A well organized and searchable guide on how to use SurvivalWare and the standard generic model that comes with it.

Use Load Data to transform financial data from a Quickbooks (or other) generated CSV file to a SurvivalWare matrix file, where the data is put into appropriate columns and rows. 

Once data has been loaded, click the Dashboard icon to quickly see how your business is doing.  Right mouse click on the Dashboard icon from the main menu to select  different types of Dashboard views. (Each model comes with its own set of Dashboards).

This is the heart of SurvivalWare and where you will spend most of your time.  Data Viewer allows you to see financial numbers and KPIs in a grid format.  The data is organized into tabs.  You can do Drilldowns or Chart the trend for any line item.

Select the Reports icon to print or preview nicely formatted reports.  There are several standard reports – such as Income Statement, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow and KPIs.  There is a selection of several column sets (e.g., Actual vs. Budget; Rolling 12 Months, etc.) that each report is available in.

A report package is a collection of formatted tabular reports, barcharts, and Comparanator graphs that you decide to collect together in one printable package.  You select what to save as you go through the DataViewer and Reports module, and then re-order them later. The Report Packages module allows you to edit and print your report packages.

SurvivalWare provides a tool to help you create a 12 month   budget.  Once the budget is in SurvivalWare, Actual vs. Budget reporting is automatic – just another Column Selection in the Reports Module. 

Projections can be done with months or years as the projection periods.  A monthly projection is similar to a budget, but tends to be done more often than once a year.  A projection is used to answer the question “how will things be the next 6 months?”  as opposed to “what are my sales and expense goals for the 12 months of 2009?”  With the projection, you use the built-in model to do a full income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement forecast.  A budget tends to be income statement only.

Use Company Setup to tell SurvivalWare information about each company, such as where its financial data comes from, or what logo to use for graphs and reports. The User Setup module allows you to specify user-specific information as well, including what folders to look in for data and which Dashboard to use.

The Cash Planner is the detailed cash-planning module that appeared as the first SurvivalWare in 2002.   With the Cash Planner you simulate individual checks and receipts, and often look at daily or weekly instead of monthly cash projections.  This module is completely separate from the month-oriented financial model used elsewhere in SurvivalWare.

The Comparanator uses line graphs to show how your company compares to a 12-month moving average or “budget” if you are a single entity.  If you are part of a franchisee systems (such as AlphaGraphics), you get to see your KPIs  graphed against the 25th percentile, Median, and 75th percentile values from the universe of franchisees submitting their financial data via SurvivalWare.

The Automator lets you run applets that automate things such as the importation of data, or standard analyses and reports.  Click on this icon to see a list of applets available for your model. Development of an Automator applet is for the advanced SurvivalWare user.  Right mouse click on this icon to access the applet development tool (also available through Rusty’s Toolbox).

A big part of the effort in SurvivalWare 2.01 was spent on de-cluttering and simplifying the User Interface.  The clutter can now be found in Rusty’s Toolbox, along with some powerful tools for the advanced SurvivalWare user.