During XBE Horizon Live 2024, Milind Alvares and Juliana Thayil gave an update about Prophet, XBE's project financial management feature.

Watch the presentation on YouTube.

A transcript of the presentation is provided below.

Introduction by Sean Devine

Now, Milind and Juliana are about to come up, but before they do, I’m going to lay out a few ground rules. Yesterday morning on Slack, I reminded our team that, even though some of you are from out of town, we’re the hosts and need to ensure everyone has a great time. However, I’m changing the rules for the next session because Milind and Juliana have traveled all the way from Goa, India, to join us for the next two days.

For the remainder of the conference, we will continue to be your hosts. But for the next 30 minutes, we will be hosting Milind and Juliana. They have not only done most of the work related to Prophet but have also made a significant journey to be here with us. I travel to India twice a year and can attest that it is quite a trip. They are here to present the following content, so let’s be extremely gracious hosts and welcome them to the stage.

Speaker Introductions

Sean Devine:
Before we dive into the Prophet content, can you both introduce yourselves to the group, as many have not met you in person before?

Milind Alvares:
Hey, I'm Milind Alvares, Director of Product at XBE. The last time I came for Horizon, I knew practically every customer. This time, I’m feeling a little out of place because I don’t join Compass calls as much as I used to. But I’ve been at XBE since we started. It’s been an exciting and informative journey building this product, learning about your industry, and all the things you guys do. I’m really proud to work at XBE.

Juliana Thayil:
Hi, everyone. I’m Juliana, the Development Team Manager at XBE. I’ve been with XBE for the past three and a half years. Coming from India, meeting this community has been a great experience. Everyone is fun to work with, and I look forward to seeing you around.

Sean Devine:

Great introductions! Here’s a fun fact: When we started XBE, I immediately brought Milind on board. If you look up user ID number one in our system, that’s me, and user ID number two is Milind. It’s a fun tidbit—if I had been user ID three and he user ID six, we’d have had to drop the database and start again!

Milind and Juliana will now talk about Prophet. I want to provide a bit of context. Back in January 2023, over a year and a half ago, we did something unusual: we pre-announced what we were going to work on. As many of you know, we almost never do that. Typically, we might say, “Maybe we’ll work on this, maybe not,” and release features when they’re ready. But with Prophet, we laid out our plans in a January 2023 newsletter, stating that we were embarking on this ambitious project. The newsletter included about 12 assertions, outlining a future where these 12 things would be true. We did this to hold ourselves publicly accountable and to seek collaboration, knowing it would take a long time to achieve.

Now, in September 2024, all the things we envisioned have come to fruition. Milind and Juliana will provide an overview of what is true today regarding Prophet. I’ll return at the end to discuss the next challenges ahead for Prophet. Milind and Juliana, take it away!

Milind Alvares & Juliana Thayil on Prophet Features

Automated Imports for Free

We have Automated Imports for Free. With our all-inclusive admin, project Prophet imports are hassle-free. If you have a project Prophet to execute with XBE, our admin team will assist you in inputting all your cost and revenue items into the project, handling all the setup so you won’t have to worry about anything.

Import Support

We now support imports from B2W and have successfully implemented it for one of our customers. We are happy to work with anyone who has a B2W system set up and wants to import their projects into XBE. Additionally, we are ready for HCSS-based implementations, which will be our next focus. Our goal is to ensure that project Prophet imports are seamless for our customers, with Prophet handling all the complexities.

Actuals Capture for Free

We offer Actuals Capture for Free, meaning you don’t need to change your current workflows. Prophet is built on top of our existing workflows, pulling in data from timecards, timesheets, and material transactions. For example, it automatically pulls in actuals from ticket data.

Milind Alvares:
This feature is crucial as it allows you to capture actuals and associate them with your financial system. Let me delve into the details. Prophet sits on top of your job production plan and other systems. At the lowest level, we have cost items, and on the other hand, we have the work done, such as timesheets and timecards. To bridge this gap, we initially associated cost items with resource types, like materials or trucking. However, this approach wasn’t scalable and required extensive training.

To eliminate ambiguity, we developed a solution that works behind the scenes by isolating cost items and ranking them based on historical allocation data and name similarities. This process allows the system to automatically associate work done with the highest-ranking cost item without any additional input from you. Essentially, Prophet manages the associations automatically, so all you need to do is continue tracking timecards and material transactions as usual.

