Tips / Tip
Get it to play the sceptical finance director before the real one sees it
The worst bit of presenting a report is the question you didn't see coming. You can rehearse that. Paste your draft and ask for the questions rather than the edits.
You're the finance director reading this [BOARD PACK / BUDGET REQUEST /
BUSINESS CASE] for the first time. You're sceptical, short of time, and
you want to know what we're not telling you.
Give me:
1. The eight hardest questions you'd ask, hardest first.
2. For each, whether the document already answers it (quote where) or
not.
3. Any figure or claim with no source or comparison.
4. Anything that reads like spin.
Don't rewrite the document and don't soften the questions.
Document: [PASTE]
Splitting "answered" from "missing" is the useful part. You'll already be fine on some of them. The missing ones are your to-do list for the day before.
The usual finds are a saving with no baseline ("15%... of what?"), a one-off cost treated as a run rate, a number with no comparison to last year or to budget, and a risk that's obvious in your head and absent from the page.
Fix the gaps in your own words. Don't paste the AI's answer into the pack as though it were your analysis. It doesn't know what was said at the last meeting, so if you know the real director has a pet worry, tell it.
A board pack or budget request is confidential. Use a tool your organisation has approved for it, or take out the names and figures you don't need to share. If it's a forecast you're worried about, check the assumptions first.