Hard to Fire
Hard to Fire · Chapter 15 · Integration plan

The 90-Day Hard to Fire Plan

Build the five primary outputs without turning the rest of the book into a certification program.

Six two-week blocks take you through Day 84. Days 85 through 90 are the reset. Budget about two hours a week, with extra time when a full audit or household conversation requires it.

Weekly moves0/12 weekly moves complete
Primary outputs0/5 primary outputs ready
Days 85 to 90Reset open

Next: Week 1. Use the Cost-or-Leverage Self-Test and AI Exposure Map.

Six blocks. One dated move each week.

Work in order. If the current block has not produced its part of the primary output, use the first hour of the next block to finish it before adding more work.

Weeks 1 and 2: Organizational Exposure0/2 complete

Week 1

Use the Cost-or-Leverage Self-Test and AI Exposure Map.

Checkpoint: Your current cost-or-leverage result and the tasks with the greatest AI exposure.

Week 2

Use the Expendability Scorecard and Protection Audit.

Checkpoint: The factor making you easiest to replace and your weakest protection dimension.

Weeks 3 and 4: Decision-Maker Value, Build0/2 complete

Week 3

Use the Manager Dependency Map and Pain-to-Power Matrix to choose one recurring problem your manager needs solved.

Checkpoint: The named manager problem and the leverage point you will target.

Week 4

Build one repeatable workflow around the Week 3 problem. Use an approved AI-assisted workflow only if it fits.

Checkpoint: One result your manager can inspect for a problem your manager actually owns.

Weeks 5 and 6: Decision-Maker Value, Make It Legible0/2 complete

Week 5

Use the Value Translation Worksheet to turn the workflow result into one truthful business update.

Checkpoint: One truthful business update.

Week 6

Put the result where the right person can see it. Use the Sponsor Map only when Trust, Visibility, or advocacy is an active gap.

Checkpoint: Evidence that the business update was delivered through the right channel.

Weeks 7 and 8: Career Portability0/2 complete

Week 7

Use the Reinvention Narrative Builder.

Checkpoint: One adjacent-role hypothesis supported by Pattern, Prevention, and Amplification.

Week 8

Test the hypothesis against a current role description and one market conversation. Use the Optionality Calendar only if relationships or materials have gone stale.

Checkpoint: Evidence that the hypothesis was tested outside your current company.

Weeks 9 and 10: Financial Resilience0/2 complete

Week 9

Use the Household Income Risk Audit. Use the Lifestyle Inflation Detector only if spending expanded materially after income rose.

Checkpoint: Current burn, post-loss burn, runway, and one threshold action.

Week 10Conditional

If you have a real side-income idea, run the employer-risk gate and Side Income Filter. If you don't, record not triggered and leave the tool closed.

Checkpoint: The Go, Test, or Not Yet result, or not triggered.

Weeks 11 and 12: Separation Readiness0/2 complete

Week 11

Use the Layoff Fire Drill Checklist within its record-ownership, truthfulness, permission, and counsel boundaries.

Checkpoint: One lawful portability inventory, the first unresolved access gap assigned, and the next maintenance date.

Week 12Conditional

Use the PIP Diagnostic and Phase 1 of the PIP Survival Checklist only when a PIP or equivalent formal performance document exists. Otherwise, record not triggered.

Checkpoint: The PIP response posture and next permitted action, or not triggered.

The five primary outputs

Everything else is supporting work. Open a conditional tool only when its condition is real. Nobody gets extra credit for finishing the entire appendix.

1. Organizational Exposure

Your Expendability total and highest exposure factor, with the two vulnerabilities you will repair first.

2. Decision-Maker Value

One translated result tied to a decision your manager owns, plus evidence that the update was delivered.

3. Career Portability

One adjacent-role hypothesis supported by evidence and tested outside your current company.

4. Financial Resilience

Current burn, post-loss burn, runway, and the next threshold action.

5. Separation Readiness

One lawful firebreak with the first unresolved access gap assigned and the next maintenance date recorded. Add a PIP response only when triggered.

Days 85 Through 90: Reset

  1. Put the five canonical outputs on one page. Update only the numbers, conclusions, or conditions that changed.
  2. Keep the work that changed your position. Replace anything that produced motion without evidence.
  3. Choose the two gaps still capable of doing the most damage.
  4. Build the first two-week block of the next cycle around those gaps, with dates.

Observable output: The first two-week block of the next cycle, with dates.

Whitman Rule

A plan you follow at 60 percent beats one you admire at 100 percent. Don't optimize the schedule. Finish the block in front of you.

The plan does not make you fireproof. Nothing does. It gives you verified numbers, usable language, a market hypothesis, and a response route. That is a much better opening position.

Monday Move

Open a new document. Write Week 1 at the top. Under it, write the date you will complete the Cost-or-Leverage Self-Test. Then stop. Monday has enough ambition already.