Board Report to Decision Tool
Real AI · Video 2 of 3
From the series of short demonstrations of AI applied to the leadership work that actually sits on your desk.
Strategic leaders have always been told to be data-driven. But what if you've never been all that comfortable in Excel? AI erased that problem.
In this video, I will show you how to take a flat data report your school already produced and turn it into a strategic what-if planning tool — with a single AI prompt.
Want to try it on your own data? Here's a prompt you can adapt. Upload your spreadsheet, then paste this in:
You are an expert financial analyst and modeler for K-12 private schools. I've uploaded a spreadsheet of [describe it — e.g., next year's enrollment and tuition projections]. I want you to turn this flat data into an interactive what-if planning model I can use to pressure-test the projection privately.
Before you build:
Read the spreadsheet carefully and confirm back to me, in plain language, what the data represents and what each column means.
Validate the numbers. Recompute any totals and flag anything that doesn't add up or any assumption baked into the data that I should know about.
List every assumption you are making to build the model, and state it explicitly. Where you have to fill a gap, tell me what you assumed and why.
Then build a multi-tab model:
A scenario tab comparing, side by side: last year's actuals, the current projection, a flat scenario, and one or more downside scenarios.
The key levers I can adjust — enrollment by division and financial aid spend (as a % of gross tuition) — set up as clearly marked, protected inputs, so I can change an assumption and immediately see the impact on net tuition revenue.
A sensitivity tab showing how net tuition revenue moves across a range of enrollment and financial-aid levels.
A "sandbox" column or tab where I can model my own custom scenario without touching the others.
An instructions/notes tab: how to use the model, which cells are safe to edit, the assumptions you made, and the formula logic in plain English.
Format it so a non-spreadsheet-expert can use it: color-code input cells vs. calculated cells, protect anything that shouldn't be edited, and don't let me break it.
Treat this as a planning and thinking tool, not an audit-ready financial statement — favor clarity and explorability over false precision. When you're done, give me a short summary of what you built and suggest two or three additional scenarios worth modeling.
A tip: the better you describe your data and what decision you're trying to inform, the better the tool. Adapt the levers to whatever you're modeling — budget lines, staffing ratios, tuition, and aid tradeoffs.
