports, or readings you log, shows whether the work is producing the result. Finished tasks prove effort; numbers prove progress.
- Run no more than three at once. Promote Missions in roadmap order, up to three live. When one is achieved, its slot frees up, and you choose whether to promote the next Mission or leave the slot open. An open slot is often the braver call.
- Review every quarter. Each quarter is one shared cycle for the whole Moonshot, not a clock per Mission. It ends with a review of the wins, the work, the blockers and the team's energy, and live Missions carry into the next quarter with their history.
The rule of three
Focus beats spread. Three live Missions is the ceiling, not a target.
- Missions go live in roadmap order. The next planned Mission can be promoted once the one before it is live or achieved.
- Promotion is your decision. Nothing goes live on its own, so you can keep a slot free when the team is stretched.
- Running the Moonshot solo? Two live Missions are recommended, and the third slot is labelled "The business running itself".
- If a Mission turns out to be the wrong one, abort it with a reason. Aborting early in the quarter counts as a brave call, not a failure.
For the details, see Missions and the rule of three.
The rhythm of a quarter
Cycles follow the calendar quarters in your organisation's time zone. They roll over by themselves until the Moonshot lands.
| When | What happens | Who |
|---|---|---|
| Every week | A pulse: score energy, workload and morale from 1 to 5 | Everyone on a live Mission, when the Moonshot is run as a team |
| End of each month | A check-in on each live Mission: on track, or scope changed | The Captain, owner or an admin |
| End of the quarter | The review: mark the wins, reflect, fill or keep the free slots | The owner signs the reflection |
The review opens for the last 2 weeks of the quarter and stays open for the first 2 weeks of the next.
The quarterly review
Progress isn't only output. The review is space to stop, think and turn the quarter into better decisions. It records:
- The wins: Missions achieved, projects completed and who did them.
- Four questions, every quarter:
- The number: where is the measure, and what moved it?
- The work: what was achieved, and what does the evidence show against the target?
- The blockers: what got in the way, and what's still in the way?
- The energy: how did it feel, for you and for whoever worked on it? Scored from 1 to 5 as well.
- A lens: a few more questions that change each cycle, so the review stays fresh.
- The free slots: promote the next Mission, or leave a slot open.
Once signed, everyone who can see the Moonshot can read the reflection.
The six lenses
Your first cycle uses the first lens. After the sixth, they start again.
| Cycle | Lens | What it asks about |
|---|---|---|
| 1, 7, 13… | Progress and pride | Biggest wins, the evidence behind them, targets missed, who deserves recognition |
| 2, 8, 14… | Focus and friction | Where effort was stretched thin, what blocked progress, the management load |
| 3, 9, 15… | Customers and value | What customers won, where the product proved useful, surprising feedback, friction points |
| 4, 10, 16… | Team and capacity | What you achieved together, where people supported each other, bottlenecks, how much still depends on the founder |
| 5, 11, 17… | Learning and confidence | What you learned, experiments that failed, which core assumptions still hold |
| 6, 12, 18… | Direction and next stage | The long-term trajectory, obstacles that keep coming back, roadmap changes worth making |
Who sees what
- The Moonshot is private to its owner until they share it, person by person.
- Each person gets View or Admin. Admins shape the roadmap and run the cycles.
- Only people with access see the Moonshot and its Missions, and only they can captain a Mission.
- In the weekly pulse, everyone with access sees the averages. Only the owner and admins see who said what.
An example: the first 53° Moonshot
An illustration of how the method maps to real targets.
The Moonshot: grow 53° to £1.2 million in annual revenue within two years, measured as Revenue over Rolling 12 months.
The roadmap:
| Mission | State | Outcome | Projects |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Go live | Live | 53° is ready for people to discover, sign up and use the core product | Marketing strategy, launch-ready product, website |
| 2. Acquire customers | Planned | The launch becomes a repeatable way to win and keep paying customers | Acquisition, activation, retention |
| 3. Scale up | Planned | The proven model grows towards £1.2 million | Team accounts, scaling proven channels |
Mission 2 can be promoted as soon as Mission 1 is live, because two slots are still free. The team could promote it now, or keep the focus on launch and promote it at the quarter's review.