Decision Review ยท Know before you commit
Is your business case strong enough to justify the investment?
Describe the commitment and add the documents behind it. In about a minute you get a recommendation, the figures recomputed by code, and the assumptions that would change the answer. A few minutes later, an audited in-depth review.
Commitment reviewed
A $225,000 order-processing system
Intended result
Lower order-entry costs and errors, without delaying deliveries
Recommendation
Get specific evidence first
Next action
Establish which spending would actually fall and what work remains.
The problem
A business case can add up and still be wrong
The sponsor has reasons. Finance has numbers. Operations has a plan. Each may have done a useful review, yet the proposal can still depend on an assumption nobody has checked.
Expected savings may depend on eliminating work that still needs to be done. New equipment may add capacity without enough demand to use it. A system may work technically while nobody owns the work needed to produce the business result.
The hard part isn't more analysis. It's knowing which assumptions could change the decision, whether the evidence answers them, and what to do next.
The numbers can add up while the decision still depends on an untested assumption.
Before you commit the money, test the business case.
How it's usually checked
Each usual check leaves a gap
Most business cases get one of three reviews before the money is committed.
Your own team
They know the business best.
But the people who built the case share its assumptions, and checking it competes with their day jobs.
Outside advisers
They bring independence and depth.
But an engagement takes weeks and a budget of its own, more than many commitments can justify.
A general AI chat
It's fast and often sharp on framing.
But it can't show its quotes are real or that it re-added the numbers. In our testing, two chat tools missed a wrong budget total in 4 of 10 runs.
What Decision Review does differently
A recommendation you can check, not just trust
One focused review of one commitment, using the documents you already have.
Starts with what exists
Add the business case, budget, proposal and records you already have. If something is missing, it names exactly what, and only when it could change the answer.
Every figure checked by code
Code recomputes the numbers and marks each input as taken from your documents, with the exact passage, or as an assumption.
What would change the answer
For each figure the recommendation depends on, code works out how far it can move before the answer flips.
An answer in about a minute
One of five findings, a short plan, the main risk and a script for replying to whoever is waiting on the decision.
Audited before it reaches you
The in-depth review is audited. A version that doesn't pass is corrected and audited again, or held for our staff to review.
Remembers what happened
Record what you decided. We ask at 30 and 90 days, and later reviews for your company draw on earlier decisions and their outcomes.
What we review
One defined operating commitment at a time
Any commitment that's hard to undo once the money is spent. For example:
Business systems
Buying or replacing ERP, CRM or other business software; upgrading a system; expanding a rollout.
Process changes
Changing approvals, handoffs, service delivery or workflows to improve cost, speed or reliability.
Equipment and capacity
Adding equipment, production or warehouse capacity, or another operating location based on expected demand and return.
Automation
Automating document handling, order processing, reporting or a defined workflow, including a specific AI use case.
Vendors and services
Replacing a major operating supplier, changing service arrangements or bringing a defined process in-house.
Project commitments
Approving the next project phase, extending a pilot or deciding whether further spending is justified.
Decision Review examines the business case and the work needed to deliver its promised result. It is not engineering, legal, tax, cybersecurity, valuation or acquisition due diligence. When a decision depends on a specialist determination, it names the exact question for your qualified people or advisers.
The outcome
Five possible findings
The commitment should fit the evidence and the consequence of being wrong.
Proceed
The evidence supports the defined commitment, the operating requirements are feasible, and the remaining risk is within the decision owner's accepted limits.
Proceed with changes
Specific changes make the commitment supportable, and the evidence already supports them. The brief states what must change and how completion should be checked.
Test before committing
A bounded trial can resolve an uncertainty that matters in time to inform the decision, with a defined question, exposure, measures, owner and stopping conditions.
Get specific evidence first
A missing fact or conflict could change the decision and can be resolved through records, analysis, clarification or specialist review.
Do not proceed
The proposal breaches a binding constraint, has an unfavorable case on the evidence, or carries downside beyond the decision owner's accepted limit.
A resolvable evidence gap calls for a specific check or test. It does not, by itself, establish that the proposal should be rejected.
In our testing
It finds what the paper got wrong
We tested Decision Review on a fictional business case for route-planning software, with errors planted in its budget and benefits.
Every run recomputed the true figures from the underlying documents and showed which inputs came from the documents and which were assumptions.
Decision Review is a new Emergent Skills method under evaluation. It gives a recommendation; you keep the decision.
Year-one cost
Paper said
$108,000Recomputed $390,520Year-one net benefit
Paper said
$702,000Recomputed $239,480
Fictional test case. Figures from our own test runs.
Know before you commit
What do you need to know before you commit?
Describe the decision, add your documents, and see a recommendation in about a minute.