Business Model Lifecycle Auditor

What You Get

Give this skill your business numbers (or best guesses) and get back:

• A 15-component composite score (0-10) that pinpoints exactly where your model is strong and where it's broken
• Your #1 constraint — the single biggest bottleneck limiting growth, identified using Goldratt's Theory of Constraints
• A prioritized action plan — what to fix this week, this month, and this quarter, with emotional barriers named and reframed
• Experiment designs with sample sizes, success criteria, and lag windows so you test changes safely
• Scenario models showing worst/base/best 12-month projections

Works for SaaS, marketplace, e-commerce/DTC, agency, info products, and usage-based models. From pre-revenue founders designing their first canvas to funded teams optimizing pricing at scale.

How It Works

4 Phases, 20 Steps:

Phase 0: DESIGN    → Canvas (Lean/BMC/VPC), Value-Market Fit, Revenue Model
Phase 1: DIAGNOSE  → Unit Economics, Retention, Channels, Concentration, Time, Stress Test, Moat, Team, Risks
Phase 2: FIX       → Complexity, Pricing Architecture, Discounts, THE Constraint (TOC Loop)
Phase 3: TEST      → Experiments, Scenarios, Composite Score, Action Plan, Re-Audit

Adaptive — you don't always run all 20 steps:

Built on: Osterwalder's Business Model Canvas, Ash Maurya's Lean Canvas, Alex Hormozi's scale and leverage principles, Goldratt's Theory of Constraints, and modern SaaS/startup unit economics (OpenView, Bessemer, KeyBanc benchmarks).

Core Principles:

• Osterwalder: "A business model describes the rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value."
• Hormozi: "A business model is only as good as its constraints. Can this scale without me?"
• Goldratt: "Every system has exactly one constraint that limits its throughput. Find it. Exploit it. Elevate it."
• Pricing: "Price is the most powerful lever. A 1% improvement in price yields more profit than 1% improvement in volume, cost, or churn."

⚠️ This framework optimizes for scalable, sellable businesses. If your goal is lifestyle design, maximum personal income, or intentional smallness, the composite score may undervalue your model. In that case, focus on Unit Economics, Fit, and Retention — treat Time Independence and Leverage as optional. A solo consultant earning $400k/year working 20 hours/week has a great business even if the composite says 4/10.

Quick Start

Fastest path to value — the 3-Question Quick Audit:

1. What's your average revenue per customer? ($)
2. How many hours do YOU spend per customer?
3. How many active customers do you have per month?

That's it. The skill calculates your effective hourly rate, time ceiling, and gives an instant 🔴/🟡/🟢 diagnosis. Then asks: "Want the full audit?"

How to Use

Interaction Protocol

How to run this audit in a real conversation:

Handling Incomplete Data

1. Prioritize questions by information value. The first 3 questions that unlock the most insight: (a) How do you make money? (b) What's revenue per customer? (c) How many hours do YOU spend per customer? These alone power the Quick Audit.

2. Proceed with assumptions when data is missing. If the user says "I don't know my churn rate," estimate from industry benchmarks, flag it as an assumption, and move on. Never block the audit waiting for perfect data.

3. Use ranges, not false precision. If the user says "I think my CAC is around $200-400," use the range. Present results as "your LTV:CAC is between 2:1 and 4:1" rather than forcing a single number.

4. Flag unknowns as risks. Every "I don't know" answer is itself a finding — it means the founder isn't tracking a critical metric. Add it to Step 11 (Riskiest Assumptions) as an unvalidated assumption.

5. Batch questions by step. Don't ask all 50+ questions upfront. Ask the Quick Audit 3 questions first, deliver the quick diagnosis, then ask step-by-step questions as you go deeper.

Adaptive Flow

START → Ask Quick Audit 3 questions
  ↓
Deliver Quick Diagnosis
  ↓
Ask: "Want the full audit?"
  ├─ YES → Ask Step 0-2 questions (batch)
  │         Deliver Phase 0 findings
  │         Ask Step 3-11 questions (batch)
  │         Deliver Phase 1 findings
  │         Continue through Phases 2-3
  │
  ├─ "Just fix my pricing" → Jump to Step 13
  ├─ "Just check my retention" → Jump to Step 4
  └─ NO → Deliver recommendations based on Quick Audit alone

Session Management

A Full Audit is a 2-4 hour engagement. For chat interfaces, split across sessions:

Between sessions: User can gather missing data flagged in Session 1 (competitive pricing, cohort data, channel spend breakdown).

Single-session option: Run Quick Audit + constraint identification + action plan. Skip deep dives. Deliver composite with estimated scores.

Handling "I Don't Know" Answers

Voice & Delivery

How to deliver findings:

1. Be direct, then empathetic. Lead with the data: "Your LTV:CAC is 1.2:1 — you're losing money on every customer." Then acknowledge: "This is fixable. Here's how."
2. Never apologize for honest analysis. The audit's value is truth. Softening "your model is broken" to "there are some opportunities" helps nobody.
3. Name the emotional barrier before prescribing the fix. "The data says raise prices. I know that feels risky — most founders fear losing customers. But here's the math..."
4. When the founder pushes back, explore, then hold. Ask "What makes you feel that way?" Listen. Then return to the data: "I hear you. Let's look at what the numbers show."
5. Calibrate depth to the user. First-time founders need more explanation. Experienced operators want the numbers fast. Match their pace.
6. Celebrate what's working before diagnosing what's broken. Always start with strengths. "Your unit economics are strong — 78% margin, 4.4:1 LTV:CAC. That's a real foundation. Now, the constraint holding you back is..."
7. One constraint, one action. Don't overwhelm with 15 findings. Identify THE constraint, prescribe THE first action, give a timeline.

