One of my best behaviours for actually writing one of these things is to have a single page that only has inputs/assumptions on it and put an annotation/note on every last data item/series saying where you got it from, because someone on the warpath will want to know where you got that BS number from two months later, and it's very satisfying to show it was them.
Agree. That’s a must. You have to cover your ass when it comes to this type of work. It’s high stakes enough that I save off copies of emails (.msg) and create a Sources folder for these, spreadsheets, and I’ll even do a screen capture if I have to login to some system and pull the data myself. I am usually given the parameters on what to pull, and it’s very easy for someone to accuse me of pulling the data wrong a month or more after the fact. I did this on every analysis. I can relate to what your saying. Two months later something like this always happens;
What was you assumption of growth?
Infinity.
What?! That’s ridiculous why would you assume that?
forward back an email you sent to me when I pointed out the growth rate seemed high but you insisted it was a slam dunk (aka the only way the deal would go through and we’d get that bonus)
At times I feel like I put so many footnotes in the resulting presentation later the information should be interpreted as meaningless.
