Why this matters
Peer benchmarking is only as good as the comparability of the underlying numbers. If one company books vendor rebates against revenue and another nets them against COGS, the gross margin comparison is meaningless — even though both numbers look right on their own P&L.
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Cohort conventions baked in:
- Currency. Australian Dollars, ex-GST, throughout.
- Period. Calendar month, calendar year — not your fiscal year.
- MRR. Snapshot at month-end, annual contracts normalised to monthly (divide annual by 12).
- EBITDA. Unadjusted — no owner-salary normalisation, no add-backs. Raise normalisation requests with your facilitator if needed.
- Rock completion. Use the most recently completed quarter for every month in the current quarter. Don't pro-rate the in-flight quarter.
- Methodology consistency. CSAT and ESAT methodologies vary by company — that's OK. What matters is you pick a method and stick with it month after month.
Financial metrics
Revenue
revenue
AUD, ex-GST
Total recognised revenue for the calendar month.
Includes all revenue streams: managed services, project services, hardware and licence resale, professional services, T&M. Use a recognition basis (revenue matched to delivery period), not cash receipts. Exclude GST, intercompany transfers, and pass-through costs you don't book as revenue.
Example: $475,000
MRR (Monthly Recurring Revenue)
mrr
AUD, ex-GST
Sum of normalised monthly fees from active recurring contracts, snapshot at month-end.
Take the monthly value of every active recurring contract on the last day of the month. Annual contracts divide by 12. Includes managed services agreements, monitoring, backup-as-a-service, security stack subscriptions, SaaS reseller margin you book as recurring. Excludes project work, hardware sales, T&M, per-incident charges, and one-off setup fees.
Example: $185,000
Product gross margin
product_gm
%
Gross margin on hardware and licence resale.
(Product revenue − Product COGS) ÷ Product revenue × 100
Product COGS includes hardware cost, vendor licences, inbound shipping, less vendor rebates received. Excludes labour to install or configure — that sits in services. Calculate using the calendar month's product revenue and COGS only.
Example: 28.5
Services gross margin (LLGM)
services_gm
%
Labour-loaded gross margin on services delivery.
(Services revenue − Labour-loaded services COGS) ÷ Services revenue × 100
Services COGS includes delivery staff salaries (engineers, technicians, delivery PMs), superannuation, payroll tax, employer-paid leave loading, subcontractor cost, tools-of-trade attributable to delivery. Excludes pre-sales engineering, sales engineering, customer success after onboarding, S&M, and G&A. Covers both managed and project services revenue lines.
Example: 52.0
EBITDA
ebitda_dollar
AUD
Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortisation. Unadjusted.
Revenue minus COGS minus all operating expenses, before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation. Unadjusted for this benchmark: do not normalise owner salary, do not add back one-off items. We compare raw EBITDA to keep peer comparison honest. If your cohort wants a separate normalised line, raise it with the facilitator.
Example: $58,000
EBITDA as % of revenue
ebitda_pct
%
EBITDA dollar divided by revenue for the same month.
EBITDA $ ÷ Revenue × 100
Derive from the dollar EBITDA and revenue you've already reported — don't round both independently or they may disagree.
Example: 12.2
Sales & Marketing expense as % of revenue
sm_exp
%
All S&M operating cost for the month, as a % of revenue.
S&M cost ÷ Revenue × 100
Includes: sales salaries (with commissions), marketing salaries, advertising spend, content creation, events, CRM and sales tools, BDR/SDR cost, agency fees. Excludes pre-sales engineering (sits in COGS), customer success post-onboarding (often in COGS or G&A — pick one and stick), and R&D.
Example: 9.5
General & Administrative expense as % of revenue
ga_exp
%
All G&A operating cost for the month, as a % of revenue.
G&A cost ÷ Revenue × 100
Includes: executive salaries (not in delivery), finance, HR, admin staff, rent, utilities, internal IT, professional services (accounting, legal), insurance. Excludes COGS, S&M, R&D.
Example: 13.2
Operational metrics
Headcount (Full-Time Equivalent)
headcount
FTE
FTE headcount at month-end.
Sum of FTE contributions at the last day of the month. Full-time = 1.0; half-time = 0.5; two contractors averaging 0.6 each = 1.2. Include all paid roles — billable, non-billable, admin, owners working in the business. Exclude unpaid family, board members, advisers, and contractors below 0.2 FTE.
Example: 18.5
Rock completion rate
rock_completion
% · EOS quarterly
% of Rocks completed on time in the most recently completed quarter.
Rocks completed by due date ÷ Total Rocks set for the quarter × 100
From your EOS / Traction system. Use the most recently completed quarter for every month in the current quarter — don't pro-rate the in-flight quarter. So Jan/Feb/Mar 2025 all report the Q4 2024 rate; Apr/May/Jun 2025 all report Q1 2025. If you don't run EOS, leave the field blank rather than estimate.
Example: 85
Customer & employee metrics
Customer satisfaction (CSAT)
csat
Score out of 100
Customer satisfaction score, scaled to 0–100.
Use whatever survey methodology you already have — post-ticket survey average, CSAT rolling mean, NPS translated to 0–100, etc. The cohort doesn't mandate one method; what matters is you pick yours, document it, and use it the same way every month. Report the trailing 3-month average to smooth out small-sample noise.
Example: 87.4
Employee satisfaction (ESAT)
esat
Score out of 10
Employee satisfaction score, 1–10 scale (one decimal place).
Taken from your engagement survey or check-in tool (e.g., Officevibe, Culture Amp, 15Five, custom pulse). If you survey quarterly, repeat the same value across each month of the quarter rather than leaving blanks — keeps the trend continuous and the rollup honest.
Example: 7.8