Before tools, before slides. I study what people actually do and see where it lags.
Vol. 0.5 / Issue 01 / Functional Model
Isaiah Moragne MBA in Finance. Product analyst. I find where value hides, then build the fix.
I find where businesses leak value, then build the thing that fixes it.
MBA on one side, Product Requirements background on the other. I spend most of my time at the seam between the two; mapping how work actually flows in ugly text flow sheets, pricing the gaps not just on tender but also time, and building the smallest thing that makes the next decision easier.
Sometimes that's a DCF Model. Sometimes it's a script to pull data from documents. Other times it's an agent that triages requests and drafts answers so the team can focus on the questions. The tool is never the point, but it's usually the last step.
Used when they earn their place and not just for the sake of zeitgeist. I'd rather ship a mathematically modeled spreadsheet than a sales pitch with estimates or an internal AI LLM that just generates noise.
Small, honest improvements that the team will still be using six months later. Changes made with purpose and not for metrics.
The small bets that get more valuable the longer they stay in the system. Time value doesn't end with money.
How I actually work
Four steps, in this order. Skipping one is usually where projects bleed time and money.
I keep coming back to the same loop, whether the problem is a valuation, a workflow audit, or a half-broken process nobody owns. It's not glamorous, but it's why the work tends to stick.
Watch the work first
Who hands what to whom, what gets redone, what's secretly held together by one person's email folder or attendance record.
Put a dollar on the gap
Friction is easy to ignore until it's priced. Time lost, decisions delayed, risk carried. Pick a number.
See the activation opportunity mathBuild the smallest fix that works
Sometimes a checklist. Sometimes Python. Sometimes an agent. The tool comes last, not first.
See the model architectureHand it off so it survives me
If the team can't run it without me in the room, it's not a system; it's a favor.
Case studies
The work, shown with its receipts.
What was the actual problem? What did I assume? What got built? And what would I do differently with another revision?
Proof browser
Filter by the evidence a reviewer needs fastest: model quality, growth math, workflow diagnosis, or decision support.
Showing all 3 proof entries.
Dynamic DCF Valuation Model
A live, inspectable DCF on any public company (currently Apple). Built so the assumptions, WACC, and integrity checks are all out in the open, not buried three sheets deep.
- Live example
- AAPL base case; implied price, market bridge, and an audit trail you can actually follow.
- What's in the workbook
- DCF output, model inputs, WACC build, working capital, three statements, checks, source audit.
- Why I built it
- Most DCFs are black boxes. I wanted one a reviewer could pick apart without opening Excel.
Activation Funnel Redesign Lab
GA4 BigQuery ecommerce analysis that finds the highest-leverage activation gap, prices the revenue opportunity, designs the A/B test, and turns the result into an AI-assisted impact memo.
- The finding
- New users are 89% of visitors but activate at 0.64%, versus 9.73% for returning users.
- The opportunity
- A +50% relative lift implies 769 incremental purchasers and $53,130 in revenue.
- The action
- Run Variant B first, with a one-page impact memo explaining the math and risks.
Finding the value hiding in routine work
A framework I'm developing for the kind of operational audit everyone benefits from. The slow leaks between teams, tools, and decisions that don't show up on any dashboard. Trying to identify and solve the sunk cost of operations.
- The question
- Where is the team paying a tax it doesn't know it's remitting?
- How I'd answer it
- Process mapping, cost-of-delay math, a little operational analysis, and an AI subagent to track financial impacts only where it earns its keep. Mathematical changes only last as long as someone cares, AI never gets bored.
- What changes
- Faster handoffs, fewer "who owns this?" emails, and decisions that don't drift for a week or a quarter.
Interactive DCF preview
The model, running in your browser.
Pick a scenario or push on any assumption. Implied share price updates live from a 5-year EBIT-based DCF on Apple (AAPL) using year-by-year workbook inputs.
How I think in dashboards
If you can't see it, you can't manage it. You definitely can't sell it upstairs.
Humans are visual learners. Dashboards are how I make complexity tractable — not the kind that decorates a status meeting, but the kind that forces a decision.
vs. 9.73% for returning users
at a +50% relative lift on new users
modeled from the activation gap analysis
guest checkout fast lane, run first
What I'm good at
Six skills I keep reinforcing, and what they actually look like.
Asking the questions before anyone writes code.
I figure out what a project actually needs to do, so the team isn't rebuilding it in three months.
Knowing which projects are worth the trouble, understanding value.
I look at initiatives the way a CFO would: margin, risk, growth, and what optionality it buys you later. Is it pure accounting or economic value?
Open valuation caseFixing workflows without a six-month consulting deck.
Small, durable improvements. The team owns them after I leave, which is the only kind that ever lasts.
Building the thing instead of asking IT for it.
Analysis scripts, automations, lightweight dashboards. Whatever shortens the gap between question and answer. Consistent 1% growth always outpaces business cycles.
Open growth analytics casePutting agents where they actually pay rent.
Triage, research, summarization, and the boring orchestration work. Not chatbots for the sake of justifying expenditures.
Turning a tangle into one slide leadership can sign off on.
Most decisions die in translation. I spend a lot of my time making sure they don't. Attach weight to the words we carry.
Read impact memoThe lab
Where I think out loud, before the case study is ready.
Most of these are still cooking. I'd rather show the in-progress versions and update them as they get sharper than pretend I have a back catalog I don't. New entries land here first.
Showing all project lab entries.
Strategic Workflow Mapper
A tool I'm building to turn the "describe your process" interview into a real artifact; one that flags handoff risk and points at automation candidates instead of just being a pretty diagram.
Value Capture Scorecard
An idea I keep sketching: a one-page scorecard for the "should we even do this project?" meeting. Value, complexity, risk, and whether the team is ready, on a single page nobody can hide from.
Notes
Short takes I keep finding myself saying out loud.
Half opinion, half pattern-recognition. These are the things I'd say in a first interview if you asked me what I actually believe about this work. Longer write-ups are on the way.
The strategy deck and the actual work should be able to recognize each other.
When they don't, it's usually the strategy that's wrong, not the team. I spend a lot of my time pulling the two back into the same room.
An AI agent is just an intern who never sleeps. Manage it like one.
Give it clear scope. Check its work. Don't let it touch anything you can't undo. The teams that treat agents like magic are the same ones that end up cleaning up after them.
A great technical answer that doesn't change a decision is a hobby.
I'm fine with hobbies, but I don't put them on a portfolio. The question I keep asking is this. what's different on Monday morning because of this work?
The short version
MBA in Finance. Sharpened by product analysis across startup and enterprise.
The MBA taught me how value gets made and lost. The product analysis years taught me how work actually happens. Most of what I do now is bridge those two views — so the strategy the boardroom wants and the system the team actually uses end up being the same thing.
Get in touch
Hiring for strategy, ops, finance, or product? I'm available.
Email is the fastest path — I read everything that lands there. LinkedIn works too. If you want the long version of my background before we talk, the resume is one click away.