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Use when justifying investment, resource allocation, or strategic decisions with financial and logical reasoning to ensure positive ROI and alignment with long-term goals.
Use when confronting a specific counterpart about a breach, violation, or adversarial behavior — situations where trust is already broken and the goal is accountability or resolution, not relationship-building. Not for giving developmental feedback (use feedback-coach) or building trust with new people (use rapport-builder).
Use when you need to act on a known political landscape — building coalitions, persuading specific people, or maneuvering to get a decision approved. Assumes you already know who the stakeholders are (if not, use stakeholder-discovery first to map them).
Use when building trust with people who don't yet know or trust you — new teams, new roles, hostile audiences, or strained relationships where the goal is connection before any ask. Applies Tactical Empathy through mirroring, labeling, and belonging cues. Not for confrontation (use difficult-conversations) or giving feedback (use feedback-coach).
Use as the mandatory evidence gate before signing off on any strategy, PRD, or business case—audits every key claim against documented sources and assigns calibrated probabilities.
Use when defining target users, customers, or audience segments to ensure they are grounded in real customer jobs rather than arbitrary demographics.
Use when performing a structured teardown of a specific competitor's activity system, moat, or vulnerability profile—requires at least one named rival to analyze.
| name | business-case |
| description | Use when justifying investment, resource allocation, or strategic decisions with financial and logical reasoning to ensure positive ROI and alignment with long-term goals. |
| license | MIT |
| compatibility | Claude Code and compatible agent products |
| metadata | {"type":"workflow","family":"workflow","rigor":"full","keywords":"ROI, investment-thesis, business-model, financial-projection, cost-benefit-analysis, runway, burn-rate, capital-allocation, resource-justification","requires":"problem-framing, buyer-persona, competitive-analysis","enhances":"pitch-deck, prd-writing","sources_pdf":"The Personal MBA (Kaufman), High Growth Handbook (Gil), Measure What Matters (Doerr), Venture Deals (Feld), The Psychology of Money (Housel), Practical Portfolio Performance (Bacon)","sources_web":"First Round Review: Startup Resource Justification"} |
This skill provides a rigorous framework for building an investment thesis. It forces the identification of explicit assumptions, calculation of ROI, and the simulation of worst-case scenarios to ensure that capital and resources are allocated only to initiatives with a clear path to "Sufficiency."
NO BUSINESS CASE WITHOUT EXPLICIT ASSUMPTIONS AND SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS
Uncertainty is inherent in business, but failing to model it is a choice. A business case that assumes a single linear outcome is a fantasy. You must simulate "The Plan Not Going According to Plan."
digraph business_case_flow {
"Discovery: Objectives" [shape=doublecircle];
"Step 1: Define Sufficiency & ROI" [shape=box];
"Step 2: Map the 5 Parts" [shape=box];
"Gate: Viable Economics?" [shape=diamond];
"Step 3: Sensitivity Analysis" [shape=box];
"Step 4: Audit Opportunity Cost" [shape=box];
"Case Approved" [shape=doublecircle];
"Discovery: Objectives" -> "Step 1: Define Sufficiency & ROI";
"Step 1: Define Sufficiency & ROI" -> "Step 2: Map the 5 Parts";
"Step 2: Map the 5 Parts" -> "Gate: Viable Economics?";
"Gate: Viable Economics?" -> "Step 3: Sensitivity Analysis" [label="viable"];
"Gate: Viable Economics?" -> "Step 1: Define Sufficiency & ROI" [label="failed"];
"Step 3: Sensitivity Analysis" -> "Step 4: Audit Opportunity Cost";
"Step 4: Audit Opportunity Cost" -> "Case Approved";
}
Define the exact revenue, user, or outcome level at which the initiative becomes "worthwhile to continue."
Justify how the initiative addresses:
Apply a "Margin of Safety."
Set one Objective (WHAT) and 3-5 Key Results (HOW).
REQUIRED SUB-SKILL: problem-framing — to ensure you are solving the right problem before investing. RECOMMENDED SUB-SKILL: decision-frameworks — to help weigh the subjective trade-offs identified in the audit.
| Thought | Reality |
|---|---|
| "The numbers speak for themselves." | Numbers are projections based on assumptions. The assumptions speak; the numbers just listen. |
| "We've already spent $1M, we can't stop now." | Sunk cost fallacy. Only future ROI matters for the decision to continue. |
| "We'll figure out the economics after we scale." | Scale without unit economics is just a faster way to go broke. |
| "Our competitor is doing it, so we must too." | Social comparison leads to copying outlier behavior that may not be repeatable for you. |
These thoughts mean STOP — you are about to shortcut: