In today's data-driven world, the ability to seamlessly integrate and analyse data is paramount. By harnessing the combined power of Workday Prism Analytics and external reporting tools like Visier, Tableau and Power BI, organisations can unlock profound insights and strategic benefits. Striking the right balance between these tools is crucial for organisations to fully exploit their analytical potential and drive informed, strategic decisions effectively.
Understanding Workday Prism Analytics
Workday Prism Analytics is designed to enhance the analytic capabilities within the Workday ecosystem. By integrating external data sources with internal Workday data, it provides a comprehensive view of business operations. Key features include:
- Unified Data Integration: Seamlessly blend external data sources with Workday data via SFTPs, Amazon S3, File Uploads and Custom Reports.
- Advanced Analytics: Utilise sophisticated analytical models to uncover trends and insights and surface these via the Workday Reporting toolkit, Discovery boards, Custom Reports, Worksheets, Slides and Dashboards.
- User Empowerment: Provide secure, self-service access to analytics for various user roles within the organisation using your existing Workday security model.
Click here to view our previous article, for an overview of Workday Prism Analytics.
Complementing Prism with External Reporting Tools
In large organisations, external reporting tools often play a significant role, especially for executive-level and leadership reporting. Tools like Visier and Power BI are widely used for their advanced visualization capabilities and flexibility. However, when integrated with Workday Prism Analytics, these tools can complement each other effectively, creating a balanced and efficient reporting ecosystem.
1. Operational Reporting vs. Strategic Reporting
Workday Prism Analytics excels in operational reporting, particularly within the HR (or if you have Workday Finance) and Finance domains. It allows managers to monitor and analyse day-to-day workflows, providing real-time insights and enhancing decision-making processes. By bringing non-HR data into Workday through Prism, organizations can achieve a comprehensive view of their operations, enabling quick and efficient data-driven decisions.
2. Strategic Visualizations for Leadership
For strategic, high-level visualizations, executives often prefer using external tools like Power BI or Visier. These tools offer advanced visualization capabilities that help in creating dynamic and interactive dashboards tailored to executive needs. By pulling data from multiple sources, including HR or finance data from Workday, these tools ensure a comprehensive view of the organization’s performance.
3. Integration and Data Governance
Integrating Workday Prism Analytics with external tools involves leveraging a common data lake as a middleware. This setup allows seamless data integration, enabling both Workday and external tools to extract and analyse data from a unified platform, ensuring consistent data governance practices across both platforms. This includes standardizing data formats, modelling and curating data sets, ensuring regular updates to maintain data quality and consistency, and implementing robust security measures. Additionally, this integration facilitates efficient data lineage tracking, compliance with regulatory requirements, and streamlined data access controls, enhancing overall data management and reliability.
4. Aggregated and ‘in the flow of work’ Reporting
One of the standout features of Workday Prism Analytics is its ability to perform aggregated reporting. Aggregated reporting allows users to see summarized data without needing access to the detailed underlying data. This capability not only enhances data security by limiting access to sensitive detailed data but also improves the performance of data retrieval and reporting processes.
Another great feature is the enhanced capability to provide analytics in the flow of work. With Prism’s ability to extend your HR / Finance data sets, providing enriched insights within the business process can significantly simplify and improve decision making.
Achieving Symbiosis: Best Practices
Define Clear Objectives
- Understand and define the specific use cases for Workday Prism Analytics and external reporting tools. Typically, Workday Prism is ideal for operational HR reporting and day-to-day analytics, while reserving external tools for high-level strategic visualizations and executive reports. This division ensures that each tool is used to its strengths, optimizing efficiency and clarity.
- E.g. If managers use Workday, it’s counterproductive for them to switch to another platform to view team reports. Consolidating reporting within Workday is more efficient. For HR organizations, where most activities revolve around Workday, keeping reporting within the same platform ensures seamless integration and ease of use. However, if the organization already relies on external reporting tools, it’s best to continue using them for consistency and familiarity.
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Consider Utilizing a Common Data Lake:
- A data lake will allow you to integrate data from various sources into a central space. This unified approach facilitates seamless data blending and ensures consistent data governance. Both Workday Prism and external tools can extract and analyse data from this central repository, maintaining a single source of truth across the organization.
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Facilitate Collaboration
- Encourage collaboration between teams using different tools. For instance, HR teams might predominantly use Workday Prism Analytics, while financial analysts may prefer external tools. Sharing insights and aligning strategies can lead to more comprehensive decision-making.
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Train and Empower Users:
- Invest in training programs to ensure users are proficient with both Workday Prism Analytics and external reporting tools. Empowering users to leverage the right tool for the right task enhances overall productivity and insight generation.
Conclusion
Achieving the ideal balance between Workday Prism Analytics and external reporting tools is about leveraging the strengths of each to meet specific business needs. Let VirtualResource help you strike the perfect balance and drive strategic growth in your organisation. Our expert team can guide you in integrating these tools effectively, ensuring you leverage their full potential for comprehensive data insights. We provide tailored support to identify the best use cases, maintain data consistency, and empower your team through targeted training.
Contact us today to learn how we can support your analytics journey.
