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Decision feasibility calculator

Use this decision feasibility calculator for feasibility studies, go/no-go analysis, decision matrices, cost-benefit analysis and opportunity scoring with explicit uncertainty.

Method version1.0.0 · Reviewed November1,2026 · Calculated on your device

What would you like to do?

Check a specific plan Build a complete feasibility study Delivery driver: earnings and time →

Choose a focused plan calculation or a complete study. These workspaces have separate inputs and results.

Decision Feasibility Analysis — build a complete study

Connect a feasibility study, go/no-go analysis, decision matrix, opportunity scoring and cost-benefit analysis. Include unknown factors and linked stress scenarios. This free workspace complements the five focused plan calculations below.

Need job pricing, production, delivery, equipment or staffing only? Jump to a focused plan calculation →

Use one defined decision and baseline. A GO result means only that your recorded requirements and entered scenarios pass; it is not a prediction.

Open saved study

Study title and baseline

1. Feasibility study and mandatory requirements

Cover demand, technical fit, operations, funding, resources and applicable permissions. Mark every mandatory condition Pass, Fail or Unknown and record evidence. Blank evidence remains unresolved. All gates apply to the study; option-specific gates are recorded in step 2.

2. Decision matrix and opportunity scoring

Define criteria with meaningful anchors: 0 is least desirable, 100 most desirable. For cost or risk, lower cost or risk must receive a higher desirability rating. Give weights for the value of moving from 0 to 100; weights are normalized automatically. Avoid counting the same advantage twice.

Rate each option with a low and high score for every criterion. Use equal endpoints for a known rating. Unknown ratings can use the full 0–100 range; they are never silently treated as zero. Mark each option’s mandatory requirements separately.

3. Incremental cost-benefit analysis

Select the option evaluated by these cash flows, against the baseline in your title. Its requirement status is included in the combined assessment. Scores in step 2 do not create cash flows or compare multiple plans’ NPV. Enter USD cash benefits and costs in equal periods; period 1 is the first period end. Use annual rates for years or monthly rates for months. Enter zero explicitly where appropriate.

Option evaluated by these cash flows

4. Unknown factors and linked stress scenarios

Each row is a separate scenario against the base plan. Within a row, extra initial cost, reduced benefits and lost-benefit periods happen together. Across rows, effects are not added. Extra costs are additional to contingency already included. Lost periods forfeit benefits at the start; costs continue within the original horizon.

Select Unbounded when you cannot defend a finite estimate: the calculator will HOLD the assessment even if placeholder amounts are zero. This avoids pretending unknown unknowns have been quantified.

Inputs remain in this tab. Nothing saves automatically or online. The editable file contains the inputs and evidence you enter; keep it private.

Methods, limits and references

Weighted score = sum(weight × desirability rating) / sum(weights). Score bounds use your low and high ratings. A robust leader’s low score must exceed every other passing option’s high score. The weight diagnostic halves and doubles one weight at a time and compares midpoint scores.

NPV = discounted incremental benefits minus discounted incremental costs. Initial outlay and spent contingency occur at time zero; period costs and final exit cost occur at period ends. Benefit-cost ratio is undefined when discounted costs are zero. Funding need is the largest cumulative period-end cash deficit. Payback is the first nonnegative period-end balance and can be followed by later deficits.

All outcomes depend on your evidence, chosen weights, rating anchors and scenarios. These are established methods in an original connected interface, not unique mathematics or a guarantee. No tax, legal, safety or industry approval is inferred.

Your calculation

What would make this work? Test your plan, identify its breaking points and find adjustments within limits you control. Start with all permitted changes at zero to assess the current plan.

Choose a method, then enter your figures. Examples are illustrative, not recommended settings or rates.

Which plan are you evaluating?

Choose a specific worksheet. It evaluates the assumptions and limits shown for that workflow.

Current proposed job price / receipts per portion

Job: total proposed price before sales tax. Restaurant: collected receipts per sold portion, before sales tax. Select the workflow first.

Required margin after entered costs (%)

Profit share of receipts after the costs you enter. Use 25 for 25%; less than 100%. This is not markup.

Other entered costs for this job, run or route (USD)

Costs not included in the separately entered labor, normal batch cost or mileage rate. Do not count both components and their total.

Loaded labor cost for planned work (USD/person-hour)

Job labor cost per productive person-hour, already including the employer costs you intend to cover. Do not enter the customer billing rate.

Low labor estimate / low all-in route time

Job: productive person-hours. Delivery: elapsed hours including waiting, loading, stops, empty and return travel.

High labor estimate / high all-in route time

Use a credible upper bound for the same scope, not a probability or guaranteed completion time.

Productive person-hours currently available

Sum the available productive time of participating people for this job. Elapsed hours and person-hours differ.

