What changed
The steps are the same as they have always been. You open a project, you create something, a process runs, a spreading task becomes ready, and you spread the filing. The one difference is what you create: an activity plan rather than a task.
A task ran a prescripted process — the same fixed steps every time. An activity plan runs a dynamic process: it decides its own steps from the document in front of it.
The end result is the same: a spreading task.
Think of it this way. The activity is Kodexa. The task is human. |
Why it matters
Spreading is the first workflow to run this way, not the only one it can carry. Because a plan decides its own steps, the same mechanism handles work a fixed script never could.
· | Multi-entity extraction One filing covering a parent and its subsidiaries, pulled apart and spread as separate entities. |
· | Automatic download and spread Filings collected as they are published and put through the plan, with nobody uploading anything. |
· | Notified when a task is ready Users are told a spreading task is waiting for them instead of going to look for one. |
· | Downstream systems Handing results to EWI and Credit Work Bench becomes viable, because a plan can have a step that does it. |
This is a platform the bank can point at other, more complex workflows — not a one-off change to spreading. |
The walkthrough
Six steps, start to finish. The numbers in each screenshot match the numbered notes underneath it.
STEP 1 OF 6
Open the project you're spreading
Start exactly where you start today.
1 | Three tabs, one of them new Projects and Tasks are where they always were. Activities is the new one. |
2 | Pick your project Same list, same names, same search. Click the project for the entity you are spreading. |
Nothing on this screen works differently. Note that activities can only be created from inside a project. |
STEP 2 OF 6
Inside the project, open Activities
This is where the one new button lives.
1 | Switch to the Activities tab Tasks is still there. It is where your spreading task will show up later. |
2 | New Activity, not New Task Activities are your starting point from now on. |
3 | One row per plan Each row is an activity plan with a progress bar showing how far through its steps it is. The spreading task is the last step, and it closes when you lock the task. |
Activities create tasks. The activity is Kodexa; the task is human. |
STEP 3 OF 6
Name it, attach the filing, start it
The form is the one you already know from creating a task.
1 | Title, description, priority The same three fields you filled in when you created a task. Nothing new to learn. |
2 | Attach the filing Upload the 10-K, 10-Q or 20-F, or pick a document already in the project. PDF, XLSX, XLS or XLSM, up to 500 pages. |
3 | Start Activity Greyed out until a document is attached. Once you click it, the plan takes over. |
The only difference is that you are kicking off an activity plan, which will create the spreading task when it is ready. |
STEP 4 OF 6
The plan runs the whole pipeline for you
From here on, nothing is waiting on you.
1 | Activity started That is the whole hand-off. No further clicks are needed to move the filing along. |
2 | Pending, then In Progress The new plan appears at the top of the list. The bar counts completed steps, so 2/3 means one to go. |
Email alerts. The project owner is emailed when a task is ready. This matters more as plans begin downloading and extracting filings on their own, because nobody will be watching the screen when the work arrives.
You do not have to sit and watch this. Close the tab and come back — the plan keeps running. |
STEP 5 OF 6
Open a plan and you see every step
Useful when you want to know what happened to a filing, or how far along it is.
1 | Click a plan to see its steps Classification, extraction, knowledge refinement, status. All of it automatic. |
2 | The one human step The final step creates your spreading task. That is the only part of the plan a person does. |
3 | Open Task Go straight into spreading from here, or pick it up later from the Tasks tab. |
The plan does every step but the last. The last one is yours. |
STEP 6 OF 6
Spreading itself is exactly as you left it
Once the task is open, everything is where it was.
1 | Same tabs, same fields General, Income Statement, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow, Off-Balance Sheet, Face Sheet Tables. |
2 | Same buttons Generate FS Excel, Save, Cancel and Lock are all where they were. |
3 | Source alongside The filing sits next to the sheet with extracted values highlighted in the document. |
Nothing to relearn. The change is upstream of this screen. |
Also new: the chat panel and the document pop-out
Two changes to the spreading screen's surroundings, neither of which affects how you spread.
1 | Your chats are kept Every request is saved in the list, so you can reopen an earlier one instead of retyping it. |
2 | A panel, not a pop-up The assistant now sits beside the spreadsheet rather than covering it. Asking it to generate an FS Excel opens it here. |
3 | Toggle the chat panel A button hides and shows the chat panel. It is the mirror of the PDF panel viewer. |
4 | View documents on a separate monitor The PDF viewer can now be undocked from the main screen. Two monitors: go for it. |
The undocked viewer is still in development. Let us know if you run into trouble with it. |
Finding a plan later
Activity plans show everything. Every running plan is visible in one list.
1 | Activities at the top level Outside any single project, this tab lists every plan running across the organization. |
2 | Filter to find one By lifecycle, running state, time range or file name — useful when someone asks where a filing got to. |
3 | Progress at a glance 15/16 means one step left, which is almost always the spreading task waiting for a person. |
A filing is never 'somewhere in the system'. It is on a numbered step. |
If you remember three things
1 | Open your project. Same place, same list, same names as today. |
2 | Create a New Activity. Not New Task. Give it a title, attach the filing, hit Start, walk away. |
3 | Your spreading task appears when it's ready. In the Tasks tab, exactly as before — and the spreading screen is unchanged. |
Stuck? The help agent is still there. Ask it a question from inside Workflow and we will pick it up. |