Year: 2023

Workday Being efficient and competitive in the fast-paced corporate world of today is essential for success.  Organizations are always looking for methods to improve productivity and streamline their processes.  Workday Configurable Business Process Framework (CBPF) is one product that has had a significant impact  in this search for efficiency. We’ll look at how Workday CBPF can help businesses leverage efficiency and  streamline processes in this blog post. What is Workday Configurable Business Process Framework (CBPF)? Workday Configurable Business Process Framework (CBPF) is a dynamic and adaptable software solution  designed to empower organizations to streamline their unique business processes. This versatile tool  offers an intuitive interface and robust functionality, making it an invaluable asset for businesses seeking  to optimize their operations. Key Features of Workday CBPF Before delving into the benefits of Workday CBPF, let’s take a closer look at its key features: Customizable Workflows: With Workday CBPF, organizations can tailor workflows to suit their  specific needs. Whether it’s HR processes, finance operations, or any other business function,  customization is at your fingertips. Dynamic Routing: Workday CBPF offers dynamic routing, ensuring that tasks are automatically  routed to the right individuals or teams based on predefined criteria. This reduces bottlenecks and  accelerates process completion. Real-time Visibility: Gain real-time visibility into the status of ongoing processes. This feature  allows for effective tracking, monitoring, and decision-making. How Workday CBP Enhances Efficiency Now, let’s explore how Workday CBPF can significantly enhance efficiency within your organization: Automation of Repetitive Tasks Workday CBPF excels at automating repetitive and time-consuming tasks. Whether it’s employee  onboarding, leave approval, or expense report processing, automation eliminates manual errors and  reduces the time required to complete these tasks. Employees can focus on more valuable and strategic  activities, contributing to overall efficiency. Cross-functional Collaboration Efficiency isn’t just about individual tasks; it’s also about how teams collaborate. Workday CBP fosters  cross-functional collaboration by ensuring that tasks move seamlessly between departments or  individuals. This encourages teamwork and innovation, enhancing efficiency at the organizational level. Scalability and Adaptability Workday CBPF is designed to grow with your organization. As your business evolves and expands, the tool  can adapt to accommodate changing workflow demands. This scalability ensures that your processes  remain efficient even as your organization scales. Compliance and Accuracy Efficiency isn’t just about speed; it’s also about accuracy and compliance. Workday CBPF allows  organizations to define processes that adhere to industry regulations and internal policies. This ensures  that tasks are executed consistently, reducing errors and compliance risks. Practical Use Cases for Workday CBPF Let’s explore some practical use cases where Workday CBPF can make a significant impact: 1. Employee Onboarding Streamline the onboarding process for new hires. Workday CBPF can automate document collection,  training enrollment, and other onboarding tasks, creating a seamless and efficient experience for both HR  teams and new employees. 2. Leave Management Simplify and automate leave request and approval processes. Employees can submit requests through self service, and managers receive automated notifications for approval. This reduces the administrative  burden on HR and ensures compliance with leave policies. 3. Expense Management Efficiently process and approve expense reports. Workday CBPF can automate expense report submission,  routing them to the appropriate approvers. This ensures timely reimbursements and accurate financial  records. 4. Expense Management Efficiently process and approve expense reports. Workday CBPF can automate expense report submission,  routing them to the appropriate approvers. This ensures timely reimbursements and accurate financial  records. Getting Started with Workday CBPF If you’re considering implementing Workday CBPF within your organization, here are some steps to get  you started: Assessment: Identify the business processes that would benefit most from automation and streamlining.  Create a roadmap for implementation. Configuration: Work with experienced consultants or administrators to configure Workday CBPF to match  your specific workflow requirements. Testing: Thoroughly test your configured processes to ensure they function as intended and identify any  potential issues. Training: Provide comprehensive training to users who will interact with Workday CBPF. Monitoring and Optimization: Continuously monitor and optimize your configured processes to adapt to  changing business needs. In conclusion, Workday Configurable Business Process is a powerful tool that can help organizations  harness efficiency, improve collaboration, and streamline their operations. By automating repetitive tasks,  ensuring compliance, and offering real-time visibility into processes, Workday CBPF empowers  organizations to thrive in today’s competitive business landscape. If you’re ready to enhance your  organization’s efficiency, it may be time to explore the possibilities offered by Workday CBPF.

