Question 1

Where do I start?

Accepted Answer

Most teams start with one person on Operations Workbench Starter, free for 30 days. Add LevelOneAI in Claude or ChatGPT, connect your email and add any exports you have, such as open POs or a schedule. Starter shows which changes put orders at risk, with the evidence, and tracks each one to a close. When the whole team needs it, with live ERP data, approvals and write-back, that's the Operations Workbench.

Question 2

How do Starter, the Workbench and the Operations Engine fit together?

Accepted Answer

The LevelOneAI Operations Engine does the work: it treats each order, PO or job as one record (Work), compares what changed with what was promised (Context), works out what it affects and who needs to decide (Decision), and assigns, drafts and tracks the next step (Action), until it's resolved. Starter runs the engine on one person's email and the documents they add. A Workbench runs it across a whole team's email, ERP and CRM for one workflow, with live data, approvals and write-back.

Question 3

Is there a free trial?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Operations Workbench Starter is free for 30 days, and you don't need a card. After that it's $199/month or $1,990/year (two months free), for 1 user and 1 mailbox. If you don't continue, your account becomes read-only and your data is deleted 30 days later.

Question 4

What do I need to use Starter?

Accepted Answer

A paid Claude or ChatGPT plan (the free tiers don't include the access it needs) and a Gmail or Outlook mailbox. For work email, a business or enterprise plan from that provider is recommended. Documents are optional: exports from any ERP or spreadsheet work.

Question 5

What's the difference between Starter and the Operations Workbench?

Accepted Answer

Starter works from one person's email and the exports they add, and you set it up yourself in minutes. It's built to show the value on your own work. The Operations Workbench connects live to your ERP and planning data, runs on its own, puts the whole team in one queue, and adds approvals, drafted follow-ups and write-back. Starter fees paid in the 6 months before you buy a Workbench are credited toward its setup.

Question 6

Which documents should I add to Starter?

Accepted Answer

Whatever you have, or none. It works on email from the first run, and tells you which document would sharpen the results most. Typical ones are an open-PO export, a production schedule, open sales orders or an AR aging report. It keeps only the fields it needs from them, encrypted, never the files.

Question 7

How accurate is it?

Accepted Answer

It says what it doesn't know. Each fact shows its source and when it arrived. When an email could match more than one order, it asks instead of guessing, and when a document is missing it says "impact not assessed" rather than "no impact." Your team makes the call.

Question 8

How does billing work?

Accepted Answer

Starter is billed monthly or annually by card, with a receipt emailed for every payment and invoices on your billing page. Cancel anytime. A Workbench is a one-time setup fee, invoiced on the schedule in your quote, plus an annual platform fee that starts at go-live.

Question 9

When does my team need a Workbench?

Accepted Answer

When the work depends on more than one person's inbox: the evidence sits in your ERP, CRM or planning data, several people need to see the same item, and someone has to make sure it closes. A Workbench gives the team one queue, one record per item, approvals and a team view.

Question 10

What's built, and what do you configure for us?

Accepted Answer

The Operations Engine, the work queue, the work record, approvals, follow-up tracking and the team view are built. For each Workbench we configure the connections to your systems, the rules that decide what counts as an exception, who owns what, what closes an item, and whether approved changes are written back. Which systems it connects to, and how, is worked out during setup.

Question 11

What does it cost?

Accepted Answer

Operations Workbench Starter is free for 30 days, then $199/month or $1,990/year. An Operations Workbench is a one-time setup fee, from $20,000 per workflow, plus an annual platform fee that's included in your quote. There's no ongoing services fee: once it's live, your team runs it, and our help is optional. The platform fee covers hosting, AI processing, connector updates and improvements to the Operations Engine. It starts at go-live, and in the first year you can cancel 90 days after go-live if the agreed measures aren't met. The payback calculator compares the setup fee with what the delay costs you each year. The next Workbench reuses the connections you already have, so it costs less to set up. See Pricing for what's included.

Question 12

How long does setup take?

Accepted Answer

Starter works the same day. A Workbench typically goes live in 6 to 12 weeks, depending on how many systems it connects and how complex the rules are. We agree the baseline and what success looks like before setup starts.

Question 13

What happens to our ERP and CRM?

Accepted Answer

They stay where they are and keep the master data. A Workbench reads from them. Write-back is optional: whether approved updates go back, and to which systems, is decided during setup. Nothing changes in your systems without approval.

Question 14

What data does LevelOneAI keep?

Accepted Answer

It's designed to keep only what it needs to run the work, such as references to the source, the facts it extracted (a date, a quantity, a price), status, owners and decisions. For a Workbench, exactly what's stored is agreed with you during setup. Starter never stores email: it keeps short labels, plus the fields it needs from documents you add, encrypted.

Question 15

What will this ask of our IT team?

Accepted Answer

Starter needs no IT: you connect your own email in Claude or ChatGPT, and there's a one-page security summary to share with IT. A Workbench needs read-only access to the systems the workflow uses, granted once by whoever administers them, and typically a few hours of IT time during setup. Nothing is installed, and nothing changes in your systems without approval. See Growing Businesses if you don't have an IT department, or Enterprises for how we fit an IT review.