Maximum permitted price increase

Zero locks price. Job: total USD increase. Restaurant: USD increase per sold portion. Do not enter a change you cannot obtain.

Verified cost reduction available

Zero locks this cost. Job and delivery: reduction of Other entered costs, in USD. Restaurant: reduction per normal batch, in USD/batch. Do not subtract a saving already included in your base costs.

Additional productive capacity actually available (person-hours)

Zero locks available capacity. Extra time does not reduce the original labor requirement.

How this calculation works

A plan meets the model when every entered cost, capacity, earnings and timing constraint is satisfied. Permitted repairs solve bounded linear inequalities; restaurant batch counts are rounded up before repair and whole hires are enumerated.

What information do I need?

Only fields for your selected method are required. Use consistent units and scope. Changing an entry method or unit system does not convert the numbers already entered. Previously calculated results are cleared when inputs change.

Input definitions and where to find them

Which plan are you evaluating?: Choose a specific worksheet. It evaluates the assumptions and limits shown for that workflow.
Current proposed job price / receipts per portion: Job: total proposed price before sales tax. Restaurant: collected receipts per sold portion, before sales tax. Select the workflow first.
Required margin after entered costs (%): Profit share of receipts after the costs you enter. Use 25 for 25%; less than 100%. This is not markup.
Other entered costs for this job, run or route (USD): Costs not included in the separately entered labor, normal batch cost or mileage rate. Do not count both components and their total.
Loaded labor cost for planned work (USD/person-hour): Job labor cost per productive person-hour, already including the employer costs you intend to cover. Do not enter the customer billing rate.
Low labor estimate / low all-in route time: Job: productive person-hours. Delivery: elapsed hours including waiting, loading, stops, empty and return travel.
High labor estimate / high all-in route time: Use a credible upper bound for the same scope, not a probability or guaranteed completion time.
Productive person-hours currently available: Sum the available productive time of participating people for this job. Elapsed hours and person-hours differ.
Maximum permitted price increase: Zero locks price. Job: total USD increase. Restaurant: USD increase per sold portion. Do not enter a change you cannot obtain.
Verified cost reduction available: Zero locks this cost. Job and delivery: reduction of Other entered costs, in USD. Restaurant: reduction per normal batch, in USD/batch. Do not subtract a saving already included in your base costs.
Additional productive capacity actually available (person-hours): Zero locks available capacity. Extra time does not reduce the original labor requirement.
Incremental cost per added productive person-hour (USD): Added-capacity expense on top of planned labor and other costs. Use zero only if it is genuinely already included; otherwise include its full incremental cost.
Confirmed sellable portions required: Whole portions assumed sold at the entered receipts. This model does not assume uncertain demand will sell.
Low usable yield per complete batch (portions): Usable portions after your stated loss allowance, not raw ingredient weight. No further spoilage is inferred.
High usable yield per complete batch (portions): Use the same recipe/batch basis as low yield. The high value must be at least the low value.
Low productive person-minutes per batch: Sum participating-person time; a two-person 15-minute task uses 30 person-minutes.
High productive person-minutes per batch: Include the normal preparation/handling tasks covered by your batch cost.
Normal cost per complete batch (USD): Include normal materials, labor and operating costs once. Extra labor/equipment capacity is charged separately at the rates below.
Maximum production cash cost (USD): Maximum entered cost for this whole production run, including extra capacity if used.
Current productive labor capacity (person-hours): Available productive person-hours for this run; sum people who can actually participate.
Sequential equipment time per batch (minutes): One equipment-hour pool, batches processed sequentially. This is not a multi-machine production scheduler.
Current equipment time available (hours): Available equipment-hours on the same basis as the per-batch equipment time.
Additional productive labor capacity available (person-hours): Zero locks labor capacity. Use an amount that can be supplied for this run.
Incremental cost per added productive labor-hour (USD): Full additional cost, not a legal overtime multiplier. It is added to production cost when the capacity is used.
Additional sequential equipment time available (hours): Zero locks equipment time. Any added time must fit the actual service deadline and process requirements.
Incremental cost per added equipment-hour (USD): Additional rental, operating or access cost per added hour; do not double-count an amount already in normal batch cost.
Low total route receipts (USD): Separate guaranteed receipts from uncertain tips or incentives. No platform pay rates are looked up.
High total route receipts (USD): A stated upper scenario, not promised work or income.
Low ALL driven miles for route: Include loaded, empty, repositioning and return miles.
High ALL driven miles for route: A credible upper bound for the same route scope.
Vehicle cost per ALL mile (USD/mile): Your fuel, tires, maintenance and allocated vehicle costs per all mile. Exclude your own labor earnings when also using the earnings target.
Required contribution per all-in hour (USD/hour): Target after entered vehicle/other costs, before income tax and omitted expenses. This is not a wage-law calculation.
Available elapsed time for route (hours): A hard elapsed-time limit, including waiting and return travel.
Additional guaranteed route receipts available (USD): Zero locks receipts. This is an actual available improvement, not an assumed tip or newly offered order.
Verified time reduction available on the route (hours): Zero locks route time. Use only an achievable operational change; the worksheet does not optimize stops or assume faster driving.
Equipment purchase price (USD): Quoted acquisition price before the separately entered installation/extras.
Installation and acquisition extras (USD): One-time installation, delivery and other acquisition cash costs, counted once.
Own cash currently available for purchase (USD): Available funding for the purchase; no unentered loan or grant is assumed.
Low annual incremental NET benefit (USD/year): Incremental receipts or savings minus incremental annual operating, labor and maintenance costs. A negative value is allowed.
High annual incremental NET benefit (USD/year): Same annual scope as the low benefit. Do not substitute gross sales.
Maximum acceptable simple payback (years): A positive horizon using equal annual benefits, without discounting, tax or residual value.
Minimum acceptable annual net benefit (USD/year): A hard minimum; zero means you require at least nonnegative annual net benefit.
Verified purchase-price reduction available (USD): Zero locks purchase price. Discount cannot exceed purchase price and does not reduce installation automatically.
Additional verified OWN cash available (USD): Zero locks your funding. Additional own cash does not improve payback and is not an unmodeled loan.
Verified improvement to annual NET benefit (USD/year): Zero locks annual benefit. Use only an achievable change not already included in the annual benefit range.
Current regular workers assigned to this period: Whole workers with the paid hours and productive share below. This aggregate model assumes interchangeable coverage.
Paid hours per regular worker in period: Use the same week, month or other period for workload, wages, capacity and budget.
Productive share of paid time (%): Your measured or explicitly assumed productive share. Applied to both regular and added paid overtime hours.
Low required workload (productive person-hours): Sum task person-hours, not elapsed crew-hours.
High required workload (productive person-hours): Credible upper workload for the same tasks and period.
Loaded cost per regular PAID hour (USD/hour): Employer labor cost per paid hour, not cost per productive hour.
Maximum staffing cost for period (USD): Includes regular staffing and any added hires, overtime or outsourcing.
Additional whole workers actually available (0–20): Zero locks hiring. Each added worker receives the full entered regular paid hours in this period.
Additional paid overtime hours available across team: Total extra paid hours, not per-worker hours. Zero locks overtime. Availability and legal limits must be checked separately.
Loaded cost per additional PAID hour (USD/hour): Full incremental employer cost. No statutory rate or multiplier is selected for you.
Outsourced productive hours available: Delivered productive person-hours, not paid employee hours. Zero locks outsourcing.
Quoted cost per outsourced PRODUCTIVE hour (USD/hour): Full supplier cost per delivered productive hour, using the same task scope.

