Writing the IC memo from approved findings

The investment-committee memo is the one document an acquisition is remembered by. It is also, too often, the least traceable: figures pasted from a spreadsheet that has since changed, risks summarised from conversations nobody wrote down, and no record of who agreed the assumptions.

InsightRollup builds the memo the other way round. The memo writer drafts it only from findings a person has approved for the memo; every figure is the engines'; every section cites the rows; and the stage machine will not record a signing until the memo is final and the practice leader has answered every control that referred. This post follows the illustrative Ironwood Risk Partners through that sequence.

Use case card

Actors	Deal lead (approves findings, finalizes), practice leader (signs off controls), investment committee
Trigger	Moving from analysis to IC memo; Analyze with the memo step
Agency Illustrative	Ironwood Risk Partners — 8 findings approved, 10 still to review
Agents involved	Valuation memo writer, supervisor agent (and every review agent's findings)
Stage gates	IC memo needs one approved finding; Signed needs a final memo, no blocking control and no sign-off waiting
Decisions and authority	Approve/reject each finding (deal lead); sign-off (practice leader); finalize (deal lead, capped at ask first)
Outcome	A final valuation-support memo, and a decision record showing who approved what
What is measured	Findings approved vs to review; controls answered; time from analysis to final memo

The order the stage machine enforces

stateDiagram-v2 [*] --> Screening Screening --> DataReceived: book export imported DataReceived --> Analysis: Analyze has run Analysis --> ICMemo: at least one finding approved ICMemo --> Signed: memo final, no blocking control, no sign-off waiting Signed --> Integration: close date recorded Integration --> Day100: every task due by day 100 done Day100 --> [*]

Stages move one at a time, and each move names what stops it. A closed acquisition cannot go back before close. Every move is an audit row with who made it.

Approving findings for the memo

What the agents found on an illustrative agency — What the agents found: each finding with severity, category, the agent, its review status and the book rows it cites.

Each finding has two buttons: Approve for the memo and Reject. Approval is the deal lead's statement that the finding is right and belongs in front of the committee. Pending findings — company news, industry context, the producer-agreements search — stay out until someone reads them.

The memo

The valuation-support memo, on illustrative data — The memo: the valuation arithmetic on top, then each section built from approved findings, every figure with the book rows behind it.

The header carries the valuation arithmetic: book revenue (12 months) $3.2M, recurring $2.6M, the seller's $3.4M, book against seller −8.2%, the asking 2.9× on the seller's revenue ($10M) and the same multiple on recurring revenue ($7.6M). Then the sections from the pack's report template — the agency and the data, retention and growth, concentration and key people, revenue quality and the seller's revenue, cross-sell, integration fit — each built from the approved findings in it, with sources. A section with nothing approved says so.

flowchart LR F["Findings"] --> A{"Approved
for the memo?"} A -->|"yes"| S["Memo sections
(report template)"] A -->|"no / pending"| X["Left out"] E["Engine figures"] --> H["Valuation arithmetic
header"] S --> D["Draft memo"] H --> D D --> FN{"Deal lead
finalizes"} FN --> FM["Final memo"] FM --> SG{"Signed?"} C["Controls answered
by the practice leader"] --> SG

From analysis to a signed acquisition Ironwood Risk Partners, illustrative.

Findings approvedDeal leadAnalysis

Eight approved after reading each against its rows; ten left to review.

Moved to IC memoDeal leadAnalysis

Allowed: at least one approved finding exists.

Memo draftedmemo_agentIC memo

Built from the eight approved findings; quotes the engines' figures; prepares finalizing it.

Sign-off preparedsupervisor_agentIC memo

Two controls that refer: the practice leader's sign-off is prepared.

Practice leader signs offPractice leaderIC memo

Answered with a note; the decision record keeps who, when and why.

Memo finalizedDeal leadIC memo

Accepting the memo writer's prepared decision; capped at ask first.

Signing recordedDeal leadSigned

Refused while the memo is a draft or a sign-off waits.

sequenceDiagram participant Lead as Deal lead participant RU as InsightRollup participant Memo as Memo writer participant Sup as Supervisor agent participant PL as Practice leader Lead->>RU: Approve findings for the memo Lead->>RU: Move to IC memo RU->>Memo: Draft from approved findings RU->>Sup: Run the acquisition controls Sup-->>PL: Sign-off prepared PL->>RU: Sign off (decision record) Memo-->>Lead: Finalize prepared Lead->>RU: Finalize, then record signing

Agent	What it prepared	What it cites	Who decides
Valuation memo writer	Finalize the valuation-support memo: 8 approved findings; book revenue $3.15M in the last twelve months	Approved findings; 14 facts	Deal lead
Supervisor agent	Practice leader sign-off: 2 controls fired	4 facts: the controls and their figures	Practice leader

Section	Hit	Outcome
Revenue	REVENUE_SHORTFALL −8.2%	refer
Key people	KEY_PRODUCER 26.1%	refer
Revenue mix	VOLATILE_REVENUE 17.1%	warn
Carriers	UNAPPOINTED_CARRIERS 58.7%	warn

For the deal team

The memo writes itself from what you approved, and the gates stop the signing being recorded out of order.

For IT

The memo is a diligence report from the pack's ic_memo template; sections pull approved findings by playbook section.

For corp-dev leadership

A year later, anyone can see which rows each figure came from and who agreed to each finding and sign-off.

Questions we get asked

Can we use our own memo template?

The memo sections come from the agency-acquisition pack's report template, which is configuration: the sections and what feeds each can be changed for your committee.

Does the model write the memo?

With a model configured, the memo writer explains and connects the approved findings in prose; every number still comes from the engines and an ungrounded answer is thrown away. With the model off, the memo is assembled from the findings as they stand.