FAQs
What is Impact Intelligence?
Impact Intelligence is Spider Impact's comprehensive suite of AI and automated capabilities that help you discover insights you didn't know existed and work more efficiently with your data. It combines conversational AI through Impact Assistant, predictive analytics like forecasting and earned value management, proactive monitoring through smart alerts, and automated reporting. Impact Intelligence is the smart layer across Spider Impact that helps you understand what's happening, predict what's coming, and get answers instantly—all while maintaining enterprise-grade security that keeps your sensitive data completely private.
How does Impact Assistant keep my data secure?
Impact Assistant uses an innovative metadata-only architecture where your actual data values never leave your secure environment. The AI receives only dataset names, field descriptions, field names and types, and aggregate statistics like date ranges or the most common values in a field—never individual records or sensitive information. This means the AI cannot hallucinate your data because all actual values come directly from your secure database. For commercial customers, contractual agreements ensure your data will never be used for AI training. For government customers, all infrastructure operates within Amazon GovCloud behind FedRAMP-authorized boundaries. This security-first approach provides powerful AI capabilities without compromising data privacy.
What types of predictions does Spider Impact make automatically?
Spider Impact provides several types of automated predictions without requiring any data science expertise. Forecasting uses time-series analysis to predict future metric values based on historical patterns, automatically detecting seasonal trends and selecting the best model. Earned Value Management (EVM) automatically predicts initiative completion dates and final costs based on current performance, requiring only updates to percent complete and actual costs. Initiative impact analysis determines whether your projects are positively, negatively, or neutrally affecting your KPIs by analyzing pre- and post-initiative performance. Trend analysis reveals underlying patterns across your data. All of these predictions happen automatically as part of Impact Intelligence, helping you see what's coming before you get there.
Can Impact Assistant proactively suggest insights I should explore?
Yes, one of Impact Intelligence's most powerful features is proactively suggesting insights to explore based on your data. Rather than requiring you to know what questions to ask, Impact Assistant analyzes your data and recommends questions worth investigating—like "total sales last month" or patterns that might need attention. You can click on these suggestions to immediately see answers and visualizations. This proactive approach helps you discover opportunities and issues you didn't know to look for, making valuable insights accessible even when you're not sure where to start.
How do I know which initiatives are actually working?
Spider Impact's initiative impact analysis uses statistical methods to determine whether your strategic initiatives are actually affecting your business performance. The software analyzes metric performance before and after initiative implementation, detecting statistically significant changes and identifying whether the impact is positive, negative, or mixed. This analysis considers both trend changes and absolute performance shifts, giving you clear insight into which projects are moving the needle. With this intelligence, you can confidently discontinue underperforming initiatives and redirect resources to projects that deliver real results, ensuring your limited resources drive maximum impact.
Do I need technical or data science skills to use these features?
No technical or data science skills are required to benefit from Impact Intelligence. Impact Assistant lets you ask questions in everyday language—no query writing or technical syntax needed. Forecasting, earned value management, and initiative impact analysis all happen automatically based on your data, with the software selecting appropriate models and methods. Smart alerts require simple configuration of what you want to monitor. Automated reporting uses point-and-click scheduling. Spider Impact democratizes advanced analytics, making powerful intelligence accessible to executives, managers, and team members regardless of technical background. If you can describe what you want to know, Impact Intelligence can help you discover the answer.