Worked example

This example uses the initial method shown in the selector. Load an example in the form to try it.

Example inputs

Which plan are you evaluating?: job
Current proposed job price / receipts per portion: 18000
Required margin after entered costs (%): 25
Other entered costs for this job, run or route (USD): 9500
Loaded labor cost for planned work (USD/person-hour): 50
Low labor estimate / low all-in route time: 70
High labor estimate / high all-in route time: 110
Productive person-hours currently available: 120
Maximum permitted price increase: 2000
Verified cost reduction available: 1500
Additional productive capacity actually available (person-hours): 0

Example answer: Current-plan assessment = Depends on uncertain estimates — the unfavorable case does not meet every requirement

Use the result well

A reduced labor requirement is shown only as a threshold, not assumed as an available repair. Added capacity does not itself reduce labor hours or erase base labor cost.

Ranges are bounds, not probability forecasts. “Throughout the ranges” uses the defined unfavorable endpoints and this worksheet’s assumptions, not a real-world guarantee. Zero permitted change locks that item. No target, budget, deadline or staffing rule is silently relaxed.

Combined repairs minimize the sum of each change divided by its permitted maximum. Equal normalized shares are a modeling convention, not a measure of business effort or the least-dollar plan. Whole hires are enumerated; continuous repairs use bounded linear-constraint vertices. Numerical tolerances apply.

Use only verified changes you can actually make without altering unmodeled quality, safety, scope or contractual obligations. A computed price, saving or extra capacity is a threshold to verify, not evidence it is obtainable. No tax, legal, engineering or safe-staffing limits are inferred.

Review the limits shown with each result. Browser arithmetic has finite precision; small differences may reflect rounding. Print or download important results before closing the tab. This workspace does not store projects online or replace an approved examination calculator, engineering design or professional judgment.

Method and sources

References support the stated mathematical concepts; the interface and implementation are original. Publishers do not endorse this site.