Workday Payroll management is a critical aspect of any organization’s operations, and ensuring accuracy, efficiency, and compliance is essential. Workday, a leading cloud-based human capital management (HCM) system, offers a robust platform for managing various HR functions, including payroll. With Workday’s third-party payroll integrations, organizations can streamline their payroll processes, automate data transfer, and achieve greater efficiency. In this blog post, we will explore the benefits and capabilities of Workday third-party payroll integrations and how they can revolutionize your organization’s payroll management. Workday offers a range of Payroll Integration products . Payroll Interface is a packaged integration template with a configurable set of HCM data across a range of categories. Most commonly used payroll interfaces are PICOF ( Payroll Interface Connector output Format) and PECI ( Payroll Effective Change Interface) . When launched, the integration captures changes to employee data for a given pay group and pay period. While some vendors prefer to have PECI , some prefer to have PICOF. Let me explain the main and the primary difference. PECI supports a sequence of effective dated changes while PICOF supports only top of stack single change with an effective date. Let me explain you with an example : Take a scenario where an Employee had been given a merit increase in three trenches as shown below in Orange , PICOF would only pick up the latest value of 90000 and send it to the vendor while PECI would pick up all three changes as separate transactions . You might have observed the terms Last successful run and the current run , in the picture above . These terms are the most relevant when we talk about change detection in workday. All integrations that detect changes work primarily on these two parameters. If we dig deep into how the payroll interfaces detect changes , here is a simple flow diagram to explain how a change entered in Workday would be extracted by the payroll interface. Advantages of Payroll interfaces with examples 1. Seamless Data Integration: Workday’s third-party payroll integrations enable seamless data integration between Workday and external payroll systems. By connecting with popular payroll providers such as ADP, Paychex, or Ceridian, organizations can eliminate manual data entry, reduce errors, and save valuable time. The integrations ensure that employee information, tax details, salary changes, deductions, and other payroll-related data are automatically synchronized between systems. This streamlines the payroll process and minimizes the risk of data discrepancies. There is a flavor of these payroll integrations called GPC ( Plobal payroll Cloud) built on the technology of PICOF, PECI which a consultant should always keep in mind when choosing the best implementation methodology. These GPC integrations are built by Workday in close collaboration with the Vendor keeping in mind the country specific local regulations. Now That makes the integration seamless and hassle free. Some of these include ADP’s Global View , NGA HRExchange etc. An implementation consultant shall follow this order when designing a payroll interface. The order of precedence would be GPC Integration > PECI > PICOF . 2. Accuracy and Compliance: Accurate and compliant payroll processing is crucial to maintain employee trust and meet legal obligations. With Workday’s third-party payroll integrations, organizations can leverage the robust features and capabilities of both platforms to ensure accurate payroll calculations, tax deductions, and statutory compliance. The integrations enable the exchange of information related to employee hours, earnings, deductions, and tax withholding, ensuring accurate payroll calculations and timely delivery of paychecks. Additionally, the integrations facilitate compliance with federal, state, and local payroll regulations, reducing the risk of penalties and legal complications. While we talk about compliance , some countries require hours to be paid one month in retro . These hours can be On-call additional hours. These interfaces also support this by linking time periods and help in staying compliant . 3. Enhanced Efficiency and Time Savings: Manual payroll processes can be time-consuming and prone to errors. Workday’s third-party payroll integrations automate key payroll tasks, improving overall efficiency and saving valuable time for HR and payroll professionals. By eliminating the need for manual data entry and reconciliation, organizations can reallocate their resources to more strategic activities. The integrations also enable faster processing of payroll, ensuring that employees receive their payments promptly. This not only enhances employee satisfaction but also minimizes payroll-related queries and disputes. Workday offers a wide range of products together with the payroll interfaces making it easier for organizations to synchronize Employee data with their payroll systems. One such enhancement is Event Driven Integration ( EDI). This normally comes together with the above mentioned GPC integrations. Event Driven Integrations as the name suggests export data to the payroll vendor almost immediately after the transaction is completed in Workday. This is more efficient than exporting data in daily or weekly scheduled batch runs there by saving enormous amounts of time. 4. Centralized Reporting and Analytics: Workday’s third-party payroll integrations provide organizations with centralized reporting and analytics capabilities, empowering them to gain valuable insights into their payroll data. By consolidating data from Workday and the integrated payroll systems, organizations can generate comprehensive reports on payroll costs, tax liabilities, employee earnings, and more. These insights help organizations make data-driven decisions, identify cost-saving opportunities, and proactively manage payroll-related risks. By leveraging the power of analytics, organizations can gain a deeper understanding of their workforce and make informed decisions to optimize their payroll processes. Let us dive a bit deeper into the reporting capabilities . There are interfacing capabilities with the payroll vendor to bring back payroll results back into Workday. Import Payroll Results is a template which the consultant could use to bring back Payroll results from the Vendor.Now you might argue why would someone do that and that is where Workday’s reporting capabilities together with PRISM come into the picture. You can create dashboards or use workday’s PayHub to provide employees and HR Advisory teams with various insights. A simple example would be a dashboard for the HR/payroll team to slice data on the spend

