Cohort desk notes: what slows capstone approvals

Capstone briefs stall when assumptions hide inside paragraphs. Reviewers cannot score hidden risks, so documents bounce between polite rewrites.

We ask for assumption tables upfront: belief, owner, disconfirming signal, refresh date. Tables feel formal, but they accelerate critique.

Another stall comes from mixed audiences—reporting stakeholders reading operational language without a translation layer. A two-paragraph glossary at the front prevents misreads.

Finally, teams underestimate creative throughput commitments. We now require a simple hours estimate next to each test wave. That single number ends more arguments than any chart.