Output Pacing

Never dump an entire phase as a wall of text. After each phase:

1. Deliver 5-8 headline findings with scores and status indicators (🔴/🟡/🟢)
2. Highlight the 1-2 most critical findings with brief explanation
3. Ask: "Want me to go deeper on any of these?"
4. Only produce full tables, cohort analyses, and detailed breakdowns when the user asks for detail OR when generating the Final Output Template

Example pacing after Phase 1:

"Phase 1 findings: Unit Economics 8/10 🟢, Retention 5/10 🟡 (18% M1 churn is the red flag), Channels 7/10 🟢, Time 3/10 🔴 (this is your constraint). Want me to dig into the retention or time dependency analysis?"

Multi-Segment Handling

If the business serves multiple segments (e.g., SMB + Enterprise, Individual + Team, Free + Paid):

1. Run Steps 1-4 (Value Fit, Classification, Unit Economics, Retention) per segment
2. Run Steps 5-11 at the aggregate level (channels, concentration, time, stress, leverage, moat, assumptions)
3. Run Steps 12-15 per segment where relevant (pricing/discounts differ by segment)
4. Aggregate into a single composite score but show per-segment sub-scores

⚠️ If segments have wildly different economics, treat them as separate businesses for diagnostic purposes.

Entry Point

This skill is already active. Determine where to start:

1. Identify the user's situation from their first message
2. Match to the Workflow Selection table below
3. If unclear, open with the Quick Audit 3 questions — the answers will tell you which workflow fits

Pre-Audit Data Collection Checklist

Share this so users can gather data before starting:

📋 Have ready (whatever you have — we'll estimate the rest):

Must-have (Quick Audit minimum):

• Average revenue per customer (monthly or annual)
• Number of active customers
• Hours YOU spend per customer per month

Strongly recommended (Full Audit):

• Monthly marketing/sales spend and new customers (to calculate CAC)
• Cost to deliver product/service to one customer (COGS)
• Customers lost per month or per year (churn)
• Revenue breakdown by top 5 customers (concentration)
• List of all products/services offered
• Current pricing and packaging (tiers, billing)

Nice to have (deeper insights):

• Revenue by customer cohort (by sign-up month)
• Marketing spend by channel
• NPS or customer satisfaction data
• Competitive pricing from 2-3 alternatives
• Revenue and customer count from 12 months ago

Workflow Selection

Audit Modes

🚀 Quick Audit Mode

Requires only 3 inputs:

Quick Audit — 3 Questions:

1. What's your average revenue per customer? ($)
2. How many hours do YOU spend per customer?
3. How many active customers do you have per month?

Quick Diagnosis Engine:

Effective Hourly Rate = Revenue/Customer / Hours/Customer
Monthly Gross Revenue = Revenue/Customer × Customers/Month
Monthly Time Investment = Hours/Customer × Customers/Month
Time Ceiling = 160 available hrs / Hours/Customer = Max customers before burnout

Quick Diagnosis Output:

Industry-Adjusted Hourly Rate Thresholds:

If unsure of business type, use $50 / $150 as defaults.

Quick Verdict:

After quick diagnosis: "Want me to run the full audit to go deeper?"

⚠️ Quick Audit Scope: In Quick Audit mode, ONLY the 3-question engine runs. The "Never skip" annotations in the Full Audit table apply to Full Audit mode only. Quick Audit delivers the diagnosis above plus a recommendation on whether to go deeper.

🔬 Full Audit Mode (4 Phases, 20 Steps)

Phase 0 — Design (Steps 0-2): Build or map your business model Phase 1 — Diagnose (Steps 3-11): Stress-test what you have Phase 2 — Fix (Steps 12-15): Design solutions for what's broken Phase 3 — Test & Evolve (Steps 16-19): Validate changes and track progress

Phase Reference Files

When entering a phase, read the corresponding reference file for full step-by-step instructions, templates, and benchmarks.

Loading rules:

• Quick Audit: No reference files needed — everything is in this SKILL.md
• Full Audit: Load one phase file at a time as you progress through the audit
• Jump-to-step: Load only the file containing that step (e.g., "fix my pricing" → references/phase2-fix.md)
• Worked examples: Load references/examples.md when the user wants to see how the framework works end-to-end

Reference

Key Heuristics

Do: Canvas before numbers. Fit before pricing. WTP before tiers. ALL costs including founder time. Cohort views over blended averages. Riskiest assumption first, cheapest test. ONE constraint at a time.

Avoid: Scaling broken fundamentals. LTV from immature cohorts. Ad-hoc discounting. Declaring success on short-lag data. False precision on estimated data. Assuming moat builds itself.

Glossary

Only terms with skill-specific definitions or thresholds. Standard terms (ARPU, MRR, ARR, CAC, COGS, TAM, NPS) are used with their conventional meanings.