WP006 — The Good Month

The Good Month

How can a business be profitable on paper and still feel like it's one bad week away from disaster?

Priya's bike shop was profitable, yet November felt like a crisis. She thought a line of credit might smooth the gaps, but credit would only provide somewhere to go after the account was already tight.

Sales, vendor invoices, payroll, and inventory moved on different schedules. All of them were reconciled by Priya's memory and a bank balance that showed today, not the weeks ahead. The constraint was visibility, not cash.

They mapped one month of known dates and amounts in a simple week-by-week forecast. It exposed a tight week three weeks early, so Priya delayed one order without disrupting the shop. The rough week became expected instead of frightening.

A profitable business can still feel like it's drowning when nobody has mapped the timing of money in against money out.

List every known, predictable expense and expected income for the next four weeks. Lay it out week by week. See which week looks tightest before it arrives, not after.