AI for operations managers, grounded in your own operations data

Throughput and OEE from the ERP, actuals from the production database, the hours out of the time sheet, the plan off the whiteboard, all retyped into Operations KPI Dashboard Q2.xlsx by hand, and one number is always slightly wrong when someone in the room digs in. The fear isn't the work; it's being caught out in front of the MT by a figure you keyed at 11pm. What you need isn't a prettier dashboard. It's the reconciled number and the one line naming which lines drag the average, ready before the question comes.

Every quarter the same argument: half the room says you're carrying too many people, the other half says you're behind the intake. Reconciling it means pivoting Capacity Planning Q3 2026.xlsx against the order book for an afternoon, and the shortfall never sits on "the whole line": it's the welders, or a specific machine, not a bucket of hours. Hire against the wrong read and it's your credibility that pays when the extra heads turn out to be idle by week 32.

There's no forward radar over the open orders. Open Orders Wk28.xlsx trends the wrong way for days before it shows up as a late shipment, and by the time Van Leeuwen phones about order P-2043 the damage is done. What you can't see is which orders are trending late now, which trace back to the same supplier, and which call today keeps on-time delivery above 95%. That's the Monday-morning fire you're always fighting a day too late.

Ask for the numbers and you get them already reconciled across the ERP, the production database, the hours sheet and the plan (no re-keying), with the nuance the room will probe for: throughput up 4%, but lines 3 and 5 drag the average, and the 'per line' tab has the figure to lead with. Every number is sourced to the exact file and version so you can verify before you commit. A dashboard stops at the number; a second brain grounded in your files carries it into the room.

Whether you're staffed for the intake, read off your own capacity sheet and order book: short around 90 hours on assembly the next three weeks, then over-capacity by week 32, and the honest read that it's order intake front-loaded, not headcount, so you pull the week-32 slack forward instead of hiring. It's specific about where the shortfall sits (the constrained skill or machine, not a bucket of hours), so you can defend the call rather than guess it.

Which orders are trending late this week, surfaced from the open-order file before the customer calls: five drifting, three tracing back to one supplier, order P-2043 for Van Leeuwen at risk for Friday. It ties the supplier flag to a fact from the file (the average delay on their last four deliveries), so it reads as a signal, not an oracle. That turns Monday's fire into a call you make today, with on-time delivery held above 95%.