Question 16

What happens when it isn't sure, or data is missing?

Accepted Answer

If an email could belong to more than one order or PO, it shows the candidates with their evidence and asks a person to confirm, instead of guessing. If a source is unavailable or a record can't be found, the item is marked incomplete, so your team knows the picture isn't complete. Every fact is labeled confirmed, conflicting, inferred or unknown.

Question 17

Is this a product or a consulting engagement?

Accepted Answer

A product. The Operations Engine, the work queue, the work record and approvals are built. Setup configures them to your systems, rules and owners for one workflow. You pay a one-time setup fee and an annual platform fee. There's no ongoing services fee, so your team runs it without us.

Question 18

Do you have a SOC 2 report?

Accepted Answer

No SOC 2 report yet. We'll walk your security team through the data flow and complete your security questionnaire on request.

Question 19

What happens to our data if we stop?

Accepted Answer

You can export your work history and audit trail. With Starter, your data is deleted 30 days after you cancel or after a trial ends without a paid plan. Your ERP and CRM keep their own data, because they were the record all along.

Question 20

Where does it run?

Accepted Answer

That's decided with you during scoping, based on your security and IT requirements.

Question 21

How is AI used?

Accepted Answer

To read the messy information around a piece of work (the email, the attachment, the system field), match it to the right order or PO, compare it with what was promised, and recommend the next step. Every fact is labeled confirmed, conflicting, inferred or unknown, with its source. Your people make the call, and nothing changes in a system without approval.

Question 22

Why can't we just add an AI agent?

Accepted Answer

You can, and it will do the steps. What an agent won't do on its own is keep one record of each order across email and your systems, notice a change nobody asked about, know which promise it breaks, and keep the issue open until it's resolved. That's what you'd have to build and maintain around it. LevelOneAI already does that, and works alongside the agents you use. See Why AI Agents Fail under Resources.

Question 23

How is this different from process mining?

Accepted Answer

Process mining reads event logs from your ERP or CRM, so it can't see what happens in email, spreadsheets and phone calls, which is where most exceptions start. It also tells you where the process breaks; it doesn't work each exception to a close. A Workbench does.

Question 24

Why not wait for our ERP or CRM vendor to add AI?

Accepted Answer

Use it. ERP AI is getting good at work inside the ERP, such as reading a supplier's email and proposing the PO change. A Workbench is for what happens next, across systems: which jobs and customer orders the change puts at risk, what the planner's sheet says, who has to approve, and whether it was actually resolved. If the problem starts and ends inside your ERP, its own AI may be all you need.

Question 25

When is our ERP's own AI enough?

Accepted Answer

When the problem starts and ends inside the ERP, updating the record is the whole job, and everything the decision needs is already there. Add a Workbench when the change matters because of what it affects elsewhere (jobs, customer orders, invoices), when the numbers people trust live in a spreadsheet or portal, when resolving it takes several people and an approval, or when someone has to confirm it was actually resolved.

Question 26

What if our workflow changes?

Accepted Answer

Rules, owners, thresholds and closing conditions are configuration, so they can be updated as your process changes, without a new project.

Question 27

What if our team doesn't adopt it?

Accepted Answer

A Workbench brings the context to each piece of work instead of asking people to go and look for it, and it fits around the systems they already use. We also agree the measures up front, so you can see whether it's working.

Cost	One-time	Per year
SoftwareSubscription, usage, model and overage fees
IntegrationConnecting ERP, MES, CRM, email and spreadsheets
Data readinessCleaning, mapping and reconciling data
ImplementationConfiguration, workflow design, testing
Governance and securityAccess controls, reviews, audit
Ongoing operationsMonitoring, fixes, maintenance
Organizational changeTraining, ownership, adoption
ExpansionMore users, workflows or connectors
Totals	$0	$0

	1Detect	2Connect	3Assess	4Coordinate	5Follow through	6Verify
Chatbot or assistant
Alerts or dashboard
Closed-loop workflow

Dimension	Weight
Business outcome and measurable ROI	20%
Fit with actual operational work	15%
Cross-system context and integration	15%
Implementation effort and time to value	10%
Total cost of ownership and pricing clarity	10%
Security, governance and reliability	10%
Action, follow-through and outcome verification	10%
Vendor flexibility and exit options	10%
Critical failure? Security, compliance or a must-have not met		Yes	Yes	Yes
Weighted score (out of 5)	100%	Not rated	Not rated	Not rated

The AI Buyer's Guide for Operations Leaders

Start with the business problem, not the AI

Define the problem and its cost

Count the full cost, not the subscription

Total cost over 24 months

Test the plug-and-play promise

Make sure it fits how the work happens

Check what happens after the alert

Make governance a buying criterion

Price vendor dependence like technical debt

Know what the price buys

Buy, build, extend or connect

Run a pilot that proves operational value

Pilot plan

Your AI buying scorecard

Red flags

The bottom line: buy outcomes, not AI features

Send the guide to your inbox.

See across systems. Act on what matters.