01 · The problem
What problem does it solve?
A distributor’s data sits in an ERP with years of sales. Every new question from the owner — what fell last month, which customers grew, what runs out next week — becomes a request to the one person who knows how to build reports.
Answers arrive a day or two later, as a spreadsheet that raises the next question. Decisions on buying and collections wait for reports, or get made without them.
Waiting for reports
Each new question queues behind the last.
One report person
Knowledge locked with whoever writes the queries.
Decisions on gut feel
Questions not asked because they’re too slow to answer.
Spreadsheet sprawl
Copies of exports that never agree.