Last week, I had again one of those conversations that a few years ago completely shifted how I think about business processes. You know the kind - where someone drops a casual observation that suddenly makes everything click into place.
I was talking about Event Modeling workshops, and how we use red sticky notes to mark knowledge gaps on our process maps. Simple concept, right? When we donât know something, we slap a red note on the board and keep moving.
Those red sticky notes arenât marking failures - theyâre marking discoveries.
The Larry Problem
Every company has a Larry. You know Larry - heâs the guy from Marketing who manually updates âthat spreadsheetâ every morning at 7 AM. The one where if Larry gets sick, half your customer onboarding process grinds to a halt. Larry doesnât think heâs critical - heâs just being helpful. Meanwhile, heâs a single point of failure holding million-dollar processes together.
The thing is, Larryâs invisible in your org chart. Heâs not documented in your SOPs. But heâs absolutely critical to your Event Model.
When we map out what actually happens (not what the process documentation says happens), Larry emerges from the shadows. Along with his spreadsheet. And his tribal knowledge. And his 7 AM alarm clock that your entire business depends on.
The Polite Conspiracy of Silence
Hereâs what Iâve learned after all those modeling sessions: most business process failures arenât technical problems - theyâre truth-telling problems.
There is someone who knows the process is broken. Theyâve known for months, maybe years. But in most corporate environments, you are either not head or even worse, rewarded for not speaking up. Stay quiet, donât rock the boat, let someone else take the risk of being wrong.
Politics.
So teams build software for processes that donât actually exist. They automate workflows that are held together with digital duct tape and good intentions. They spend months building âexactly what was requestedâ - which turns out to be completely wrong.
Event Modeling changes this because you canât lie to a visual model. When you have to literally draw out what happens next, the gaps become visible to everyone in the room. The polite conspiracy of silence crumbles when faced with a board full of red sticky notes.
Visual Evidence
those red sticky notes give you permission to deliver bad news without being the bad guy.
You canât walk into a C-level meeting and say âYour processes suck.â But you can show them an Event Model blinking in blood red and say âEvery red sticky note represents a potential problem.â
Itâs not YOU saying their system is broken - itâs the MODEL saying it. The problems were always there, hiding in plain sight. You just made them visible.
And suddenly, what was once threatening becomes tactical. Instead of defending broken processes, teams start counting red sticky notes. âWe started with 47 unknowns - letâs see if we can get down to 30 by Friday.â
Youâve turned organizational dysfunction into a measurable, solvable game.
The Questions That Matter
Next time youâre in a requirements meeting, ask yourself:
- How many âLarrysâ are holding this process together?
- What are we pretending to understand that we actually donât?
- If we had to draw this process step-by-step, where would the red sticky notes go?
Because hereâs the truth: what is made visible can be tackled.
Your biggest business problems arenât hiding in complex technical architectures. Theyâre hiding in the gaps between what people say happens and what actually happens. Theyâre in the knowledge that lives in Larryâs head but nowhere in your documentation.
The red sticky notes just help you find them.
Ready to uncover whatâs really happening in your business processes? The next Event Modeling Mastery Workshop will happen in October 2025 - only 12 spots available. 2 days, 2x 4h - teaching you the foundatios of Event Modeling. Because sometimes the most valuable discovery is admitting what you donât know.
Martin Dilger Founder, Nebulit Making the invisible visible, one red sticky note at a time
Join the Agentic Engineer Program
Apply Spec-Driven Development Hands-On - Event Modeling, Event Sourcing, and AI Engineering with autonomous agents.
Book a Call Today
Want to talk through how Event Modeling could work for your team or project? Letâs have a quick, no-pressure conversation.