FP&A Intelligence Workbook
Generate comprehensive FP&A intelligence workbooks with auto-detected insights, recommendations, and professional Excel formatting.
This is the most powerful financial analysis skill - it answers real business questions, not just data dumps.
What Makes This Different
| Traditional Report | Intelligence Workbook | |-------------------|----------------------| | Shows data | Answers questions | | Lists numbers | Explains "why" | | Static tables | Highlights anomalies | | Manual analysis | Insights auto-surfaced | | Data dump | Recommendations included |
Arguments
| Argument | Description | Default | |----------|-------------|---------| | --year <YYYY> | REQUIRED Calendar year | -- | | --output <file> | Output file path | tmp/FPA_Intelligence_Workbook_YYYY_TIMESTAMP.xlsx |
Workflow
Step 1: Verify Connection
If any Datarails tool call fails with an authentication or connection error, tell the user:
The Datarails connector isn't connected. Click the "+" button next to the prompt, select Connectors, find Datarails, and click Connect.
Then STOP — do not retry until the user has reconnected.
Step 2: Generate Workbook via MCP Tool
Call the generate_intelligence_workbook MCP tool with the parsed arguments:
Use: generate_intelligence_workbook
Arguments:
year: <parsed year, REQUIRED>
output_path: <parsed output, or omit for default>The tool handles:
- Loading the client profile for the environment
- Fetching P&L data via aggregation (~5s per query)
- Fetching KPI, vendor, and cost center data
- Auto-substituting failed aggregation fields using profile alternatives
- Calculating insights and recommendations
- Generating 10-sheet Excel workbook with professional formatting
Step 3: Report Results
Present the generation summary to the user:
- Output file path
- Year analyzed
- Any errors or warnings
10 Sheets Generated
- Insights Dashboard - Top 5 findings with severity, key metrics with trends, recommendations
- Expense Deep Dive - Top 20 expense accounts with % of total, MoM change
- Variance Waterfall - What changed vs prior period and why
- Trend Analysis - 12-month trends with growth rates
- Anomaly Report - Auto-detected outliers with severity scores
- Vendor Analysis - Top 20 vendors, concentration risk flags
- SaaS Metrics - ARR waterfall, unit economics, efficiency ratios
- Sales Performance - Rep leaderboard, cohort analysis
- Cost Center P&L - Department-level detail
- Raw Data - Pivot-ready dataset for your own analysis
Auto-Generated Insights
The workbook automatically detects and surfaces:
| Insight Type | Detection Rule | Severity | |--------------|----------------|----------| | OpEx exceeds Revenue | OpEx/Revenue > 1.0 | CRITICAL | | High expense growth | MoM change > 20% | WARNING | | Vendor concentration | Single vendor > 10% of spend | INFO | | Negative margins | Gross profit < 0 | CRITICAL | | Unusual variance | > 3 std deviations | CRITICAL |
Processing Time
- With aggregation (typical): ~30 seconds
- With pagination fallback: ~10 minutes for 50K+ rows
Why This Matters
This workbook answers the Top 10 Business Questions:
- Where is the money going? - Top 20 expense drivers
- What changed vs last month? - MoM variance waterfall
- Which cost centers are over budget? - Variance by department
- Are we efficient? - OpEx as % of Revenue, Gross Margin
- What's unusual? - Auto-detected anomalies
- Who are our biggest vendors? - Top 10 vendor spend
- How are sales reps performing? - Win rates, ARR by rep
- What's our burn situation? - Runway, burn multiple
- What should we investigate? - Exception report
- What actions to take? - Automated recommendations
Troubleshooting
"profile_not_found" error
Run /dr-learn first to create a profile.
"missing_dependency" error
The MCP server is hosted remotely — this error should not occur. If it does, contact support.
Takes too long
- With aggregation: should complete in ~30 seconds
- Run
/dr-testto check which fields support aggregation
Missing data in sheets
- Check if profile has correct field mappings
- Run
/dr-learnto refresh profile
Related Skills
/dr-extract- Basic data extraction (simpler, faster)/dr-insights- Executive PowerPoint + Excel combo/dr-anomalies-report- Focused on data quality issues/dr-reconcile- P&L vs KPI validation