The Fundraise Readiness Checklist

Most founders find out they were not fundraise ready somewhere around week six of a process, when a partner asks for the cohort data and the answer takes eleven days to produce.

By then the damage is done. Not because the number was bad, but because the delay told them something about how the business is run.

This checklist is the same diagnostic we run before a raise. It covers the 26 things investors check before a Series A term sheet, across five areas: your financial fundamentals, your model, your metrics, your corporate housekeeping, and your story.

How to use it

Work through the 26 items below and tick only what is genuinely in place today. Not what is nearly done. Not what you could put together if someone asked. What exists right now.

Answering honestly is the entire value. A checklist you flatter yourself through tells you nothing that diligence will not tell you later, at much greater cost.

It takes about 30 minutes. Your score and your five section scores appear as you go.

What the score means

Score	Where you stand
22 to 26	Strong shape. You are ready to start conversations. Focus on narrative, warm intros and investor fit.
16 to 21	Good foundations. You are closer than most. Two or three focused fixes over the next 60 days materially improve your outcome.
10 to 15	Sixty to ninety days away. Prioritise Financial Fundamentals and the Financial Model first, because those are the sections investors test hardest and earliest.
Under 10	Not ready yet, and that is the most useful thing this can tell you. The window to fix these gaps is now, not during diligence.

This is a diagnostic, not a verdict. Every gap on this list is fixable. The goal is not a perfect score, it is knowing which gaps to close before you go to market.