Integrated Social Venture Planning and Decision Making

Introduction

A social venture is not investment-ready merely because it addresses an important social problem. It must demonstrate that the problem is significant, the proposed solution is valued, the operating model is feasible, the economics are credible, governance is trustworthy, and impact can be measured and improved. Integrated social venture planning brings these requirements together in one decision system.

This chapter focuses on the transition from analysis to disciplined action. It explains how an entrepreneur can synthesize opportunity analysis, stakeholder evidence, business modeling, finance, governance, impact measurement, and risk analysis into a coherent plan. It also examines how these elements should be defended in a professional pitch to investors, grant makers, public agencies, partners, and affected communities.

An integrated plan is more than a written document. It is a set of connected claims:

• a social problem exists and is sufficiently important;
• a defined group experiences that problem;
• the venture’s intervention can plausibly improve outcomes;
• users, payers, partners, and regulators will support adoption;
• revenue and funding can sustain operations;
• governance will protect mission and stakeholder interests;
• risks are recognized and managed; and
• evidence will be collected to test whether the venture creates genuine value.

The quality of a plan depends not on the attractiveness of each section in isolation, but on the consistency among sections. For example, a plan promising affordable services to low-income customers must ensure that its pricing, cost structure, subsidy strategy, impact assumptions, and cash-flow forecasts support that promise.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this chapter, students should be able to:

1. Integrate opportunity, stakeholder, business-model, financial, governance, impact, and risk evidence into a social venture plan.
2. Distinguish between outputs, outcomes, impact, and financial performance.
3. Construct and interpret a theory of change and a social venture business model.
4. Apply basic financial measures, including contribution margin, break-even volume, runway, and discounted cash flow.
5. Design governance and accountability arrangements appropriate to a mission-driven organization.
6. Identify major operational, financial, ethical, regulatory, and mission risks.
7. Evaluate the credibility of assumptions and use sensitivity analysis in decision making.
8. Present and defend an investment-ready plan through a professional pitch.

1. From Opportunity Recognition to Integrated Planning

Opportunity analysis in social entrepreneurship involves more than identifying an unmet need. It requires determining whether a feasible and ethically acceptable intervention can create value for a community while supporting organizational survival.

A useful opportunity statement specifies four elements:

1. Population: Who experiences the problem?
2. Problem: What condition causes avoidable harm or unmet need?
3. Context: Why does the problem persist, and what institutions shape it?
4. Intervention opportunity: What change might the venture make, and through what mechanism?

The entrepreneur should distinguish a symptom from a root cause. For instance, low school attendance may be associated with poor learning outcomes, but the underlying causes may include transport costs, safety concerns, household labor demands, inaccessible teaching methods, or inadequate school quality. Each cause implies a different venture model.

Evidence hierarchy

Strong planning uses multiple forms of evidence:

• Experiential evidence: interviews, observation, focus groups, and user narratives.
• Descriptive evidence: administrative data, surveys, demographic statistics, and market research.
• Comparative evidence: benchmarks, control groups, historical trends, or comparisons with similar communities.
• Causal evidence: evaluations that test whether the intervention itself contributed to observed change.
• Commercial evidence: willingness-to-pay tests, pilot sales, retention rates, letters of intent, and partner commitments.

No single evidence type is sufficient. A compelling personal story establishes importance but does not establish scale. A large market estimate establishes potential reach but does not prove willingness to adopt. A pilot outcome may indicate promise but may not generalize to other locations.

A disciplined plan records each major assumption, the evidence supporting it, its confidence level, and the test required to validate it.

2. Stakeholder Evidence and the Theory of Change

Social ventures operate in systems containing beneficiaries, customers, funders, employees, suppliers, government bodies, community leaders, and sometimes actors who may oppose the intervention. A stakeholder is any person or group that affects, is affected by, or has a legitimate interest in the venture.

Stakeholder analysis should examine at least four questions:

• What does this stakeholder value?
• What power or influence does the stakeholder possess?
• What contribution or resource can the stakeholder provide?
• What harm or risk could result if the stakeholder is ignored?

The beneficiary is not always the paying customer. A child may benefit from an education service, while a parent, school, government agency, or donor pays. This creates a multi-sided value proposition and requires careful attention to possible conflicts. The payer may prefer low cost and rapid delivery, while beneficiaries may need quality, privacy, and participation.

