Board Briefing (Operate)

Overview

Turn forecast output into a board/investor-grade briefing: the headline numbers, the cash story, what changed, and the risks - as markdown and Excel. Make the operator look like they have a CFO.

Core principle: A board wants the story and the three things that matter, not a data dump.

When to use

• Board decks, investor updates, lender packages
• "Summarize the forecast for leadership"

Workflow

1. Discover the company command. Run

openfpa entrypoint-list <company-root> --kind report. Use a registered briefing workflow when one exists.

1. Build the forecast (monthly + optional runway):

   import pyfpa
   from pyfpa.io.loaders import load_cash13_config
   monthly = pyfpa.cashflow_from_config(pyfpa.load_config("examples/ridgeline/config.yaml"))
   runway = pyfpa.runway_summary(pyfpa.cash13_forecast(load_cash13_config("examples/ridgeline/cash13.yaml")))

1. Render the briefing:

   from pyfpa.io.reporting import to_briefing_md, forecast_to_excel
   md = to_briefing_md(monthly, title="Acme Inc.", runway=runway)
   forecast_to_excel(monthly, "forecast.xlsx")

to_briefing_md emits a headline (revenue, EBITDA, net income, ending cash), an optional 13-week runway section, and a monthly table.

1. Add the narrative the renderer can't. to_briefing_md emits only the headline, the optional runway section, and the monthly table - it has no narrative slot. So author your own markdown around it: prepend a ## What changed section (the 3 things that moved) and append ## Risks (3 forward risks) and ## The ask (e.g. "approve a $200K line to bridge the spring build"). The rendered briefing is the data spine; you supply the story.
2. Apply judgment (see fpa-cfo-judgment): caveat any pre-close months, state whether cash is flash or GL, and don't quote ebitda as true EBITDA if D&A matters.
3. If the audience wants the model itself, produce the live-formula workbook via fpa-excel-model alongside the briefing.

One-command demo

python examples/ridgeline/run_demo.py runs this whole path on the synthetic demo and writes docs/demo/briefing.md + forecast.xlsx.

Common mistakes

• Leading with a table instead of the takeaway.
• Presenting a cash trough without the recommended action.