Monthly Confidence Reports for Fort Knox Model

The “Monthly Confidence Package” was something Philip Campbell talked about in yesterday’s webinar, “Winning at the Game of Busines”.  It is a carefully chosen set of reports to convey an accurate picture of a company’s financial condition and prospects for the immediate future.  You can download the report formats and packages used in the webinar.

Here is the link:

www.survivalware.com/download/Monthly_Confidence_Reports_1_26_2012_Webinar.zip

 This is a zip file that contains some new report formats for the Fort Knox model (these files go in ..\FortKnox), and three report packages (these go in ..\FortKnox\UserStuff).

The three report packages are:

Monthly-Confidence-Package.RPK

YearEnd-Confidence-Package.RPK – run it prior to RollOver

Monthly-Confidence-Package-with-Graphs.RPK – spiced up with trend graphs of all the key indicators

Bug Fix available for Fort Knox Model

Many thanks to Nattawut Tumpen from Thailand who found a problem in the calculation of Cash Flow from Investing for the Indirect Method.  Recall that the latest version of the Fort Knox Model in SurvivalWare 5.01 calculates cash flow using three different methods:

1. Direct Cash Flow (FAS95)

2. Indirect Cash Flow (FAS95)

3. Philip Campbell’s Peace of Mind schedule.

The Indirect method was erroneously double counting three variables (which fortunately are not always used):

“Int Income – ST Invest”

“Other Income (Expense)”

“Other Expense (Non-Operating)”

This can be fixed by downloading this zip file and extracting the two files within it to c:\Survware\FortKnox.  Feel free to contact customer support (mailto:custsupport@survivalware.com) if you have any questions about how to apply the fix.

SurvivalWare Basic 5.01 Released

In the fanfare on the release of SurvivalWare Pro 5.01, we neglected to mention the new version of SurvivalWare Basic 5.01 at the same time.  The same Fort Knox model included with the Pro version comes with SurvivalWare Basic 5.01.  This model was upgraded in several areas.  The most noticeable is the addition of two cash flow statements (Direct and Indirect following the FAS95 guidelines).  There are some minor additions as well, such as adding a total column to the Rolling 12 Month reports, and a new input line item to handle asset displosals.

The new version of SurvivalWare Basic is available as a 30-day trial, or for purchase at $495.

SurvivalWare Basic is identical to SurvivalWare Pro, except that these modules are disabled:

* Report Customizer

* Automator Development Environment

* Consolidation Wizard

* Company Stats (percentile analysis)

What’s new in SurvivalWare Pro 5.01

What’s the big deal with SurvivalWare Pro?  We’ll start with continued incremental improvement based on conditions “on the ground.”. Okay, so a few of these were Bug Fixes.  But there really is a lot more. This new version is a big deal because this is the first time we’ve published the technical specifications to allow you to develop your own models in SurvivalWare (or modify ours), and the first time we’ve published documentation on how to build applets. 

But that’s not all.  SurvivalWare Pro is designed for the Analyst or Developer who uses SurvivalWare intensively, whose productivity is key.  We want SurvivalWare to work for you, not the other way around. 4

So we are changing our focus to Knowledge Transfer.  You’ll see blog articles on our website blog, “What is” type articles on our WordPress blog (“What is Cash Flow?”), SurvivalWare Pro is all about putting the information you need at your fingertips to accomplish the task at hand.  Workshops help you see how the pieces fit together.  The total package – of online workshops, real world examples, reference guides, software, and customer support -  works together to get you up to speed quickly, and productive early on. 

Finally, we’ve made some improvements to the Fort Know model.  You can now print or view three different kinds of Cash Flow Statements: 

• Indirect Cash Flow Statement (According to FAS95 Guidelines)
• Direct Cash Flow Statement (According to FAS95 Guidelines)
• Peace of Mind Schedule (pioneered by Philip Campbell in his book, “Never Run out of Cash.” 

A couple of line items have been added (such as “Gain (Loss) on Disposal of Assets”), and there are some new reports. 

Here are the top 10 new things to like about SurvivalWare Pro:

  1. 30 Day Trial Version.  Previously not available.