Theory of change

A theory of change explains how venture activities are expected to produce social results. Its typical chain is:

Inputs → Activities → Outputs → Outcomes → Impact

• Inputs are resources such as capital, staff, technology, facilities, and partnerships.
• Activities are actions undertaken by the venture.
• Outputs are immediate products or services delivered.
• Outcomes are changes in knowledge, behavior, access, income, health, or institutional performance.
• Impact is the broader and more durable social or environmental change to which the venture contributes.

A theory of change should state assumptions. For example, a digital health venture may assume that users have access to a phone, trust remote advice, follow recommendations, and can reach a clinic when referral is necessary. These assumptions are not administrative details; they determine whether the causal chain is credible.

A theory of change is not a promise that the venture alone causes all observed improvement. Social outcomes are affected by economic conditions, public policy, household behavior, and other organizations. Therefore, responsible claims use language such as “contributes to” unless stronger causal evidence exists.

3. Business Model Integration

The business model explains how the venture creates, delivers, and captures value. A social venture should make three forms of value explicit:

1. Social value: improvement in human well-being, equity, rights, or environmental conditions.
2. Customer value: benefits perceived by the person or organization receiving or purchasing the offering.
3. Organizational value: revenue, grants, partnerships, capabilities, and legitimacy that sustain operations.

The Business Model Canvas can be adapted for social ventures by adding beneficiary segments, impact measures, mission risks, and funding relationships. Its conventional components are customer segments, value propositions, channels, customer relationships, revenue streams, key resources, key activities, key partnerships, and cost structure.

A useful planning table connects business and impact logic:

Cross-subsidy and blended revenue

Many social ventures combine earned income, grants, donations, public contracts, and investment. Cross-subsidy occurs when one customer group pays more than the cost of serving it, allowing the venture to serve another group at a lower price. This model is viable only if the profitable segment remains sufficiently large and the subsidy relationship is transparent.

Blended finance combines capital with different financial expectations. A grant may fund experimentation, a recoverable grant may finance expansion, and an investor may provide growth capital. The plan must explain the purpose, conditions, reporting requirements, and risk implications of each source.

4. Financial Feasibility and Decision Analysis

Financial analysis does not replace mission analysis, but it reveals whether the venture can continue delivering value. Forecasts should distinguish assumptions from known facts and should include income statements, cash-flow forecasts, balance-sheet implications where relevant, and scenario analysis.

Contribution margin and break-even

The contribution margin per unit is the amount remaining from each sale after variable cost:

where CM is contribution margin per unit, P is selling price per unit, and V is variable cost per unit. All monetary values must use the same currency and period.

The contribution margin ratio is:

The break-even volume, assuming constant price, constant unit variable cost, and fixed costs within the relevant operating range, is:

where Q_BE is break-even units and F is fixed cost for the period. This formula is applicable when the venture sells one principal unit or when a weighted-average contribution margin is used for a stable sales mix.

Worked example. A social enterprise sells water filters for $30. Variable cost is $18 per filter and monthly fixed costs are $6,000.

CM = $30 − $18 = $12 per filter.

Q_BE = $6,000 ÷ $12 = 500 filters per month.

At 500 filters, sales revenue is $15,000 and variable cost is $9,000, leaving $6,000 to cover fixed costs. The result is an operating break-even point, not necessarily a cash-flow break-even point, because payment delays, inventory purchases, taxes, debt service, and capital expenditure may still create cash requirements.

Runway and working capital

Runway estimates how long an organization can operate before available cash is exhausted. With a constant net cash burn:

where C is unrestricted cash available and B is average monthly net cash burn. The assumption of constant burn makes this a simple planning estimate. Seasonal revenue, staged grants, debt repayments, and growth spending require a month-by-month cash-flow model instead.

Working capital is especially important where a venture pays suppliers before receiving customer or grant payments. A profitable venture can fail if it cannot meet obligations when they fall due.

Discounted cash flow

For an investment decision, future cash flows can be converted to present value:

Here, NPV is net present value, I₀ is the initial investment at time zero, CFₜ is net cash flow in period t, r is the discount rate per period, and n is the number of periods. The cash flows and discount rate must use matching periods. A positive NPV indicates that financial returns exceed the specified discount rate under the stated assumptions; it does not prove social impact.

For social ventures, financial NPV may be supplemented by social return analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, or a social impact valuation. Such methods require caution because assigning monetary values to dignity, health, rights, or environmental benefits can introduce false precision. A transparent dashboard often communicates impact more responsibly than one composite score.

Sensitivity and scenario analysis

Sensitivity analysis changes one assumption while holding others constant, such as price, retention, cost, or grant timing. Scenario analysis changes several related assumptions together. At minimum, plans should include base, optimistic, and adverse cases.

