RevOps Use Case Series (Part 2): Runway & Cash Forecasting Without Guesswork
After executive reporting, the next question RevOps teams get from leadership is almost always some version of this:
“How much runway do we really have — and how confident are we?”
This question isn’t about math. It’s about whether leadership trusts the system answering it. Runway and cash forecasting should provide clarity. Instead, they often create anxiety, debate, and second-guessing. In this post, we’ll break down why forecasting is so hard for RevOps teams — and how DDAI makes it dramatically simpler.
The Problem: Runway Looks Simple — Until It Isn’t
At a high level, runway is straightforward: money in the bank divided by monthly burn.
But in practice, burn is rarely static. Budgeted spend diverges from actuals. Hiring timelines shift. Expenses fluctuate. A runway calculation based on budget quickly becomes disconnected from reality.
Forecasting future cash position adds even more complexity. RevOps teams must account for when revenue is actually collected — not just when deals are closed.
Where Forecasting Breaks Down
The problem isn’t that RevOps teams don’t know how to build models. It’s that forecasting requires assumptions to stay aligned across systems that were never designed to agree with each other.
HubSpot shows which deals are won and what’s in the pipeline. Stripe tracks invoices, subscriptions, and payment timing. QuickBooks reflects when cash actually lands in the bank.
To look ahead, teams layer in pipeline deals, assign close probabilities, and estimate when money will be collected. This logic almost always lives in spreadsheets filled with assumptions that quickly go stale.
As deals slip, close early, or fall through, forecasts drift from reality — and leadership loses confidence.
What Leadership Is Actually Asking
Executives don’t want models. They want answers to questions like:
“What is our current runway based on actual spend and cash in the bank?”
“How does runway change if our current burn continues?”
“What will our cash balance look like three or six months from now?”
“How does probability-weighted pipeline impact future cash?”
Answering these questions reliably is nearly impossible without a unified view of pipeline, revenue, and cash.
How DDAI Makes Runway and Cash Forecasting Practical
DDAI connects HubSpot, QuickBooks, and Stripe into a single Common Data Model and applies a semantic layer designed specifically for RevOps and finance questions.
Instead of maintaining fragile spreadsheets, RevOps teams shift to a live forecasting posture — where runway is derived continuously from actual spend, real pipeline behavior, and cash movement.
Once leadership can ask runway questions directly and get answers grounded in live data, static models stop being the source of truth.
From Uncertainty to Confidence
With DDAI, runway and cash forecasting stop being exercises in guesswork. RevOps delivers forward-looking clarity leadership can trust, without rebuilding models every time the business changes.