Workday In the modern era of digital transformation, enterprise software systems have become the backbone of operations for organizations worldwide. Among these systems, Workday stands as a leading provider of cloud-based human capital management and financial management software. Workday Release Management plays a pivotal role in ensuring that the software stays up-to-date, efficient, and aligned with an organization’s evolving needs. In this blog, we’ll take a closer look at what Workday Release Management entails, its significance, and best practices for successful implementation. Understanding Workday Release Management Workday Release Management is a structured process that facilitates the smooth deployment of updates, enhancements, and new features to the Workday platform. This process involves planning, testing, and deploying changes to ensure that they don’t disrupt critical business processes or compromise system stability. Whether it’s bug fixes, security patches, or major feature additions, Workday Release Management ensures that changes are implemented seamlessly. What to expect in the Workday Feature Release? A standard feature Release will encompass novel features or functionalities, certain of which will be deployed automatically. Others, however, will necessitate strategic implementation and rigorous testing to ensure seamless integration for customers. Moreover, Feature Releases might bring about refinements to current functionalities. This encompasses potential enhancements to the user interface, introduction of fresh web services, modifications to existing web services in line with the web service versioning timetable, resolution of bugs, updates relating to payroll tax and adherence to regulations, and occasionally, the introduction of entirely new products. Broadly speaking, all features will fall into one of the following three categories: 1. Mandatory: These features are automatically integrated by Workday on the feature release date, and customers are required to commence immediate usage. 2. Opt-In: These features are automatically integrated by Workday on the feature release date, and customers have the option to start using them at their convenience with minimal effort. 3. Setup Required: Workday automatically deploys these features on the feature release date, but it’s up to customers to decide whether they want to make use of them. Depending on the complexity of the functionality, a substantial setup endeavor might be necessary. Certain features under this category might also entail updating your professional services agreement with Workday. In typical circumstances, Workday will always provide a minimum of two releases’ notice before removing or phasing out functionality. This ensures that customers have time to address any potential issues. Consequently, certain features that initially fall under the “opt-in” or “setup required” categories could transition into the “mandatory” category in subsequent releases, unless there are extraordinary circumstances. The What’s New in Workday report is a compilation of release notes that provides detailed information on features and enhancements in your Workday tenants. You can use the report to plan for your adoption of new Workday functionality. To access the What’s New in Workday report you must have access to Workday What’s New domain in the System functional area. For example to explore 2023 R2 features : Select a Workday Releases value of Workday 2023 Release 2. This will show you all items scheduled to deliver to your Production tenant in Workday 2023R2 that will be in Preview as of August 5, with new items added each week as we deliver more functionality. Preview Tenants The Sandbox Preview tenant is a copy of the Production tenant, but it also contains new functionality available in a future Feature Release. Generally, Workday targets Preview features for the next feature release, but that isn’t guaranteed. Workday sometimes targets Preview features for an unspecified future feature release. Preview features could undergo changes based on feedback or new desired behavior, or retracted and never released as a Preview feature. The creation of your Sandbox Preview tenant coincides with the timing of your initial Workday Service go-live date and it stays in existence forever. You can use a Sandbox Preview tenant to test new functionality as it becomes available in between feature releases. Once you have the list of all features, here is a typical flow diagram on how to plan a release: You can find all the information for the Workday Feature Release in the community. Navigate to the Release Center page as shown below and you will be able to find everything that is related to the upcoming release from Workday. This sometimes also includes video content for each feature explaining the change, the impact, and the configuration required. Example : Workday 2023R2 makes it easier to generate documents as part of compensation processes. You can now include the Generate Document step in compensation business processes. The release notes indicate everything related to the feature and a video to explain the configuration. Now, you can follow the flow chart above and decide if and when this will need to be implemented for your organization. The Significance of Workday Release Management 1. Risk Mitigation: Effective Release Management minimizes the risk of system failures, data corruption, and security vulnerabilities that can arise from poorly managed changes. 2. User Experience: A well-managed release process maintains a positive user experience by avoiding disruptions to daily operations. Employees can continue using the platform with minimal interruption. 