Before language models wrote pitch decks in 30 seconds, some of us wrote business plans. Hundreds of them.
Mine?
About 300, give or take.
Mostly for startups looking to raise, pivot, or just make sense of their own idea.
No shortcuts. No prompts. Just sweat, frameworks, and the occasional existential crisis.
Here’s how I survived and what I’d still do today, even with all the tech in the world.
The Workflow That Didn’t Break
1. Start with the one page form.
If the business can’t be explained in one page (problem, solution, who pays, why now) it’s not ready for 30 pages.
2. Use a fill in the blanks template.
Not to write, but to think. My go to sections:
- Market thesis
- Pain, not just problem
- Value prop and differentiation
- GTM motion, by phase
- Team credibility (and gaps)
- Financial model logic, not just numbers
3. Write ugly, revise fast.
Draft everything badly first. Polish on pass two. Most founders waste weeks perfecting page one.
4. Force a “kill it” review.
Ask: what would make this fall apart in due diligence? Every plan has a weak point. Call it early, or investors will.
The Templates That Helped
My main template was this.
I kept three:
- A “one-pager” template to test coherence
- A “deck-to-doc” converter that mapped slide headlines to deeper narrative
- A “GTFO checklist” for anything too vague
They weren’t fancy. But they forced clarity.
The Sanity Checks That Mattered
- Would you fund this if it weren’t yours?
- Could someone read it on a plane and retell it by baggage claim?
- Is the team slide something you’d proudly forward to a stranger?
And the final one: If this plan disappeared tomorrow, could the company still operate?
Because the best business plans don’t live in PDFs. They live in the choices you make daily.
Even now, with LLMs ready to draft everything, that doesn’t change.
Use them to go faster.
But don’t let them think for you.
That part’s still yours.
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