Navigating Workday Student Reports: Why Accurate Field Selection Matters
Making well-informed decisions hinges on accurate reporting. Yet, within Workday Student, mistakes can easily arise during report creation. For instance, a report writer mistakenly assessed students' academic standings by selecting the wrong field. This simple error led to significant misunderstandings, which could have been avoided.
Understanding the Issue
The problem emerged from a calculated field meant to capture when a student's "Academic Standing" was designated as suspended. While this setup aligned with the school's policy, it overlooked real-life exceptions.
The real challenge is that in Workday Student, the "Academic Standing" field only displays what is calculated based on the institution's rules. This might seem helpful, but the key to understanding a student's true situation lies in what has been officially posted, often called "Posted Academic Standing." The report writer’s failure to recognize this crucial distinction resulted in inaccuracies.
The Heart of the Problem
Why does this issue keep happening? One major reason is that Workday is not embraced as a technofunctional system. In Workday Student, workstreams often break down like this:
Functional Workstreams - Academic Foundation, Student Core, Admissions and Recruiting, Records, Advising, Curriculum, Student Finance, Financial Aid, and Cross-Functional
Technical Workstreams: - Reporting, Data Conversion, Integrations, Security operates on two different streams: functional and technical.
Here's the problem - the technical teams don't understand the configuration options. The functional teams aren't often taught the business objects used in reports that relate to the configuration or how to dig into calculated fields to see how they were built. The functional user would clearly know the difference between calculated and posted academic standing. It's not hard to dig in either and doesn't require much technical knowledge.
Bridging the Gap
To avoid these pitfalls, institutions need to adopt a technofunctional approach. This means fostering a collaborative environment where functional and technical teams work together. By combining their strengths, schools can create comprehensive and accurate reports.
If you play a role in implementing Workday Student, advocate for a team structure that supports this technofunctional model. Outdated approaches derived from legacy systems may not function well in a system requiring advanced collaboration.
Taking a proactive stance is essential. Invest in training, promote open communication between teams, and create processes that encourage an in-depth exploration of calculated fields. This focused effort can significantly improve management of the system and enhance the accuracy of reports produced.
Final Thoughts on Workday Reports
Navigating Workday Student reports requires a keen understanding of field selection and its broader implications. Depending only on calculated fields while neglecting the context of posted standings can lead to larger issues within the institution.
By committing to a technofunctional approach, institutions can avoid costly errors and improve the efficiency of their reporting processes. The next time you are responsible for creating or reviewing a report in Workday, remember the importance of selecting the right fields and fostering teamwork to fully grasp the data at hand.
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