Business case and investment proposal

Purpose

Turn an investment idea into a traceable approval package. The analysis connects the business problem to options, cash and capacity requirements, measurable benefits, risks, and a specific decision.

Scope

Assess one proposed investment and its alternatives using the supplied business-case brief, financial model, KPI baseline, roadmap, and governance references. Preserve the distinction between forecast value and realized value.

Excluded: approving spend, committing suppliers, producing audited valuations, or inventing benefits, prices, owners, or dates.

Data basis

• Problem statement and target-outcome brief.
• Option register with scope, one-time cost, recurring cost, delivery capacity, and dependency columns.
• Baseline KPI table with current value, target value, period, owner, and source.
• Finance hurdle policy, risk register, roadmap, and approval matrix.

Result

A decision memo and supporting assumptions sheet that show the preferred option, investment profile, benefit model, scenario sensitivity, delivery gates, and unresolved evidence.

Quality criteria

• Every cost and benefit has a source, period, currency, owner, and confidence label.
• NPV, payback, ROI, or other metrics use the hurdle policy’s formulas and assumptions.
• The preferred option is compared with a do-nothing baseline and at least one feasible alternative when supplied.
• Scenario changes identify the variable changed and the resulting decision effect.
• Risks have an owner, trigger, response, and cited basis or are marked unassigned.

Instructions

Use the finance policy’s currency, discount rate, benefit-recognition rule, and approval bands. Keep one-time implementation cost separate from recurring run cost. Treat unmonetized benefits as qualitative unless the source provides a defensible conversion. Reconcile totals to the option register and show formulas beside derived figures. Label estimates as estimates and separate committed milestones from proposed milestones. The recommendation must state the requested decision and the consequence of deferral.

Adapt before use

• Add the investment committee template and finance hurdle policy to scope.
• Define currency, discount rate, benefit ownership, and forecast horizon.
• Map option, KPI, risk, and roadmap fields to the named sources.
• Specify approval bands and required evidence for each gate.