  2. Technical Reference Guide – all 489 pages of it – published for the first time(and available in the context-sensitive Help system)

  3. SurvivalWare Pro User Guide – 183 pages

  4. Saturday Morning Webinars – Free 90 minutes hands-on sessions

  5. New Automator commands and functions

  6. Reporting improvements

  7. Consolidation Wizard enhancements

  8. Expanded selection of Cash Flow Statements

  9. Sample applets and system applets source code library – over 150 real world applets to get ideas from, or copy code snippets to use in your applets

  10. Ability to run on a server in a local area network

30 day Trial for SurvivalWare Pro

 It is the full version.  You do have 30 days from the time you install it on your PC to try it out.  You can attend our Saturday morning workshops during this period, and sample our world-renowned customer support.  If you have a specific project to work on, we can advise you on how to proceed.

 WARNING: If you try SurvivalWare Pro, chances are you’ll buy it.  Better factor that into your budget.

Technical Reference Guide  (489 pages)

 Tell me it isn’t so – we’re using a technical reference guide as a selling point??

 I guess the techies won that battle.  But why?  Who cares? 

1. It took a lot of work.
2. It has a lot of value for SurvivalWare Analysts who want to analyze groups of similar companies, or consolidate multiple legal entities.
3. It has a lot of value for SurvivalWare Developers in building, maintaining, and tweaking customer models and reporting systems,

 Overview

 The technical reference guide consists of these major sections: 

1. Automator – Sample Files
2. Automator – Commands and Functions
3. Automator – Matrix and System Variables
4. Report Commands and Functions
5. Report Variables
6. Logic Commands and Functions
7. Input Form Commands and Functions
8. Path names
9. Control Files and File Formats
10. Using the ENCORE! Editor
11. Making changes to Logic

Pro User Guide

The SurvivalWare Pro User Guide consists of three major sections:

1. Analyzing Multiple Company Files

2. Customizing Reports

3. The Automator Development Environment

 Saturday Morning Webinars

Every Saturday morning we plan to put on free 90 minute webinars to help Business Owners,  SurvivalWare Analysts and Developers learn how to get the most of out SurvivalWare Pro. 

Each week we start with a quick review of a financial management topic, followed by an in-depth review of a SurvivalWare applet or customer problem.

 November / December Schedule

New Automator Commands

 Since the documentation for the Automator is new, all the commands will probably seem new!  Here are the commands added since version 4.0:

New Reporting Features

 You can now create your own report packages by turning on Report Recording.  When turned on, each subsequent report or graph you preview will be added to a report package to be printed (or sent to PDF) in bulk.

 Multi-company reporting has been improved with ByRow and ByColumn reports in the consolidation wizard.  These also can be added to report packages.

Consolidation Wizard enhancements

 You can set it to include only those companies with complete data, time period by time period.

 You can now use long company names in the ByRow View and reporting.

Columns can be sorted.

  Expanded selection of Cash Flow Statements

 This is for the Fort Knox model that comes with SurvivalWare Pro or SurvivalWare Basic.

 There are now three cash flow statements to choose from: 

1. Indirect Cash Flow Statement (according to FAS95 Guidelines)
2. Direct Cash Flow Statement (according to FAS95 Guidelines)
3. Peace of Mind Schedule (pioneered by Philip Campbell in his book, “Never Run Out of Cash”)

Sample Applets source code library

 Over 150 real world applets to get ideas from, or copy code snippets to use in your own applets

Server version for Local Area Network

 With the appropriate license,  you can now run SurvivalWare on a local area network.  Everyone uses the same SurvivalWare executable and logic files, so updating becomes simpler.

SurvivalWare Pro 4.1 – Consolidation Wizard Documentation Available

The official release date is 4/4/2011, and we are trying to make information about version 4.1 available in advance as things come together.

Documentation for the new Consolidation Wizard feature in SurvivalWare Pro Version 4.1 is ready for download.  Click here for the full 80 page PDF file.

Here is a peek at the Table of Contents:

SurvivalWare 3.1 – Shopping Cart back by Popular Demand

Shopping Cart

The shopping cart is simply a tool to collect in one place a number of variables for viewing or reporting.  When you are in the Dataviewer, Projections Module, Budget Module, or Rusty’s Toolbox, the variables are organized into tabs for viewing.  There is one tab each for the three primary financial statements: Income Statement, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow (circled below).  There are additional tab for things like Breakeven Analysis, Working Capital, and Valuation.

