Frequently Asked Questions
Everything you need to know about Bear Decisions
So, what does this really look like?
One Model. Hundreds of Possibilities
Imagine that...
- You are managing a facility and have two areas of decisions you need to consider:
- • Whether you should expand the plant (yes or no)
- • How much total budget you are going to ask for (maintaining existing, higher or lower)
- When you are considering these decisions, you have also identified three areas of uncertainty:
- • The price of the product you are selling (high, base or low)
- • The interest rate you will be charged on the loan you are taking out (high, base or low)
- • Other miscellaneous risks that may impact your decision (high, base or low)
- If you were to use Bear Decisions, you would be able to:
- • See that there are 6 different decisions you could make
- • See that there are 27 different outcomes you could see per decision
- • Consider the full 162 different scenarios you could see based upon the combination of the decisions and uncertainties
Other Questions?
Does this replace Excel?
Not at all. It runs entirely within Excel – your model (and data) stays yours.
So how does it change my Excel model?
The only required changes will be to have your alternative inputs stored somewhere within your Excel model. Bear Decisions will then use these inputs to generate the scenarios and visualizations. They can be on a separate sheet or in the same sheet as your existing key inputs.
Over time, you may choose to focus the analytics and graphs within your Excel model to dive deeper into individual scenarios and allow Bear Decisions to handle the heavy lifting of calculations and comparisons between cases.
Can I use my macros and formulas?
Yes! We work with your model, not around it.
If you do have macros and you flag that you want to use them, by default we just pause the calculation process for you to manually trigger your macro(s) due to limitations on Microsoft's APIs.
Documentation is provided however to automate the triggered macro execution process. (It does require pasting in some standard VBA code however, sorry!)
Do I need to know any coding?
No! Bear Decisions does not require any coding expertise.
All calculations use your Excel document's logic, we just aggregate and filter the results based upon your selections.
The only exception is if you already have VBA to trigger macros - if you want to automate their triggering then you will need to paste in some standard VBA code.
Can't I just ask ChatGPT to do this for me?
Unfortunately AI's haven't progressed to a point where they can help with this type of work. While great with words, a lot of these models struggle with numbers and when you are making a decision, you really want to make sure that the numbers you are presenting are correct. Bear Decisions does that.
How long does it take to see a benefit?
Bear Decisions deploys in minutes (if not seconds) and can be rapidly configured – helping you to start gaining insight immediately, not weeks or months down the track.
How much does Bear Decisions cost?
I'm honestly still working on that. I plan for it to be affordable as an 'also' tool, with a subscription model. During the waitlist beta period it will be free to participants and subsequently all new users will be able to try it out for free for 30 days.
How will Bear Decisions help me avoid version chaos?
Well unfortunately we cannot promise you aren't still going to have a document called "final-plan_v4 (updated) 2.xlsx" but what we do offer is the ability to see all your what-if questions answered within a single document - so no more copying files to represent different cases.
Having that single version also means that if you do find an error, want to add a calculation nuance or need to add a new input or reporting detail, you can make that change just once, test across the entire spectrum of cases and validate that it has worked with no surprises. This helps you rapidly iterate to get that change right and know that your cases all remain consistently evaluated – helping you make confident data-driven decisions, free from bias.
Is this Monte Carlo?
Not yet. But Bear Decisions does deterministic scenario better than any current Excel plugin or capability.
What if I want to dig deeper into a visualization?
Each visualization has the ability to copy the data behind it to the clipboard – enabling you to paste it wherever you need to dig into the details.
You can also click into a visualization, then send a specific scenario back to the Excel model to see the full details of that scenario.
What versions of Excel are supported?
Bear Decisions is supported in the Windows and MacOS desktop versions as well as Office on the Web, and the iPad edition.
Note that a minimum Excel version of 2021 or Microsoft 365 is required for Bear Decisions to work.
I would generally recommend using the desktop version of Excel as it offers the most flexibility and control, as well as the best calculation performance.