1. Inventory without flattery
Map every event you currently score. Strike anything that cannot be reproduced from logs. Most teams discover they have been scoring derived metrics as if they were facts.
Flagship programme
Signal Weighting Lab
You will leave with a documented scoring model, a change log a colleague can audit, and a short board sentence that refuses to flatten depth into a single happy number. You will not leave with a vendor-ready dashboard.
Modules
2. Dignity of actions
Assign provisional weights in public. An open cannot outrank a completed job unless you write a paragraph explaining why your product is a magazine.
3. Session as sequence
Replace duration with ordered jobs. We mark drop-offs that the UI caused, and we refuse to call those “low engagement.”
4. Quiet weeks
Especially for B2B: model expected silence. Penalising a finance admin for month-end cadence is a scoring error, not a retention insight.
5. Confidence and exclusions
Publish who is out of the score and why. Internal testers, support logins, and leaked invite codes belong on a list, not in the mean.
6. The board sentence
One paragraph that a sceptical director can read. If the number moved because you changed a weight, the sentence must say so.
Learning outcomes
By the end of the lab you can defend every weight in writing, reconstruct the score from the event dictionary, and separate product failure from calendar silence. You can also say no to a request for a single traffic-light that hides the change log.
You will not be qualified as a data engineer. Warehouse design, identity resolution at scale, and streaming infrastructure sit outside this lab on purpose.
Instructor
Helen Okoye
Helen spent nine years inside UK product orgs arguing about whether a “habit loop” was just a notification. She now teaches the Signal Weighting Lab from Norman Cross and marks change logs herself. Her notes are blunt; her office hours are not optional if your score uses a black-box vendor blend.
Informational fee
The published lab seat is £1,860 for twelve weeks, including critique hours and written marks. Materials-only Desk Copy access is listed on fees. This page does not take payment. Enrolment is arranged by note; we confirm seats in writing.
From people who sat this lab
Module four forced us to stop treating a two-week gap as churn. I still think the homework is too wordy. The score we use on Mondays came from those words.
★★★★★
Helen will not let you keep a weight you cannot say in a sentence. Annoying. Correct.
Questions we actually get
Do I need a data team?
You need someone who can export an event sample and a dictionary. If your logging is a mess, we will spend two weeks on inventory and you will not finish a glamorous model. That is a real limit of the lab, not a marketing footnote.
Is this a certification?
No. You receive a marked change log and a letter stating you completed the cohort. Employers who want a certificate should look elsewhere.
Can my whole team sit in?
One seat is one voice in critique. Extra listeners can buy Desk Copy. Live argument does not scale to a silent gallery.
What if I miss a Tuesday?
Recordings exist for illness. Habitual absence means we stop marking. The lab is not a content library with a chat window.