Dear Collabie: We are considering Workday for managing HCM, Payroll, and Benefits. We’re currently using Infor HMS Infinium. One of our biggest challenges is extracting data to review, analyze, and forecast . How can Workday’s reporting tools help us?
-Data Dilemma
Las Vegas, NV
Dear “Data Dilemma:”
Aah, the ol’ green screen. Your first challenge might be one of the most common reporting issues we’ve seen with Infinium. Our clients who previously used Infinium before moving to Workday utilized an internal IT programmer or third-party software to pull their data. The third-party software had licensing limitations, but those who had access typically had visibility to much more data than they needed. Additionally, the software was difficult to use and required a detailed working knowledge of relational databases with complex table joins. Due to the complexities of the table joins, multiple data dumps were generated and reports were created by combining the various data dumps through Excel manipulation. As a result of all the manual work, reports were only generated a few times a month so data was constantly out of date. Is this what happened to you? I’m tired just thinking about it!
In comparison, Workday maintains a robust reporting environment by providing a built-in Report Writer tool (That’s right! No additional licensing!) and gives users the ability to run reports based on their security configuration. Reports can be shared and run by multiple users, each with different security access, which you can configure. The results of the report will depend on the user’s access; thus, they will only see what they are eligible to see.
Reports can be run in real time, displayed as worklets throughout Workday, or scheduled to run on a recurring basis. Reports can also be configured to include prompts, such as dates, to allow the users to select the effective date they are interested in. This allows for historical reporting, current reporting, and even reporting on future dated changes in Workday. Once generated, all reports are exportable to either Excel or a printable PDF format.
There are two types of reports in Workday – Standard Reports and Custom Reports. The Standard Reports are maintained and delivered by Workday. To date, there are over 1,000 Standard Reports available in Workday. Custom Reports can be designed and built by you, the customer, using the built-in Workday Report Writer tool. These can be created from scratch or created by copying an existing Standard or Custom Report and customizing to suit your needs.
Workday offers a variety of classes for functional and technical users to learn the Report Writer tool, ranging from beginner to advanced level courses. There is additional documentation and support available through the Workday Community. Your implementation partner will also work with your team to answer any questions related to your reporting needs. The Collaborative Solutions team is well-versed in Workday’s reporting tools, of course!
Finally, one of the most highly distinguishable aspects of Workday reports is that they are actionable when viewed within the tenant, as opposed to the static reports pulled out of Infinium. This allows the users to directly drill into the details of the report for more information and/or perform authorized actions on items that they have security access to.
Our Infinium-to-Workday converts have been very happy with the functionality of the reporting tools. With Workday, their end-users are now able to be more self-sufficient in pulling data and utilizing the data to make strategic decisions – a win for all!