For example, if a venture’s break-even point depends heavily on retention, the decision question is not simply “What is expected retention?” but “What retention level makes the model viable, and what evidence will be collected before scaling?” This converts forecasting into staged decision making.

5. Governance, Accountability, and Mission Protection

Governance is the system by which authority is allocated, decisions are made, performance is monitored, and stakeholders can hold leaders accountable. Legal form matters, but legal form alone does not guarantee responsible governance.

A social venture plan should specify:

• ownership and voting rights;
• board composition and competencies;
• representation of affected communities;
• conflicts-of-interest procedures;
• financial controls and authorization limits;
• safeguarding and data-protection responsibilities;
• reporting duties to investors, donors, regulators, and beneficiaries; and
• mechanisms for complaints, whistleblowing, and remedy.

Mission drift occurs when financial or institutional pressures gradually redirect the venture away from its intended beneficiaries or outcomes. Mission protection can include a clear mission clause, reserved matters requiring special approval, beneficiary representation, impact covenants, transparent pricing commitments, and regular mission audits.

Governance also involves ethical judgment. A venture collecting sensitive health or poverty data must obtain informed consent where appropriate, minimize data collection, secure records, define retention periods, and explain how automated decisions affect people. The principle of “do no harm” requires attention to exclusion, stigma, dependency, labor conditions, and unintended consequences.

6. Impact Measurement and Learning

Impact measurement should support decisions rather than merely produce attractive reports. A good measurement system links each important outcome to an indicator, data source, frequency, responsible person, baseline, target, and decision rule.

Indicators should be valid, reliable, feasible, disaggregated where equity matters, and resistant to manipulation. A high number of people served may conceal low completion or poor quality. A satisfaction score may not demonstrate improved welfare.

Where possible, the venture should establish a baseline before intervention and define the period of measurement. A simple change measure is:

where Y₀ is the baseline outcome and Y₁ is the later outcome. This measures change but does not establish that the venture caused it. A comparison group, randomized design, matched comparison, or credible qualitative explanation may strengthen causal interpretation.

Impact measurement has opportunity costs. Excessive data collection can divert funds from delivery and burden beneficiaries. The appropriate question is: what minimum credible evidence is needed for operational learning, accountability, and the next decision?

7. Risk Analysis and Decision Gates

Risk is the possibility that uncertainty will affect objectives. A risk register should record the risk, cause, consequence, likelihood, severity, owner, existing controls, mitigation, early-warning indicator, and contingency response.

A simple qualitative risk rating may classify likelihood and impact as low, medium, or high. Multiplying ordinal scores can create a rough prioritization aid, but it should not be treated as a precise probability model. The quality of discussion matters more than the numerical label.

Common social venture risks include:

• Demand risk: users or payers do not adopt the offering.
• Impact risk: the intervention produces weak or harmful outcomes.
• Financial risk: revenue, grants, or investment arrive later than expected.
• Operational risk: supply, staffing, quality, or technology fails.
• Regulatory risk: licensing, tax, procurement, or data rules are breached.
• Reputational risk: misconduct or exaggerated claims reduce trust.
• Mission risk: growth or investor pressure changes the beneficiary focus.
• Safeguarding risk: vulnerable people experience abuse, exclusion, or exploitation.

Decision gates reduce irreversible commitment. For example:

1. Discovery gate: proceed only if problem evidence and stakeholder legitimacy are adequate.
2. Pilot gate: proceed only if users engage and delivery quality is acceptable.
3. Scale gate: proceed only if unit economics, working capital, impact signals, and governance capacity support expansion.
4. Renewal gate: continue, adapt, or stop based on evidence rather than sunk costs.

A responsible plan identifies conditions under which the venture will pause or discontinue an intervention. The willingness to stop is a mark of evidence-based management, not failure.

8. Building the Investment-Ready Plan

An investment-ready plan should be concise enough to use and detailed enough to verify. A recommended structure is:

1. Executive case: the problem, solution, target population, traction, capital request, and intended outcomes.
2. Problem and opportunity: scale, causes, affected stakeholders, and evidence quality.
3. Solution and theory of change: activities, outputs, outcomes, assumptions, and limitations.
4. Market and stakeholder analysis: users, payers, alternatives, partners, competitors, and adoption barriers.
5. Business model: value proposition, channels, revenue, costs, and scaling logic.
6. Operations: people, technology, supply chain, quality controls, and implementation timetable.
7. Impact measurement: indicators, baselines, targets, methods, and reporting responsibilities.
8. Governance and legal structure: authority, accountability, safeguarding, and mission protection.
9. Financial model: assumptions, forecast, cash needs, scenarios, break-even, and funding use.
10. Risk register: principal risks, mitigations, triggers, and contingencies.
11. Investment proposition: amount requested, instrument, milestones, investor or funder returns, and reporting terms.
12. Implementation roadmap: priorities for the next 12, 24, and 36 months.