Since the Fort Knox model is designed to be used by a variety of businesses, chances are that you use some, but not all of the variables provided.  When you’re doing analysis or projections, it can be useful to have the 10 or 20 most important variables in your business visible on one screen.  These may be different for you when doing historical analysis vs. projections.  They may also be different for you over time.  Problems may crop up that require special monitoring, and a view of a different set of performance indicators.

We provide the shopping cart as a means to collect variables from the far reaches of the model and put them in one place.  You can quickly graph them in succession using the Next and Back button with the trend charts or Comparanator.  In the Reports module there is a selection to print out the variables in the current shopping cart with any of the column sets.

We allow you to create multiple shopping carts, and edit their contents

At any time you can Left Mouse Click the Survival Cart icon and it will bring up the rows in the current shopping cart.  Notice the “Back” icon has been activated.  Click on this to leave the shopping cart view and go back to the previous view.

Since the Fort Knox model is designed to be used by a variety of businesses, chances are that you use some, but not all of the variables provided.  When you’re doing analysis or projections, it can be useful to have the 10 or 20 most important variables in your business visible on one screen.  These may be different for you when doing historical analysis vs. projections.  They may also be different for you over time.  Problems may crop up that require special monitoring, and a view of a different set of performance indicators.

We provide the shopping cart as a means to collect variables from the far reaches of the model and put them in one place.  You can quickly graph them in succession using the Next and Back button with the trend charts or Comparanator.  In the Reports module there is a selection to print out the variables in the current shopping cart with any of the column sets.

We allow you to create multiple shopping carts, and edit their contents

Adding Rows to the Shopping Cart

This is a two step process, and we will be the first to admit it is a little clumsy.  First select the row you want to add by clicking on it or one of its cells.  Then Right Mouse click the Survival Cart Icon.  If you Left Mouse Click by mistake, the tabs will disappear and the rows contained in the current shopping cart will appear.  If this happens, you can click on the “Back” icon to restore the previous screen.

Viewing Rows in the Shopping Cart

When you move the mouse over the SurvivalWare Cart icon, the message bar tells you how many rows are in the shopping cart.

At any time you can Left Mouse Click the Survival Cart icon and it will bring up the rows in the current shopping cart.  Notice the “Back” icon has been activated.  Click on this to leave the shopping cart view and go back to the previous view.

Edit Shopping Cart

The Edit Shopping Cart feature is under the File Menu in the DataViewer, Projections Module, Budget Module, and Rusty’s Toolbox.

Here’s what it looks like.  You can delete a row, move a row up or down in the list, or empty the cart altogether.

You can also save the shopping cart under a new name, or read in a previously saved shopping cart.  Shopping carts can be stored in any folder, but preferably in the Model folder.  The file names use the extension, “.SHP”.

Reports with the Shopping Cart

Click on the Reports Icon from the Main menu to access the Reports module.

Then:

1. select the Shopping Cart report
2. Select a column set
3. Click on the Preview Report icon

SurvivalWare 3.1 – New Comparanator Options

The comparanator  has been much improved in version 3.1.  There are now a total of ten “Styles”:

• Basic Line Chart

• Dual Scale Line Chart

• Actual vs. 12 Month Average

• Actual vs. Budget vs. Last Year

• Next Year Budget

• Peer Group Members

• Scenarios

• Peer Group vs. Benchmark

• Actual vs. Comparison Group (25/50/75)

• Actual vs. Comparison Group (5/25/50/75/95)

 (right click)

To select a comparanator style, and make it the default going forward, simply Right Click on the Comparanator Icon or select “Set default Comparanator style…” from the File Menu  in the DataViewer or Projections Module.

Basic Line Chart

Graphs the focus row (and Next and Previous rows as requested) against a single comparison row.    You can browse through a list of variables in the Fort Knox model to pick a comparison row.  Once selected, it is “sticky” – i.e. it remains the default comparison row until you explicitly change it. 

