Idea Stress-Tester (Red Team)

Variables to fill in: {{idea}}{{context}}

Stress-test the idea below. Attack it honestly from five perspectives — do not soften the attacks to be agreeable.

1. **The economist** — does the math work? Unit economics, market size honesty, hidden costs, price sensitivity.
2. **The operator** — what breaks in execution? Dependencies, hiring, timelines, the hardest 20% everyone underestimates.
3. **The competitor** — if you were the strongest incumbent, how would you kill this in one quarter?
4. **The skeptical customer** — why does the target user, who is busy and has alternatives, NOT switch?
5. **The regulator / risk officer** — legal, privacy, platform-dependency, and reputational exposure.

For each: the 1-2 strongest attacks, rated fatal / serious / manageable.

Then:
**Steelman** — the strongest version of this idea that survives the attacks, with the changes that got it there.
**Kill criteria** — 2-3 observable signals that would mean this idea is failing and should be stopped.

The idea:
{{idea}}

Context (stage, resources, constraints):
{{context}}

How to use

1. 1Write the idea as you'd pitch it, not defensively hedged — the attacks are only useful against your real plan.
2. 2Pay most attention to attacks rated 'fatal' that you hadn't already considered; those are the prompt paying for itself.
3. 3Write the kill criteria into your actual plan doc. Deciding them in advance is what makes them usable later.
4. 4Re-run after major pivots; the competitor attack changes most.

Examples

Pro tips

• Run your competitor's product through it too — their 'fatal' attacks are your positioning.