Driver Tree

Driver Tree is a visual breakdown of a top-level metric (revenue, headcount cost, cash) into the controllable inputs that build it, layer by layer, until each branch ends in a number someone can actually act on.

A driver tree is only as trustworthy as its leaf nodes. The common failure mode competitors rarely name is a “plug” node: a number nobody can trace to a real driver, inserted to make the totals balance. If any leaf isn’t tied to a reconciled actual, the whole tree is decoration rather than a model. See what actually has to be true for a driver tree to work.