The Basic Line Chart uses a single scale for the Y-Axis, which means it is useful only when comparing rows of similar magnitudes, e.g. two different expense lines. 

Here is “Total Overhead” vs. “Sales”:

Dual Scale Line Chart

 Useful for comparing variables of different magnitudes. 

Graphs the focus row (and Next and Previous rows as requested) against a single comparison row, using separate y-axis scales for each row   You can browse through a list of variables in the Fort Knox model to pick the comparison row.  Once selected, it is “sticky” – i.e. it remains the default comparison row until you explicitly change it. 

Here is “Delivery Costs” vs. “Sales” in a Dual Scale Line Chart.  The scale for “Sales” goes from zero to 250,000.  For “Delivery Costs” it goes from 0 to 15,000.

Actual vs. 12 Month Rolling Average

Graphs the focus row (and Next and Previous rows as requested) against the twelve month moving average for that row.  Note that you are not given the option to change time periods like you are with the other comparanator styles.

Actual vs. Budget vs. Last Year

Graphs the focus row (and Next and Previous rows as requested) for the twelve months of the current year.  For the same 12 months, the Budget numbers are graphed, as well as, last year’s numbers.  Note that you are not given the option to change time periods like you are with the other comparanator styles.

Note: Current Year Budget values can be entered in the Budget Module. 

Next Year Budget

Graphs the focus row (and Next and Previous rows as requested) for the twelve months of the current year.  For the same 12 months, the Budget numbers are graphed, as well as, the numbers for Next Year’s Budget.  Note that you are not given the option to change time periods like you are with the other comparanator styles.

Note: the Next  Year Budget values can be entered in the Budget Module. 

Peer Group Members

These can be separate locations if you have multiple outlets, or clients of yours who have agreed to share data files.  This style graphs the focus row (and Next and Previous rows as requested) with one line representing each group member.  It is useful for small groups. 

You can create a CSF file in the DataViewer, Projections Module, or Rusty’s ToolBox.   Select “File ‘ then “Create CSF File”.

Scenarios

This does the same really as Peer Group Members, but the group members are different scenarios for the same company as opposed to different companies.   You create the scenarios by typing in different assumptions or using the Forecast Tool to access different forecast techniques.  Then save each result under a new name (File / Save Company As…). 

You would normally select this style from the Projections Module as opposed to the DataViewer.

Peer Group vs. Benchmark

Here’s “Total Overhead” for the month of March 2010 for the group.  US201 was selected to be the benchmark. 

You can build your own  benchmark file and enter published industry stats by setting up a new company.  Check the box “Use this file for Benchmark data only.”  This allows you to enter values for calculated measures such as “Inventory Turns” or “Days of Cash.”

Actual vs. Comparison Group

In SurvivalWare a Comparison Group has special meaning:  it is a collection of company or locations which have been assembled in a central area (e.g. by a corporate analyst for a franchise company), and analyzed through the Company Stats module in Rusty’s Toolbox.  The analysis produces a set of “meta data” files than can be re-distributed to the participants without compromising anyone’s privacy. 

These two comparanator styles let you graph your performance against the percentiles of the group – either 3 at a time (25^th percentile, Median, 75^th percentile) or 5 at a time by including the 5^th and 95^th percentiles as well.

We’ve included a sample comparison group so you can see how this works. It is called “fake-meta-data” and the files are all contained in the folder ..\Survware\FortKnox\ComparisonGroups.

SurvivalWare 3.1 – A Sneak Preview

There have been a number of improvements to SurvivalWare that have been made this year,  and we have decided to make the new version available sooner rather than later.  Look for the official announcement later this month.   We continue to simplify the user interface, while at the same time making sure SurvivalWare does what you need it to do.  The most popular new feature seems to be the new Time Scale / Time Span icons that appear on the Trend graphs so that you can instantly switch from Months to Quarters or Years, and expand the view from History, to more History, and on to Projections.

The top row controls the time scale.    The current selection is greyed out (in this case Months).  The second row of icons lets you control the time span appearing in the chart, with more time periods appearing in the chart as you go from left to right.