Every major number should be traceable to an assumption or source. Every major claim should indicate the evidence supporting it. Every requested dollar should have a specific use and a measurable milestone.

9. The Professional Pitch

A pitch is not a compressed business plan read aloud. It is a structured argument designed for a decision. A strong pitch normally follows this sequence:

• establish the problem through credible human and systemic evidence;
• define the affected population and explain why existing alternatives are insufficient;
• present the intervention and its distinctive value;
• show traction or learning, not merely intentions;
• explain the business and funding model;
• demonstrate financial discipline and impact measurement;
• identify risks and how they will be managed;
• make a precise request; and
• explain what decision the audience should make next.

The presenter must distinguish facts, estimates, hypotheses, and aspirations. Saying “our pilot enrolled 240 users” is different from saying “we will reach 100,000 users.” The latter is a forecast requiring assumptions about acquisition, capacity, retention, and financing.

Visual materials should emphasize one message per slide or page. Charts should label units, dates, denominators, and sources. Testimonials can humanize a problem but should not substitute for representative evidence. Questions about weak retention, low margins, regulatory exposure, or mission trade-offs should be answered directly.

A professional defense acknowledges uncertainty. Investors and partners generally do not expect perfect predictions; they expect disciplined reasoning, credible controls, and a plan for learning.

Applied Case: ReFill Communities

The following is an illustrative fictional case.

Background and problem

ReFill Communities proposes neighborhood water-refill stations in low-income urban districts where households purchase expensive single-use containers and where unreliable water access creates health and financial burdens. The founding team has identified a potential beneficiary population of 18,000 households, but recognizes that the addressable first market is smaller because only some neighborhoods have suitable premises, electricity, and municipal water connections.

Interviews with residents, shop owners, a public-health officer, and a local environmental group reveal three findings. Residents value lower prices, but they will not use a station they consider unsafe. Shop owners want additional customer traffic but fear maintenance responsibilities. The public-health officer supports the concept but requires water-quality testing and record keeping.

Analysis and model

The venture plans to install refill equipment in partner shops. Residents pay per container, while a philanthropic grant funds initial water testing, community education, and installation in the poorest locations. Shop owners receive a small commission. The theory of change is that accessible and trusted refill stations reduce the cost of safe water and reduce plastic waste, contributing to improved household welfare and environmental outcomes.

The initial financial assumptions are:

• price per refill: $0.60;
• variable cost per refill: $0.25;
• monthly fixed operating cost: $7,000; and
• expected initial demand: 18,000 refills per month.

Contribution margin is $0.60 − $0.25 = $0.35. Break-even volume is:

The initial demand estimate is below break-even, so immediate full commercial scale would be financially unsafe. The team considers three responses: secure a service contract with the municipality, reduce fixed costs through shared testing infrastructure, or begin with a smaller pilot and grant-funded operating support while testing repeat usage.

Governance and impact design

The proposed board includes a water-quality specialist, a finance professional, a community representative, and an independent chair. A conflict-of-interest policy prevents equipment suppliers from controlling procurement decisions. The venture commits to publishing monthly quality results in accessible language and establishing a complaint channel.

Core indicators include stations passing quality tests, average refill price, repeat-user rate, household expenditure on water, liters of single-use plastic avoided, and service interruptions. The team avoids claiming that every health improvement is caused by the venture because household health depends on many factors.

Decision and pitch

The investment committee recommends a six-month pilot rather than immediate expansion. The pilot has explicit gates: at least 70% of stations must pass quality tests each month; repeat use must reach a predetermined threshold; downtime must remain below an agreed limit; and the venture must secure a municipal or institutional payment commitment before adding stations. The pitch is stronger because it does not hide the initial operating deficit. It shows the gap, explains possible remedies, and requests capital for a learning process with measurable decision points.

Learning points

The case demonstrates that a social venture plan is integrated when the social promise, price, cost structure, governance controls, impact measures, and funding request reinforce one another. It also shows why a large population estimate should not be confused with immediate market demand, and why pilot design is a central managerial decision rather than a preliminary formality.

