PAU Extremadura Business & Business Model Design (UEx) common mistakes
PAU Extremadura Business & Business Model Design (UEx) · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
When asked to analyse a company's environment, the candidate lists generic macro factors ("the economy", "technology") without linking them to the specific firm or quantifying the direction of impact, so the answer reads as a PESTEL template rather than an environmental diagnosis.
Candidates memorise PESTEL as a list of headings and reproduce the headings instead of using the framework as a filter: they never ask which factors actually change this firm's costs, demand or bargaining position, so the answer stays at the level of the acronym.
What to do instead
For each factor you keep, write one sentence of the form: factor → mechanism → effect on this firm (cost, demand, margin, bargaining power) → direction and rough magnitude. Delete any factor where you cannot complete the mechanism step. Practise by taking a named Spanish SME (a regional agri-food exporter, a rural hotel chain) and forcing every factor to name a concrete channel of impact on that firm.
The candidate treats stakeholders as a flat list (customers, employees, shareholders, society) and assigns them all the same weight, instead of distinguishing power, legitimacy and urgency, or separating internal from external and primary from secondary stakeholders.
Stakeholder theory is usually studied as a definition to recall, not as a prioritisation tool, so under time pressure the candidate dumps every group named in the textbook and cannot say who actually constrains the decision being discussed.
What to do instead
Before writing, draw a quick two-axis grid (power vs. interest) and place each group; then state explicitly which two or three stakeholders dominate the specific decision in the question and which are merely monitored. Justify each placement with one observable fact (contractual dependence, legal obligation, ability to mobilise public opinion).
In competitive analysis the candidate applies Porter's Five Forces generically, saying "competition is high" or "suppliers have power", without identifying the industry boundary, the specific buyers/suppliers, or the underlying determinants (concentration, switching costs, fixed-cost structure, threat of integration).
The five forces are learned as five labels rather than as a structured argument, and candidates skip the step of defining the relevant market, which is exactly the step that makes the analysis discriminating.
What to do instead
Always state the industry definition first (product, geographic scope, stage of the chain). Then for each force give the determinant you are using and a verdict with direction: e.g. "supplier power moderate-to-high because the three input suppliers hold >60% of regional capacity and our switching cost includes re-certification". Aim for determinants, not adjectives.
The candidate confuses strategic objectives with vague aspirations or with actions: writing "to grow", "to be innovative" or "to open new markets" where the question asks for objectives, and never making them measurable or time-bound.
Objectives, strategies and tactics are taught together and the candidate reproduces the firm's mission language, which sounds authoritative but cannot be evaluated; there is also a habit of avoiding numbers for fear of being wrong.
What to do instead
Force every objective through a measurable form: metric, baseline, target, deadline, and the level (corporate/business/functional) it sits at. If the case gives no data, state a plausible baseline explicitly and flag it as an assumption. Then add one line distinguishing the objective from the action that pursues it, so the examiner sees you know the difference.
When describing a business model, the candidate lists the nine Canvas blocks as headings with one phrase each, but never explains the logic connecting them - how the value proposition is delivered through channels and relationships to segments, and how that produces the revenue and cost structure that yields the margin.
The Canvas is memorised as a checklist of boxes; candidates believe filling all nine boxes equals a complete answer, so they never articulate the causal story that is what the tool is for.
What to do instead
After filling the blocks, write a two-to-three sentence "logic paragraph": for segment X we solve problem Y with proposition Z, reach them via channel C at cost K, they pay P, so unit margin is P−K and the model is viable if volume exceeds V. If that sentence cannot be written, a block is missing or wrong.
The candidate does not distinguish customer segments from user/buyer/payer roles, and describes segments by demographic label ("young people", "SMEs") rather than by the job, pain or gain that makes them a coherent group for this proposition.
Segmentation is often revised as demographic categories from marketing, while the business-model view requires needs-based grouping; the candidate mixes the two vocabularies and produces segments that cannot be prioritised or sized.
What to do instead
Define each segment by job-to-be-done plus the context in which it arises, then state who uses, who decides and who pays if they differ. Test each segment with the question "would this group respond to the same proposition, through the same channel, for the same reason?" - if not, split it.
When asked to innovate or redesign a model, the candidate proposes a pattern by name (freemium, subscription, platform, long tail) and asserts it will work, without showing the mechanism, the conditions under which the pattern works, or the numbers/assumptions it depends on.
Pattern catalogues are easy to memorise and give the illusion of an innovative answer; the candidate substitutes naming a pattern for analysing fit, and skips the conditions that make the pattern fail in the case at hand.
What to do instead
For every proposed pattern, write three lines: mechanism (why it changes willingness to pay or cost), precondition (what must be true about the customer, the product or the market), and the key assumption to test. Then state one way the pattern fails in this specific context. If you cannot state the precondition, do not propose the pattern.
In the investment/profitability question the candidate computes a payback or NPV mechanically but mixes cash flows with accounting profit, omits the discount rate or the terminal horizon, or compares projects of different scale and duration by a single absolute figure.
Formulas are rehearsed in isolation, so the candidate reaches for the most familiar one and does not check whether the inputs are cash flows, whether the horizon is consistent, or whether the criterion is appropriate for ranking.
What to do instead
Before calculating, write the decision rule you will use and why (payback for liquidity, NPV for value creation, IRR with caution on ranking and non-conventional flows). Keep a strict cash-flow column with investment at t=0 and operating flows afterwards, state the discount rate and its source, and when comparing projects of different size, add a profitability index or equivalent.
The candidate answers the legal-form or viability question by listing form names (autónomo, S.L., S.A., cooperativa) with generic pros and cons, without linking liability, capital requirements, taxation and social-security obligations to the specific venture's risk profile and financing needs.
Legal forms are studied as a comparative table to be recalled, and the candidate does not connect the table to the case facts (number of founders, capital needed, risk of the activity, expected profit), so the recommendation is unanchored.
What to do instead
Adopt a decision sequence: risk and liability exposure → capital needed and who provides it → number of partners and desired governance → tax and social-security cost at expected profit level → recommendation with the two decisive criteria named. Always end with the criterion that would change your recommendation if it were different.
The candidate writes marketing and market-research answers that describe the product's features and call it the value proposition, without stating the customer's problem, the alternative they use today, or the evidence (primary or secondary) that supports the claim.
Product knowledge from the case dominates, and research methods are studied separately from the value proposition, so the candidate never links the claim to a method of testing it and substitutes enthusiasm for evidence.
What to do instead
Write the value proposition in the form: for [segment] who [problem/context], our [offer] delivers [outcome] unlike [current alternative]. Then name the research design that would test it (exploratory qualitative interviews, survey with defined sampling frame, A/B test) and the specific metric that would confirm or refute it.