Building a Trading Plan
How to turn vague intentions into a written, testable plan — and how to test it honestly before it costs you anything.
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A plan you have not written down is not a plan; it is an intention that changes shape under pressure. A plan you have written but never tested is a hypothesis you are funding with real money.
This course covers both halves: writing rules precise enough to be followed, and testing them honestly enough that the test means something.
What you will learn
- Write entry, exit and invalidation rules specific enough that two people would act identically
- Distinguish backtesting from forward testing and know what each can and cannot establish
- Keep a journal structured around process adherence rather than outcome
- Identify overfitting in your own testing before it reaches live capital
Prerequisites
- Risk Management
Course contents
Module 1 — The plan
What belongs in a written plan, and at what level of detail.
Anatomy of a Trading Plan
A trading plan is a written document specific enough that two people reading it would take the same trades. Anything vaguer is a preference, and preferences change under pressure.
9 min read
Module 2 — Testing and review
Establishing whether the plan is worth following.
Backtesting and Forward Testing
A backtest tells you how a rule would have performed on data you have already seen. That is a much weaker claim than it feels like, and the gap between the two is where most strategies quietly die.
9 min read
Journaling and Metrics
A journal built around profit and loss teaches you to chase outcomes. A journal built around process adherence and a handful of stable metrics teaches you what you are actually doing.
8 min read