Verified against ChatGPT · 2026-08-06
Model runway scenarios with a trigger you'll actually act on, not just a number to watch
Turns cash balance, burn, and revenue assumptions into 2-3 runway scenarios with a pre-committed action trigger for each — arithmetic and scenario modeling only, explicitly not financial or investment advice.
The prompt
Ready to copy — highlighted parts are example details you can swap.
You are modeling cash runway scenarios. You compute the arithmetic and lay out the scenarios clearly. You do not tell the founder which scenario to choose or whether to raise money — that decision depends on context you don't have. CONTEXT Current cash balance: $410,000 Current monthly burn (net cash out): $62,000 Revenue growth assumption(s) you want modeled, stated as a range if uncertain: MRR growing 6-10% month over month, currently at $71,000 Cost changes under consideration (hire, cut, pause): A second engineer hire at $11,000/month fully loaded, currently paused pending this decision BASELINE RUNWAY Compute current runway in months as cash balance divided by current monthly burn, stated plainly with the exact arithmetic shown, not just the resulting number. SCENARIO TABLE Build 2-3 scenarios using A second engineer hire at $11,000/month fully loaded, currently paused pending this decision and MRR growing 6-10% month over month, currently at $71,000 — for example, a base case (no changes), an aggressive-hiring case, and a cost-freeze case. For each, show resulting monthly burn, resulting runway in months, and which single input assumption the scenario is most sensitive to (the one that, if wrong, changes the runway number the most). PRE-COMMITTED TRIGGERS For each scenario, state a specific, numeric trigger that would mean switching plans — e.g. "if monthly burn exceeds X" or "if runway drops below Y months" — decided now, in advance, rather than left to be judged in the moment when the number arrives alongside every other pressure of that month. SENSITIVITY FLAG Name explicitly which single assumption across all scenarios the runway numbers are most fragile to, and state in one sentence what a 20% miss on that specific assumption would do to the runway figure — this is arithmetic, not a prediction of whether the miss will happen. MANDATORY CLOSING LINE End with this exact line, unmodified: "These are scenario calculations only, not financial or investment advice — validate assumptions with your own numbers before acting on any trigger." OUTPUT FORMAT Baseline Runway, Scenario Table, Pre-Committed Triggers, Sensitivity Flag, then the mandatory closing line.
Customize
Optional — swap in your own details for the highlighted parts above.
Why this works
Computing runway as cash divided by burn is pure arithmetic, while deciding whether to cut costs, keep hiring, or go raise is a strategic judgment call the model has no standing to make — the same mechanical-versus-judgment separation that keeps a term-sheet mechanics explainer honest applies here just as directly, and the mandatory closing line exists for the same reason: to keep a scenario calculation from silently drifting into advice about which scenario a founder should actually choose. Requiring a pre-committed numeric trigger for each scenario — decided now, before the month arrives — is the same logic behind pre-committing a GTM test's pass/fail metric: a founder staring at a live cash balance in a stressful month, with payroll due and hope that revenue growth will accelerate, is a much worse judge of when to act than the same founder modeling scenarios calmly today, and a trigger fixed in advance removes the temptation to keep hoping past the point the numbers already answered the question. Modeling multiple scenarios against a stated range for {{revenue_growth_assumptions}}, rather than a single point estimate, surfaces exactly how fragile the runway number is to the input most likely to be wrong — a single-point projection built on one optimistic growth number gives false precision and hides how much of the runway figure is actually riding on that one unproven assumption, whereas naming the sensitivity explicitly (what a 20% miss on growth does to the number) turns an invisible risk into a visible one the founder can actually plan around instead of discovering three months late.
What you get back
Baseline runway: $410,000 ÷ $62,000/month ≈ 6.6 months at current burn. Scenarios: - Base case (no hire, current burn): runway ≈ 6.6 months. Most sensitive to revenue growth holding at 6%+ MoM. - Hire case (+$11,000/month): burn → $73,000/month, runway ≈ 5.6 months. Most sensitive to whether the hire accelerates revenue enough to offset the added burn within 2-3 months. - Cost-freeze case (defer hire, cut $8,000/month elsewhere): burn → $54,000/month, runway ≈ 7.6 months. Least sensitive to revenue assumptions of the three. Triggers: Hire case — reconsider if MoM growth drops below 5% for two consecutive months. Base case — treat runway dropping below 5 months as the point to revisit hiring plans regardless of sentiment at the time. Sensitivity: All three scenarios are most fragile to the revenue growth assumption; a 20% miss on 8% MoM growth (i.e., actual growth near 6.4%) would shrink runway by roughly 3-4 weeks across every scenario over a 6-month horizon. These are scenario calculations only, not financial or investment advice — validate assumptions with your own numbers before acting on any trigger.
Verified against
ChatGPT GPT-5.1 · 2026-08-06
Claude Sonnet 5 · 2026-08-02
Changelog
- 2026-08-06 — Initial publish, verified against ChatGPT GPT-5.1 and Claude Sonnet 5.
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