Some other recent advances:

Shopping Cart to gather variables from around the model for viewing or reporting

New Comparanator styles

Create CSF File menu item allows for quick creation of peer groups or scenario lists for graphing and reporting

Advanced Data Load option simplifies the user interface for loading non QuickBooks data

Forecast Tool upgrade – can model “delays”  in key line items.  Also Term Loan calculator

Analyze company stats feature in the Toolbox: brand new user interface to make it easy for franchise groups to calculate percentiles for their locations

Automator (Pro version only): complete overhaul of the user interface so that command lists and explanations are available on the screen as you are building applets.

AlphaGraphics Customers:  the new Budget module development work is proceeding and should go into testing soon.  The hope is to release this feature in SurvivalWare version 3.1.

Work on SurvivalWare 3.1 is well underway

Sometimes the development cycle moves faster than others.   SurvivalWare Pro 3.0 was driven by our desire to put customization tools in the hands of power users in preparation for a ramping up of demand.  Version 3.1 is customer driven.  A customer (AlphaGraphics, Inc.)  is paying us to make the Budgeting module simpler to use, while at the same time extending the budget to the Balance Sheet and Cash Flow statements from just the Income Statement.  It’s a big deal, but it sure is going to be nice.  I’m doing the work for the AlphaGraphics model, and at the same time making the changes to our generic Fort Knox model so that the new feature is available to the rest of the customer base.

By the way, if you haven’t seen it yet, take a look at this brand new video of Kevin Cushing, CEO of AlphaGraphics, explaining why SurvivalWare has become a system standard for AlphaGraphics.   He also lays down a challenge to improve SurvivalWare to make it more integrated with their business planning process.

Kevin Cushing on SurvivalWare as System Standard for AlphaGraphics

One of the nice things about the new budgeting module  will be that you can work on the current year budget or next year budget at any time.  Previously it was tough to make changes to the current year budget.

The user interface has been improved, with numbers and checkmarks to help you keep track of your progress.  Here is a sample screen:

The User Interface has been simplified

It should be ready for beta testing in a week to 10 days.  We’re hoping to get it released in time for the annual AlphaGraphics conference in early July. 

In addition to the new Budgeting Module, there will be other enhancements, such as the ability to enter notes in a company file that can be displayed to help the user remember how to load data or do something else.

Don’t worry – anyone who purchased version 3.0 will be upgraded to 3.1 automatically.  We plan on an upgrade to the technical documentation with version 3.1 as well.

Most AlphaGraphics users are waiting for 3.1 before upgrading from 2.0 so they have to do it just once.

Please leave comments if you have suggestions for improvements to SurvivalWare.  And don’t worry Kirk, we’ll get better looking icons for Balance Sheet and Cash Flow reports before final release.

SurvivalWare Version 3.0 – What's New?

We’re targeting October 15th to make the formal announcement.  This version has been in “soft release” since August 31, 2009.  It has been available as a 30 day trial, or for purchase.  We just didn’t tell anyone about it (unless they stumbled onto our website).

Now we’re about to start telling the world.    Here’s the top 10 list of what’s new in SurvivalWare version 3.0:

1. Drilldown enabled from Projections module
2. Export to Excel;  streamlined import from Excel
3. Comparanator now available in projections module for doing scenario comparisons
4. Consolidation / comparison list builder
5. KPI Customizer allows the user to define non-financial data to track, and calculations based on these and the financial data already loaded
6. Dashboard customizer allows for user to select variables and color breaks for gauges and barcharts
7. Report customizer runs off easily changed specifications in a master Excel file
8. By Column reports – can now select any time period
9. FortKnox foundation model (this will be sold separately at $295 when the introductory price expires).  In SurvivalWare version 2.0, the all purpose model was called FM2008 and was free.  Fort Knox is a big improvement over FM2008.  I
10. Improvements to the Forecast Tool 

A few more words about the Fort Knox model:

 Here are the improvements to the Forecast Tool:

• Term Loan calculator
• ARC Loan calculator
• Can adjust seasonal forecast up or down
• Can control which months each technique applies to
• “Inflate as of” option
• Simplified user interface

SurvivalWare including the Fort Knox model is priced at $495 through the end of this month.  Starting November 1, the Fort Knox model will be sold separately at $295, or $790 bundled together with the SurvivalWare platform.