SCQA and the Minto Pyramid for Board Decisions
By Road map ROI, from Cookie Tech, which builds custom software · Published Jun 3, 2026 · Last updated Nov 3, 2026
What changed: Merged with our Minto Pyramid guide and added a worked example with real calculator output.
Open with the tension, answer with a number, then defend it.
Decisions · ~15 min (est.)
●●●
Situation → Complication → Question → Answer ▲ arguments ▲ facts
- Inputs
- What everyone agrees on · What changed · The one decision · Your recommendation and its numbers
- Output
- An opening and a one-page argument that end in a decision
- When to use
- When your last review ended with "let's circle back next month".
- Replaces
- Status updates that bury the ask on slide 27.
You need one decision from a board or a boss. Two structures help. SCQA (Situation, Complication, Question, Answer) gets the room to the question quickly. The Minto Pyramid then holds up your answer with a few arguments that do not overlap. Barbara Minto developed the pyramid method and taught it at McKinsey. Her site also teaches an SCQ framework. SCQA adds an Answer to it, and we have not confirmed that the four-letter version appears in her book.
The four parts of SCQA
Situation: what everyone in the room already agrees on. Complication: what changed, which is the reason for the meeting. Question: the one decision in front of them, as a choice between two or three options. Answer: your recommendation, with its numbers.
Worked example: one decision, start to finish
The company and the numbers are invented. Situation: last quarter we set out to grow sign-ups, and sign-ups grew. Complication: most new customers stop in their first week, so the growth is not reaching revenue. Question: do we fund a new onboarding now, or keep the team on the current list? Answer: fund it. It costs $28,000 and we expect $95,000 a year in benefit.
Put a number in the Answer
Do not stop at a sentence, because the first thing a board asks is how much. We ran the invented numbers in our calculator, at a 10% discount rate over 3 years. The second row is the question you will be asked next: what if only half of it comes true? The decision survives, and you can say so before anyone asks.
| Case | Yearly benefit | Pays back in | Net present value |
|---|---|---|---|
| As expected | $95,000 | about 4 months | about $208,000 |
| Only half of it | $47,500 | about 7 months | about $90,000 |
The pyramid under the Answer
Put the one sentence you want them to remember at the top. Under it, a few arguments that do not overlap. Under each argument, the facts behind it. In this example: fund the onboarding. It pays back within a year. It still pays back within a year if only half the benefit arrives. Drop anything that does not hold up the top line.
Which one to use
Our advice: use SCQA for the first minute of the meeting, and the pyramid for the page you send before it. A long deck with no clear recommendation usually needs the pyramid. A meeting that ends with "let's circle back" usually needs a sharper Question.
Sources: Barbara Minto, the Minto Pyramid course; Barbara Minto, the concept (SCQ framework). Other figures on this page are illustrative or our assumption.
Frequently asked questions
- What does SCQA stand for?
- Situation, Complication, Question, Answer. It gets a meeting from what everyone already agrees on to the one decision in front of them.
- How should the Question be phrased?
- As the single decision in front of the room, phrased as a choice between two or three options. For example: do we fund a new onboarding now, or keep the team on the current list?
- What is the difference between SCQA and the Minto Pyramid?
- SCQA is how you open: it leads the room to the question and gives the answer. The pyramid is how you defend the answer: one top line, a few arguments that do not overlap, and the facts under each.