Technology, AI, and Contemporary Practice

Digital platforms can reduce transaction costs, support remote delivery, automate reporting, and improve targeting. However, technology can also exclude people without devices, connectivity, literacy, or digital confidence. A technology plan should therefore specify accessibility, offline alternatives, cybersecurity, data ownership, and support for users who cannot self-serve.

Artificial intelligence may assist with demand forecasting, document analysis, translation, customer support, and anomaly detection. Its use requires human oversight, representative data, testing for bias, explainability appropriate to the decision, and a process for correcting errors. Automated eligibility or credit decisions can reproduce historical discrimination. A social venture should never treat an algorithmic output as neutral merely because it is numerical.

Contemporary practice increasingly emphasizes climate resilience, just transition, participatory governance, gender and disability inclusion, and evidence of additionality. Funders are also asking for clearer links among capital, outcomes, and accountability. These developments reinforce the central principle of this chapter: integration is both a planning method and an ethical obligation.

Challenges and Limitations

Integrated planning has several limitations. Forecasts remain uncertain, especially in new markets. Stakeholder evidence may be biased toward people who are easiest to reach. Impact attribution is difficult in complex social systems. Financial measures can privilege monetized benefits over rights or dignity. Governance structures may be formally sound but ineffective in practice. Scaling can reduce quality or weaken community ownership.

The answer is not to abandon planning, but to make assumptions visible, use multiple evidence sources, test the most consequential uncertainties first, and revise the plan as learning occurs. A plan should be treated as a living decision system with version control, documented changes, and clear accountability.

Best-Practice Checklist

Before presenting a social venture plan, the team should be able to answer “yes” to the following questions:

• Is the problem defined from the perspective of affected stakeholders?
• Is the evidence adequate for the strength of the claim being made?
• Are beneficiary, customer, payer, and partner roles distinguished?
• Does the theory of change state assumptions and possible harms?
• Are revenue, costs, cash timing, and funding instruments consistent?
• Has the model been tested under adverse scenarios?
• Are governance, safeguarding, privacy, and conflicts of interest addressed?
• Are impact indicators feasible and linked to decisions?
• Are risks assigned to owners with triggers and contingencies?
• Is the capital request specific, justified, and linked to milestones?
• Does the pitch explain uncertainty rather than conceal it?

Chapter Summary

Integrated social venture planning connects social opportunity analysis with operational and financial feasibility. A credible plan begins with stakeholder evidence and a clearly defined problem, then uses a theory of change to explain how activities may produce outcomes and impact. The business model must distinguish beneficiaries from payers and show how social, customer, and organizational value are created.

Financial tools such as contribution margin, break-even analysis, runway, discounted cash flow, and scenario analysis help test sustainability, but financial performance does not by itself demonstrate social value. Governance protects accountability, mission, data, and vulnerable stakeholders. Impact measurement should be proportionate, decision-oriented, and cautious about causal claims. Risk registers and decision gates allow the venture to learn before making irreversible commitments.

An investment-ready plan is an integrated argument supported by traceable evidence, explicit assumptions, credible forecasts, ethical safeguards, and a precise request. A professional pitch defends decisions by showing not only what the venture hopes to achieve, but how it will know whether the strategy is working and what it will do when evidence contradicts expectations.

Key Terms

Addressable market: The portion of a broader population that the venture can realistically serve under current constraints.

Beneficiary: A person or group intended to experience social or environmental benefit.

Break-even volume: The sales volume at which contribution margin covers fixed costs.

Business model: The logic through which an organization creates, delivers, and captures value.

Contribution margin: Selling price minus variable cost per unit.

Decision gate: A predefined point at which evidence is reviewed before continuing, adapting, or stopping an activity.

Governance: Systems for authority, accountability, oversight, and organizational control.

Impact: Broader, significant change to which a venture contributes over time.

Impact measurement: The systematic collection and interpretation of evidence about social or environmental results.

Mission drift: Movement away from intended social purpose because of financial, organizational, or external pressures.

Outcome: A change in behavior, condition, access, capacity, or well-being associated with an intervention.

Output: The immediate product or service delivered by an organization.

Runway: The estimated period before available cash is exhausted at a stated burn rate.

Sensitivity analysis: Analysis that changes one assumption to examine its effect on a result.

Social value: Benefit to people, communities, institutions, or the environment beyond private financial gain.

Stakeholder: A person or group that affects, is affected by, or has a legitimate interest in the venture.

