Project overview

The instructions that write a project's What matters now: the headline, finding, next step and secondary issue, plus the People, effort and payroll paragraph. Every figure is calculated from the record — only how it is put into words is edited here.

Edits are kept in this browser and are used the next time a project overview is shown, so a change takes effect immediately without a release. If a run fails or writes nothing, the project keeps its calculated wording.

What matters now

The headline, finding, next step and secondary issue in a project's What matters now.

Given to the model: The project's own figures: authorized and anticipated funding, budget periods, spend, balance, dates, payroll.

Create the “What matters now” content for a standalone Project Overview using the supplied project records. This view describes recorded actuals and funding. No plan forecast is available in this context.

Return valid JSON with exactly these fields:
{
"headline": "",
"finding": "",
"next_step": "",
"secondary_issue": ""
}

OUTPUT

* headline: a short, specific finding, ideally no more than 10 words.
* finding: one or two short sentences explaining the evidence and its practical meaning.
* next_step: one concrete action supported by the finding, or an empty string if no action is needed.
* secondary_issue: one short sentence about another distinct, material issue, or an empty string.
* Use natural language and compact money figures, such as $27.11M or $361.6K.
* Do not repeat information across fields or list every available metric.
* Do not generate separate “Context needed” or “Basis” statements. The application displays data dates.

SELECTING THE FINDING
Assess both the recorded financial position and the completeness of information needed for future planning. Choose the issue with the greatest supported consequence, considering urgency, financial impact, and uncertainty. A missing anticipated amount does not automatically outrank a verified material overdraft.

If no issue needs attention, provide a neutral summary of what is on record. Do not manufacture a risk or next step.

SPONSORED PROJECTS

* Use authorized budget as the baseline for comparisons with actual spend.
* Keep anticipated budget separate and explicitly label it anticipated. It is not authorized funding.
* Use supplied validated totals and differences. Compare budget and spend only when their project scope, time basis, and cost basis are confirmed to match.
* If comparability is unknown, describe the records as needing reconciliation rather than declaring a verified overdraft.
* Do not describe the entire authorized budget as remaining or currently available. Distinguish total authorization from the unspent balance and any supplied restrictions.
* A positive remaining balance alone does not establish underutilization, excess funding, or risk.

PROGRAM INCOME
* Program income is money the project has received. It is separate from the budget and is never added into the budget figure. Read spend against the budget as for any sponsored project.
* Where spend exceeds the budget and the award treats program income as additive, say how much of the excess the income received covers and how much income remains beyond that. Where spend is within budget, note the income received as available beyond the budget.
* Never describe program income as budgeted or not yet budgeted. When program income is recorded but the award does not record its treatment, do not count it, and name the missing treatment as the input needing attention.

BUDGET PERIODS AND PLANNING INPUTS

* Review supplied period dates, realization, amounts, and confirmation status.
* If an existing current or future anticipated period has a zero or missing amount that has not been confirmed, identify the expected budget as an input needing attention. Ask the user to enter expected funding or confirm that none is expected so future planning and forecasting can use the intended assumption.
* Distinguish a recorded $0 from an amount that is absent.
* If $0 has already been confirmed as intentional, do not repeatedly request correction.
* Do not infer that an anticipated budget is missing merely because a period is already authorized or no anticipated period exists.
* A period with $0 new authorization does not alone prove that no funds are available; consider supplied available balances and carryforward information.
* Identify a gap in budget-period dates only when supplied performance dates establish the uncovered interval.
* Do not infer depletion dates, future staffing coverage, or forecast outcomes from actuals alone.

NON-SPONSORED FUNDS

* Describe the recorded fund balance and relevant inflows and outflows, including opening balance where applicable.
* A positive balance is healthy and is not, by itself, a risk.
* Do not declare an overdraft from outflows alone when opening funding or inflow records are incomplete.
* Recommend reconciliation when the record is insufficient to establish the balance.

EVIDENCE AND ACTIONS

* Call information missing only when it is needed for the decision and is neither supplied nor reliably derivable.
* Do not claim a balance is missing merely because there is no stored balance field.
* Do not recommend obtaining funding, transferring charges, or cutting spending without evidence supporting that action. Reducing future spending does not itself resolve an existing historical overdraft.
* Never invent figures, approvals, funding expectations, or source completeness.
* Use the supplied reporting date to interpret periods. Do not treat the date of the last transaction as proof that all records are complete through that date.

People, effort and payroll

The paragraph at the top of the People, effort and payroll section.

Given to the model: The latest month with a payroll charge, how many of the associated people charged it, salary and fringe that month, the prior month, and effort levels.

Try it on one project

Runs the edited instructions against a single project's own figures and shows what would be written. Nothing is saved — the project page writes itself from these same instructions.