Presentations · Glossary
What is a QBR (quarterly business review)?
A QBR, or quarterly business review, is a meeting held every three months to compare what happened against what was agreed and to set priorities for the next quarter. A customer QBR is run by a supplier with its client's decision makers; an internal QBR is run by a team or business unit for its own leadership.
A QBR is where a relationship or a plan gets checked against numbers rather than impressions, which is why a weak one quietly damages renewals and budgets. Most go wrong for the same reason: the deck reports activity when the room came to hear about outcomes.
Indunil Asanka · Co-founder
5 min read · Published
| Quarterly business review | Executive business review | Monthly business review | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cadence | Every three months | Once or twice a year, or at renewal | Every month |
| Audience | Client managers or unit leadership | Senior executives on both sides | Operational managers |
| Question it answers | Did the quarter meet the goals, and what next | Is the partnership worth continuing and expanding | Is the month on track |
| Typical length | 45 to 90 minutes | About an hour, mostly discussion | 30 to 60 minutes |
| Deck | 8 to 12 slides with a goal scorecard | A short strategic deck | A dashboard more than a deck |
| Decision at the end | Priorities for next quarter | Renewal, expansion or strategy change | Corrective actions |
Two kinds of QBR share one name
The term is used for two related meetings. In customer success and account management it is the review a supplier runs with a client, usually a software vendor, agency, outsourcer or logistics provider, to show the value delivered and agree what happens next. Inside a company it is the review a sales team, region or business unit presents to leadership, covering results against plan, pipeline, hiring and spend. The mechanics are the same in both: goals agreed at the start of the quarter, evidence against each goal, the problems that explain the gaps and a short list of commitments for the next three months. What differs is who is judging. A client is deciding whether to renew, and leadership is deciding where to put the next dollar and the next hire.
The order that works
Open with the goals that were agreed, scored plainly as met, missed or partly met, because that is the question in everyone's head. Then show the two or three numbers behind the score, with the comparison that gives each one meaning: against target, against last quarter or against the same quarter last year. After the scorecard come the reasons, including the uncomfortable ones, and then the risks that could affect the next quarter. The close is the part people remember: three priorities, each with an owner and a date, and any decision you need from the room. A customer QBR that starts with the supplier's product roadmap tells the client the meeting is about the supplier, and the attention goes before the value has been shown.
When the meeting matters most
The QBR two quarters before a renewal is the one that decides it, because it is the last formal chance to show value before the client starts comparing quotes. Internally, the QBR after a missed quarter matters more than the one after a good quarter, since it is where leadership decides whether the plan was wrong or the execution was. A QBR also matters when the people in the room have changed. A new chief financial officer at a client has no memory of why the contract was signed, so the deck has to restate the original goals rather than assume them. Busy decision makers often read the deck before or instead of attending, which is a strong argument for slides that make sense without a speaker.
Common mistakes
The first is reporting activity instead of outcomes: tickets closed, meetings held and features shipped say nothing about whether the client's goals moved. The second is a scorecard with twenty metrics, where nothing stands out and the one red number hides among green ones. The third is burying bad news on slide nine; surfacing a miss early, with its cause and fix, builds more trust than a polished recovery story at the end. The fourth is ending without decisions, so the next QBR repeats the same discussion. The fifth is a deck that only works with a presenter talking over it, which fails the moment it is forwarded to the person who signs the renewal.
Building a QBR deck in the slide builder
A QBR deck can be generated from a written brief of up to 8,000 characters, so the goals, the quarter's numbers and the risks can go into the prompt and land on metrics, comparison, timeline and checklist slides; the metrics role alone has 31 layouts. The customer QBR example linked on this page puts value delivered against the client's three onboarding goals on the second slide, before any roadmap. The example library also holds a sales QBR with attainment by rep and an internal quarterly review for a mixed quarter. Charts can be kept editable by exporting to editable PowerPoint, where 9 of the 10 chart kinds become native charts, which helps when finance wants to update a number before the meeting.
Questions people ask
Who should attend a customer QBR?
On the client side, the person who owns the budget or the renewal and the manager who uses the service day to day. On the supplier side, the account owner and one person who can commit resources. Keep it small enough for a real conversation, usually four to eight people, and send the deck to anyone senior who cannot attend.
How long before the meeting should the deck be sent?
Two to three working days is a common courtesy. It lets the client check the numbers against their own records, which avoids spending the meeting arguing about data. Hold back nothing important for a live reveal; a QBR is a working meeting, not a launch.
What if the client has no clear goals?
Set them in the first QBR. Propose two or three measurable goals tied to why they bought, agree them in the meeting and write them into the follow up email. Every later review then has something concrete to report against, which is the whole point of the format.
Is a QBR the same as a board meeting?
No. A board meeting is a governance meeting with formal papers, resolutions and minutes, attended by directors with legal duties. A QBR is a management or commercial review. A board may see a summary of the quarter's QBRs, but the board pack is a separate document with a different purpose.
Should pricing come up in a customer QBR?
Only when it is tied to value already shown, such as an expansion that follows a goal being met. Opening a QBR with an upsell turns a review into a sales call and makes the client guarded about sharing problems. If a renewal is near, flag the timeline and arrange a separate commercial conversation.
Can a QBR be done without slides?
A shared dashboard can replace the numbers, but a short deck still helps because it records what was agreed and travels to people who were not there. The minimum is a scorecard slide, a risks slide and a next quarter priorities slide, with owners and dates on the last one.
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