How do I generate a board-ready AI spend report?
One-click PDF reports with AI-written narrative in three tones (Board/CFO, Technical Finance, Engineering). Scheduled monthly delivery to finance teams. Everything your CFO needs — generated in 15–20 seconds from your actual spend data.
Cognocient generates a PDF board report in 15–20 seconds from your actual spend data, with an AI-written narrative in your choice of three tones: Board/CFO, Technical Finance, or Engineering. Schedule monthly delivery directly to your finance team.
What's in the report
| Section | Detail |
|---|---|
| Executive summary | Claude-written narrative, 150–200 words, tailored to your actual spend data |
| Total AI spend with MoM trend | Month-over-month comparison with percentage change |
| Waste identified and recovered | Dollar value of waste found and recovered this month |
| AI Efficiency Score | Cost per business outcome this month, with a trend vs. last month |
| Top 5 most expensive features | Ranked by total spend with investment/waste classification |
| Budget vs. actuals by department | Variance table for every department with active budgets |
| Top 3 active recommendations | Highest-impact optimisations Cognocient has identified |
The narrative is written by Claude using your real data — not a template. It summarises what changed, what was recovered, and what to watch next month. Each report is unique to the period.
Generate a report
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Navigate to Reports — Dashboard → Reports
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Click "Generate AI Report →" — Claude writes the narrative using your actual data. Generation takes 15–20 seconds.
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Download PDF — Report downloads immediately. All charts, tables, and narrative included in a single PDF.
Report generation uses Claude to write the narrative section. If PDF generation fails, see PDF report not generating for troubleshooting steps.
AI Efficiency Score explained
This is your cost per business outcome for the current calendar month — total AI spend divided by tagged outcomes delivered — shown with a trend versus last month, e.g. “$0.42 per outcome, down 12%.” It requires outcome tracking (X-Cost-Outcome) to be in use; without any tagged outcomes yet, the card shows total spend and a prompt to set up tracking instead. Available on the Business plan. See What is an AI Efficiency Score? for the full explanation, including how it differs from the separate 0–100 FinOps Maturity Score and the Investment vs. Waste Efficiency figure.
Narrative tone
Customize how the AI-written narrative section is framed. Three tones are available:
| Tone | Best for | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Board / CFO (default) | Board meetings, quarterly reviews | ROI, efficiency, strategic insights |
| Technical Finance | Finance team analysis | Waste categories, model costs, recovery opportunities with exact dollar amounts |
| Engineering | Engineering sprint planning | Cost-per-feature, optimization opportunities, implementation actions |
Set your tone in the Narrative tone selector when generating a report. The charts, tables, and metrics are identical across all tones — only the narrative paragraph changes.
Scheduled delivery
Reports can be auto-generated and emailed to your finance team on a recurring cadence (Growth plan). Configure in Reports → Scheduled Delivery tab: choose a frequency (monthly on the 1st, weekly on Monday, or end of billing cycle), a report type (the one-page AI ROI Summary or the Full Detail report), and a narrative tone. Recipients receive a PDF attachment — no Cognocient login required.
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