2 min lesson
Anchor each score to evidence
Work through this: "You score 5 on writing craft and product fluency but 2 on metrics literacy because your channel plan said 'track engagement' with no baseline or target. Given how Cursor's loop is structured, how should you read this and what do you do?"
Step 1 of 2
Anchor each score to evidenceNo score without a pointer
Don't score from memory. Point each number at a specific artifact line or a recording timestamp, so the score is defensible the way your launch exercise has to be.
- Positioning rigor
- The positioning sentence and the competitive-alternative line in your doc
- Writing craft
- The launch blog's headline and lede; count the empty adjectives
- Product fluency
- The demo recording: did the narrative lead, did you handle the objection cold
- GTM execution
- The channel plan: per-channel asset, owner, sequence and a metric each
- Metrics literacy
- Whether you named a baseline and a target, not just "track engagement"
- Values fit
- The changed-my-mind story and where you used AI with visible judgment
Your readiness is set by your weakest two dimensions, because the loop has a stage for each. Averaging a 5 in product fluency against a 2 in metrics literacy doesn't make you a 3.5 candidate; it makes you the candidate who fumbles the funnel question. Circle the two lowest scores, ignore the strong ones and spend your remaining prep entirely there.
Self-scoring inflation is the silent failure. The fix is to grade against a real artifact a hiring manager would actually ship, not against your intent. If you can't point to the differentiated value sentence in your own positioning doc, that dimension is not a 5 no matter how clearly you can describe what you meant to do. Score the output, not the ambition.