Find out if your strategy holds up while it's still cheap to change.
Whetstn takes a business strategy, finds the hardest part of it, names what has to be true for it to work, and has you test the riskiest part first. Then an AI red team attacks the plan. You end with a decision-ready strategy, not a deck of good intentions.
Capped at 59: no real-world evidence yet
How it works
A structured path built on the strategy methods that hold up in practice: Rumelt's crux, Lafley and Martin's "what would have to be true", McGrath's discovery-driven planning and Klein's pre-mortem.
Frame and diagnose
Say where the business is and what you're deciding. Whetstn helps you name the crux: the hardest part of the challenge you can actually act on.
Generate options
At least three real options, including the one you'd rather not consider. Rejected options keep their reasons.
Prove what has to be true
List the conditions each option needs, rate your confidence honestly, and test the doubtful, critical ones first with the cheapest test that would change your mind.
Attack the plan
A rival CEO, a sceptical customer, an operator, a lender, an investor and a disruptor take it apart. Then a pre-mortem: it's two years on and it failed. Why?
Two honest scores
Most tools reward you for filling in boxes. Whetstn scores whether the strategy has been tested, and whether the evidence says it will win.
Edge: how well it's been tested
Rigour, not optimism. Edge is capped until there is real-world evidence, research that has been checked and a test on every barrier condition. The caps tell you exactly what's missing.
Strength: how likely it is to win, on the evidence so far
Starts from the base rate for your position and decision, then moves with each test result. Every number shows its inputs. Whetstn never rates your confidence for you.
Learn from worked examples
Open a worked example and see the method end to end, then start your own. The scoring is checked against eight backtest cases with known outcomes, written without hindsight.
CanvaCostcoGuzman y GomezKoalaWho Gives A Crap8 backtests
Your strategy stays yours
Your strategies save in your browser, and to your account when you sign in, so you can pick them up on any device. Only you can read them. The AI steps use your own Anthropic API key, which goes only to Anthropic.
- Sign in with an emailed link, no password. Your strategies are saved to your account and only you can read them.
- Delete your account, and everything saved to it, at any time. You can also export your work.
- Your Anthropic key stays in your browser and is never saved to your account. Set a monthly spend limit on it in the Anthropic console.
- Free during the Alpha, by invite: join the list with your name and email. The examples work without a key.
- We keep only your name and email, to tell you what's changing. Unsubscribe from any email.
Free while it's in Alpha
Whetstn is being built with its first users. We're letting people into the Alpha a few at a time: join the list and we'll email your invite, then ask what works and what doesn't. A paid plan comes later, priced with Alpha users.
Free
- Everything in Whetstn today: the full method, the scores, the red team and the worked examples.
- The AI steps use your own Anthropic API key.
- A say in what gets built next.
To comeset with Alpha users
What we plan to add. None of it is built yet:
- AI included, so there's no API key to manage.
- Send the tested strategy to your team's backlog in Linear.
- A monthly check that your numbers still back the strategy.
Run it yourself, or with us
Self-serve
Open Whetstn, load an example, then capture your own strategy. Facilitator mode adds workshop questions for each stage.
Strategy sprint
A facilitated sprint for owners and leadership teams: we run Whetstn with you and you leave with a tested strategy and a 90-day plan.
Into the work
Turn the tested strategy into objectives, experiments and a 90-day plan, exported for your team's backlog, so the work serves the strategy.
Every strategy has a hardest part. Whetstn makes you find it, and test it, before you spend.