Same-Day Income Statement for Free

We provide a Same-Day Income Statement for Every Job Production Plan for Free. This feature allows you to see how a job is progressing by comparing estimated costs versus actual costs at various levels—job level, revenue item level, resource level, and even down to individual material types.

Using visual signals like green for good and red for areas needing attention, you can easily identify discrepancies between your estimates and actuals. For instance, you might notice that crew performance is excellent, but material costs are higher due to waste. This level of detail helps you investigate and address specific issues affecting profitability.

Margin Matrix

We’ve developed a Margin Matrix that provides a comprehensive view of your expected versus actual performance. The Margin Matrix includes four dimensions:

1. Drift: The difference between the bid and the forecast, offering a feedback loop for estimators to understand potential divergences.
2. Fluff: The difference between the bid and the possible, indicating what remains for competition to undercut pricing.
3. Shift: The difference between the bid and the actual, showing the degree of profit shift from initial expectations.
4. Stretch: The difference between the forecast and the possible, helping set expectations based on what’s achievable.

This matrix allows you to drill down into details to investigate any discrepancies, ensuring that you can manage profitability effectively.

Extensible and Robust Architecture

Our Architecture is extensible, robust, and precise, supporting every scenario in the industry. Since we began working on Prophet, we’ve focused on maintaining a flexible backend despite increasing complexity. The core architecture, including the server side and API, remains unchanged because it has proven to be solid and reliable.

We’ve enhanced workflows above the core architecture, such as automating the generation of cost item actuals and improving client-side workflows. This ensures that Prophet remains scalable and reliable, providing detailed and specific information without any obscurity.

Comprehensive Reporting

Prophet supports a wide variety of Reports, including:

• Estimate Variance
• Price Estimates Report
• Revenue Item Summary
• Project Activity Report

We can build any report you can imagine, provided there is interest. For example, when we needed specific reports, our team delivered them quickly, demonstrating that generating reports is straightforward given the detailed data we capture. You can rely on us to handle all your reporting needs.

Game Plans

Prophet includes Game Plans, similar to the architecture at the branch level but applied at the project level. This feature allows you to communicate your strategy effectively by assigning objectives to teammates, setting goals, and outlining your project plans. It ensures that everyone is aligned with the project’s goals and expectations.

Conclusion by Milind and Juliana

To summarize, Prophet offers:

• Automated Imports: Hassle-free project imports with support for B2W and HCSS.
• Actuals Capture: Seamless integration with existing workflows to capture actuals.
• Same-Day Income Statements: Real-time visibility into job performance.
• Margin Matrix: Comprehensive analysis of bid, forecast, actual, and possible margins.
• Robust Architecture: A flexible and reliable system supporting industry scenarios.
• Comprehensive Reporting: A wide range of customizable reports.
• Game Plans: Strategic planning tools at the project level.

These features are available without requiring any additional work from you. By simply entering your project details and associating them with the job production plan, Prophet handles everything behind the scenes.

Meta Points and Future Plans by Sean Devine

A few quick meta points before we move on to what’s next. It was incredibly important to me that Milind and Juliana present today because the majority of our team is based in India—24 out of 34 team members. Representing our culture and having our leaders who direct the work present at this event is crucial. Thank you both for coming, and thanks to everyone else who couldn’t make it.

What’s Coming Next in Prophet

Prophet has been an ambitious project from the start. We pre-announced our intentions and have now largely achieved our initial goals. A special thank you to the Gallagher team for their collaboration and perseverance. Their dedication has been instrumental in reaching this milestone.

Looking ahead, we are focusing on two main areas:

1. AI-Driven Predictions of Cost Estimates:

• We are developing AI-driven predictions that will revolutionize how estimates are generated. Prophet is the bridge between operations and both estimating and financial tracking. Our next step is integrating actuals with estimation to create a unified system. In the next five years, we aim to introduce AI-driven, pattern-matching estimates that go beyond traditional methods.

1. Improvement of the Pricing Process:

• We are working on enhancing the pricing process based on estimates. This will involve more advanced techniques to manage pricing related to estimates, providing a better feedback loop for future projects.

By the time you fully implement Prophet, these additional features will be available, enhancing your ability to leverage the feedback loop for both current and future jobs. We are committed to defining the cutting edge of integrating estimating and actual tracking.

Closing Remarks

To everyone who has used Prophet so far, thank you for being pioneers on this journey. For those who haven’t, we’re excited to work with you and show you how much Prophet can do for your operations without requiring extra effort on your part. We’ve automated the challenging aspects, allowing you to take full advantage of Prophet’s capabilities right now.