Cockpit AI briefings for managers
The MailDesk Cockpit is an operational dashboard for the people who run a shared support, sales, or info mailbox. On top of its live KPI cards (incoming, needs-reply, overdue, average first response) it offers an AI Insights panel that turns those numbers into a short, readable briefing a manager can act on — plus a few deterministic, no-AI tools for spotting unusual days, scoring escalation risk, and proposing how to rebalance work across the team.
Available in: Cockpit integration (maildesk_mail_client_cockpit). The Cockpit module builds on
MailDesk Pro and uses the same AI provider you configure for Pro. Without Cockpit there are no manager
briefings; without a configured Pro AI provider the briefings stay disabled.
The MailDesk Cockpit is an operational dashboard for the people who run a shared support, sales, or info mailbox. On top of its live KPI cards (incoming, needs-reply, overdue, average first response) it offers an AI Insights panel that turns those numbers into a short, readable briefing a manager can act on — plus a few deterministic, no-AI tools for spotting unusual days, scoring escalation risk, and proposing how to rebalance work across the team.
What it does

The AI Insights panel in the Cockpit gives managers a small set of AI-assisted actions:
- Generate daily briefing — a one-page written summary of the queue: state of the queue, risks and anomalies, and 2–4 recommended actions for today. The text streams in live and can be copied.
- Customer escalation risk — ranks customers most likely to escalate, based on open threads, overdue threads, urgency keywords, and how long the oldest message has waited.
- Rebalance workload — proposes how to redistribute open work across the team.
- Anomalies (last 30 d) — flags metrics that are unusually high or low versus their recent baseline. (Before a provider is configured, this same action appears as Detect anomalies (statistical, no LLM).)
AI is only the wording, not the maths
Anomaly detection, the mailbox health score, and the workload-rebalance scoring are calculated in plain arithmetic on the Cockpit's own metrics — no call to an AI provider, and no AI cost or quota use for the calculation itself. Only the human-readable narrative (the briefing text, the reply strategy) is produced by your AI provider.
Why it matters
A manager watching several mailboxes does not have time to read every thread. The daily briefing condenses the day into a paragraph and a short action list; the escalation-risk and anomaly tools point straight at the customers and metrics that need attention first — without a manager having to open and skim each conversation. Because the statistical tools never call an AI model, they cost nothing per run and are always available even before a provider is set up.
Requirements
-
The Cockpit module installed. It depends on MailDesk Basic, MailDesk Pro, the Automation module, and Odoo's Resource module — Odoo installs these for you.
-
A working AI provider configured in MailDesk Pro for the text briefings. See Set up your AI provider. The statistical tools (anomaly detection, mailbox health) work without a provider.
- At least one mailbox account visible to the manager, with some message history so the KPIs have data.
- MailDesk works on Odoo 17, 18, or 19 — the steps below are the same on each.
Permissions required
Cockpit uses a four-tier access model. Each tier includes everything the tier below it can do.
| Tier | Group | Can do with AI |
|---|---|---|
| Viewer | Cockpit Viewer | Read KPIs, trends, and drilldowns for mailboxes they can access. No AI actions. |
| Operator | Cockpit Operator | + reply-strategy and reply-draft help on their own threads; a small "Cockpit Brief Chat" allowance. |
| Manager | Cockpit Manager | + the manager briefings: daily briefing, weekly summary, anomaly detection, escalation risk, workload rebalance, mailbox health, workload forecast. |
| Administrator | Cockpit Administrator | Everything, across companies, plus AI provider setup. No daily quota. |
Briefings are a Manager (or higher) action
The daily briefing, weekly summary, anomaly detection, escalation risk, workload rebalance, mailbox health, and workload forecast are reserved for the Cockpit Manager tier and above. An Operator who tries to run them is told the operation is restricted to Cockpit Manager or higher. A standard MailDesk administrator is treated as a Manager for these tools.
Available in
Available in: Cockpit integration. The AI text briefings additionally require a MailDesk Pro AI provider, because Cockpit reuses Pro's provider configuration rather than holding its own keys — one key serves both.
Steps — run a daily briefing
- Open MailDesk → Cockpit from the MailDesk menu.
- In the side panel, find the AI Insights block. A small badge shows your tier (for example manager).
- Click Generate daily briefing.
- A briefing panel slides in and the text streams in live. While it is still writing you can press Stop; when it is done you can Copy the text or Close the panel.
Expected result
The briefing reads as three short sections — State of the queue, Risks & anomalies, and Recommended actions today — built from your real KPIs and any detected anomalies. The Cockpit does not invent numbers; it only narrates the ones it computed.
Run the statistical tools (no provider needed)
- Anomalies (last 30 d) compares the latest day against a 30-day baseline and lists metrics that are unusually high or low, with a severity badge. (Before a provider is set up, the same button reads Detect anomalies (statistical, no LLM).)
- Customer escalation risk lists the customers most at risk, with a score and severity.
- Rebalance workload proposes how to spread open work across the team.
These run on the Cockpit's own data and do not contact your AI provider.
Daily usage limits (quotas)
Every AI action is counted per user, per day, per operation. When a manager or operator reaches the limit for an operation, MailDesk asks them to try again tomorrow or have an administrator raise the cap. Administrators have no daily limit.
| Operation | Operator / day | Manager / day | Administrator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daily briefing | — (manager only) | 25 | unlimited |
| Weekly summary | — (manager only) | 10 | unlimited |
| Anomaly detection | — (manager only) | 50 | unlimited |
| Workload rebalance | — (manager only) | 50 | unlimited |
| Escalation risk | — (manager only) | 50 | unlimited |
| Mailbox health | — (manager only) | 100 | unlimited |
| Workload forecast | — (manager only) | 20 | unlimited |
| Anomaly explanation | — (manager only) | 100 | unlimited |
| Reply strategy | 30 | 200 | unlimited |
| Reply draft generator | 60 | 400 | unlimited |
| Cockpit brief chat | 10 | 50 | unlimited |
See who used how much
Usage is recorded per user and operation. A manager or administrator can review it under MailDesk → Configuration → SSOT & Cache → Cockpit Debug → Cockpit Next → AI Usage, with totals for calls, input tokens, and output tokens, and filters for errors and rate-limited calls.
Troubleshooting
| You see | Likely cause | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Generate daily briefing button is missing | You are below the Manager tier, or no AI provider is ready | Have an administrator grant the Cockpit Manager tier and confirm a Pro AI provider is configured |
| Briefing returns "Configure the MailDesk AI provider … to enable daily briefings" | No working AI provider in Pro | Set up and test a provider — see Set up your AI provider |
| "Daily AI quota reached for …" | The per-day limit for that operation is used up | Wait until tomorrow, or ask an administrator (administrators have no limit) |
| "Operation … is restricted to Cockpit Manager or higher" | An Operator triggered a manager-only briefing | Use the manager tools as a Manager; Operators have reply-help tools instead |
| "MailDesk Pro is not installed …" | The Pro module is missing from this database | Install MailDesk Pro; Cockpit AI reuses Pro's provider |
| Anomaly / escalation tools work but text briefings do not | The statistical tools need no provider; text briefings do | Configure a Pro AI provider for the written briefings |
For provider-side errors (invalid key, quota exhausted at the provider, unreachable local server), see the AI troubleshooting page.