Theory of change: A reasoned explanation of how inputs and activities are expected to produce outcomes and impact.

Unit economics: Financial performance associated with one unit of a product, service, customer, or transaction.

Review Questions

Short Answer Questions

1. Why must a social venture distinguish beneficiaries from paying customers?
2. What is the difference between an output, an outcome, and an impact?
3. State the assumptions underlying a basic break-even volume calculation.
4. Identify four governance mechanisms that can protect a venture’s mission.
5. Why should a pitch distinguish facts, estimates, hypotheses, and aspirations?

Long Answer Questions

1. Explain how stakeholder analysis and a theory of change contribute to an integrated social venture plan.
2. Discuss how a social venture can combine earned revenue, grants, and investment while managing mission risk.
3. Explain the role of governance, safeguarding, and data protection in responsible social entrepreneurship.
4. Compare sensitivity analysis, scenario analysis, and decision gates as tools for managing uncertainty.
5. Describe the structure and evidence requirements of an investment-ready social venture plan.

Analytical / Application Questions

1. A venture sells a service for $40, has a variable cost of $24, and monthly fixed costs of $12,800. Calculate the contribution margin and break-even volume. Explain one limitation of your calculation.
2. Design a theory of change and five-indicator impact framework for a venture providing affordable vocational training to unemployed adults. Identify at least two assumptions and one possible unintended consequence.
3. Using the ReFill Communities case, recommend whether the venture should scale immediately, continue a pilot, or redesign its model. Defend your decision using financial, impact, governance, and risk evidence.

Multiple Choice Questions with Answers

Question 1

Which sequence correctly represents a typical theory of change?

A. Impact → Inputs → Activities → Outputs → Outcomes

B. Inputs → Activities → Outputs → Outcomes → Impact

C. Activities → Inputs → Impact → Outputs → Outcomes

D. Outputs → Inputs → Outcomes → Activities → Impact

Correct Answer: B. Inputs → Activities → Outputs → Outcomes → Impact

Question 2

A product sells for $30, has a variable cost of $18, and fixed costs are $6,000 per month. What is the break-even volume?

A. 200 units

B. 300 units

C. 500 units

D. 720 units

Correct Answer: C. 500 units

Question 3

Which statement best describes a beneficiary?

A. Only the person who owns the venture

B. A person or group intended to experience social or environmental benefit

C. Any supplier paid by the venture

D. Only a government regulator

Correct Answer: B. A person or group intended to experience social or environmental benefit

Question 4

What does a positive financial NPV indicate under the stated assumptions?

A. The venture has guaranteed social impact

B. The venture has no operational risk

C. Financial returns exceed the specified discount rate

D. All stakeholders will receive equal benefits

Correct Answer: C. Financial returns exceed the specified discount rate

Question 5

Which is an example of an outcome rather than an output?

A. Number of training sessions delivered

B. Number of manuals printed

C. Number of staff employed

D. Percentage of participants applying a newly learned practice

Correct Answer: D. Percentage of participants applying a newly learned practice

Question 6

What is the primary purpose of a decision gate?

A. To ensure that a venture never changes its original plan

B. To review evidence before continuing, adapting, or stopping an activity

C. To replace all financial forecasting

D. To guarantee that a pilot will succeed

Correct Answer: B. To review evidence before continuing, adapting, or stopping an activity

Question 7

Which situation most clearly illustrates mission drift?

A. A venture improves its data-security procedures

B. A venture changes its logo after stakeholder consultation

C. A venture abandons its poorest beneficiaries to pursue a more profitable customer segment

D. A venture adds an independent board member

Correct Answer: C. A venture abandons its poorest beneficiaries to pursue a more profitable customer segment

Question 8

If unrestricted cash is $24,000 and average monthly net cash burn is $6,000, what is the estimated runway under a constant-burn assumption?

A. 2 months

B. 4 months

C. 6 months

D. 12 months

Correct Answer: B. 4 months

Question 9

Which practice strengthens the credibility of an impact claim?

A. Using only a compelling beneficiary story

B. Reporting outputs as if they were impacts

C. Defining a baseline and acknowledging alternative explanations

D. Removing unfavorable results from the report

Correct Answer: C. Defining a baseline and acknowledging alternative explanations

Question 10

What should a precise investment request normally include?

A. Only the venture’s vision statement

B. The amount requested, its use, and linked milestones

C. A guarantee that no assumptions will change

D. Only the founder’s personal motivation

Correct Answer: B. The amount requested, its use, and linked milestones