How we go bankrupt in 2026
Optimism destroys companies. Use the Pre-Mortem protocol to predict your failure so you can prevent it.
Optimism is for the marketing team. The CEO is paid to be paranoid.
Daniel Kahneman’s Pre-Mortem flips the script: Don’t ask “What might go wrong?”
Ask: “It is June 2026. We failed. Why?”
Hindsight is 20/20. The only way to win is to move the hindsight to today.
The Prompt
Act as a Short Seller researching my company.
We are betting the company on: [Strategic Initiative/Launch].
Assume it is June 2026. It failed. The stock/revenue crashed.
1. The Autopsy: Write the Wall Street Journal article explaining exactly why. Focus on ignored external risks (Macro, Regulation, Competitor moves).
2. The Blind Spot: What technology or consumer shift did we dismiss as "irrelevant" today that actually killed us?
3. The Insurance: Give me 3 leading indicators I need on my dashboard today to catch this early.
The Executive Upgrade
Running a Pre-Mortem is easy. Acting on it is hard.
Most execs see the risks, say “We’ll keep an eye on that,” and then ignore them until it’s too late.
You don’t need “awareness.” You need Tripwires.
A Tripwire is a metric that forces a decision automatically, removing your ego from the equation.
Here are the two Governance Protocols to institutionalise the paranoia.
Follow-Up Prompt 1: The Tripwire Design
(Use this to automate your reaction)
