Pre-mortem
Built on WealthKarma, a real retirement app for Gulf expats. Nothing here is invented.
Pre-mortem · public launchFailed by 15 Feb 2027 · 7 causes
01 · The failure
It is 15 February. Six months after launch, fewer than a hundred people are paying, and the ones who signed up in month one have gone.
02 · What happened
Placed at the point you would have found out, not the point it started.
LaunchMonth 1Month 3Month 6
Week 1The page still didn't say who it was for, so the traffic we paid for left
Week 2People signed up and never funded the account
Month 1Nobody moved on to a paid plan, and the price had never been in front of anyone
Month 3The employer meetings kept happening and none of them turned into a pilot
Month 3The end-of-service money stayed where it was. Nobody moved it
Month 4One thread comparing us to the advisers people already distrust, and it stuck
Month 6Everyone who joined in month one had stopped contributing
Fatal Costly Raised independently by this many people
03 · The ones you'd find out too late
Fatal, and no evidence reaches you for months. Each gets something that moves sooner.
Everyone from month one stops contributing
Month 6Moves first
The second monthly contribution, visible in week eight.
Fires at
Under 6 in 10 make the second payment
Watched by
Whoever owns the numbers, weekly from week six.
Employer meetings never become pilots
Month 3Moves first
A dated pilot agreed, not a second meeting booked.
Fires at
Zero after the first four meetings
Watched by
Whoever is taking the meetings.
The end-of-service money never moves
Month 3Moves first
How many of the first fifty bring up the gratuity without being asked.
Fires at
Under 5 of the first 50
Watched by
Whoever reads the signup replies.
04 · The finding
Every one of these is something we already found out and didn't act on.
05 · What can't be known
Nobody was in a room for this one. Every cause came from the earlier outputs, not from the team.
Two of the seven have no earlier signal at all.
A cause nobody thought of is not on this page.