3. Innovation Enablement: Workday regularly releases new features and updates to enhance functionality and address user needs. Effective Release Management ensures that organizations can leverage these innovations promptly. 4. Regulatory Compliance: In industries with strict compliance requirements, such as finance and healthcare, Workday Release Management helps ensure that system changes adhere to regulatory standards. Best Practices for Successful Workday Release Management 1. Thorough Planning: Establish a detailed plan that outlines the scope of changes, testing requirements, and potential impacts on business processes. Involve key stakeholders to gather insights and align with organizational goals. 2. Testing and Quality Assurance: Rigorous testing is crucial to identify and rectify issues before deployment. This includes functional testing, performance testing, and user acceptance testing (UAT). 3. Communication Strategy: Keep stakeholders informed about upcoming releases, their impact, and the expected benefits. Clear communication helps manage expectations and minimizes surprises. 4. Change Control: Implement a robust

Design In the realm of modern human resource management, organizations are continuously seeking ways to optimize their workforce processes. Workday, a leading cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, offers a comprehensive suite of tools to revolutionize the way businesses manage their human capital. Among its many features, Workday Worksheets stand out as a powerful tool for improving efficiency and streamlining everyday tasks. In this blog post, we will explore the concept of Workday Worksheets and delve into how they can transform your workforce management. Understanding Workday Worksheets: Workday Worksheets are a dynamic and flexible feature that allows HR professionals to collect, organize, and analyze data related to their workforce. These worksheets act as electronic spreadsheets, enabling users to manipulate data, create calculations, and generate reports—all within the Workday platform. With Worksheets, HR teams can eliminate the need for external tools like Excel, enhancing data integrity and centralizing all essential HR processes. Use-Cases for Workday worksheets: 1. Compensation Planning: Workday Worksheets can be used to create custom compensation planning models, enabling organizations to streamline and automate their compensation review processes. Users can define formulas and rules to calculate salary increases, bonuses, and other forms of compensation based on various factors such as performance ratings, job levels, and budget constraints. 2. Budgeting and Forecasting: Workday Worksheets can be utilized for budgeting and forecasting purposes. Users can create worksheets to consolidate and manipulate financial data, perform calculations, and generate reports. This allows for more accurate and efficient budgeting processes, with the ability to update and adjust projections as needed. 3. Talent Management Analytics: Workday Worksheets can help HR professionals analyze and visualize talent management data. Users can create custom metrics and calculations to measure employee performance, track workforce diversity, assess retention rates, and generate insights for strategic decision-making. Worksheets can also be used to create dashboards and reports that provide real-time visibility into key talent metrics. 4. Absence Management: Workday Worksheets can be used to manage and track employee absences. Users can create worksheets to calculate accruals, track leave balances, and manage time-off policies. This enables HR teams to automate absence management processes, ensure compliance with regulations, and provide employees with accurate and up-to-date information about their leave entitlements. 5. Compliance Reporting: Workday Worksheets can assist with generating compliance reports and meeting regulatory requirements. Users can create worksheets to collect and consolidate data related to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, workforce demographics, compensation equity, and other compliance-related metrics. Worksheets can perform calculations, apply filters, and generate reports that help organizations monitor and report on their compliance efforts. How do Workday Worksheets work Below is a process on How to configure Worksheets in Workday , populate data and secure the data using Workday’s Security Model. 1.Creating Worksheets: Users can create new worksheets from scratch or use pre-built templates provided by Workday or their organization. When creating a worksheet, users define the structure, layout, and data fields/columns they want to include. 2. Importing Data: Worksheets can be populated with data from various sources. Users can import data from other Workday reports, external files (such as CSV or Excel), or other data sources integrated with Workday. The imported data is mapped to the corresponding fields/columns in the worksheet. Technical details are provided below : Click on the “Add Live Data” option. Search for the desired report. Provide the required prompts or filters. Click on “OK” to initiate the data population process. Wait for the data to populate in the worksheet. 3. Manipulating Data: Once a worksheet is created and populated with data, users can perform various operations to manipulate and analyze the data. This includes sorting, filtering, grouping, and applying formulas or calculations to derive new insights. For Calculations or Functions we have the Function library which has an extensive list of functions which can be used in Worksheets with a short definition and syntax. 4. Collaboration: Workday worksheets support collaboration among users. Multiple users can work on the same worksheet simultaneously, making real-time updates and changes. Users can also add comments, annotations, or share worksheets with others for review or input. 5. Data Visualization: Workday provides built-in visualization capabilities to help users understand and present data effectively. Users can create charts, graphs, and pivot tables within worksheets to visualize trends, patterns, and summaries of the data. 6. Data Security: Workday worksheets adhere to the overall security framework of the Workday system. Role-based permissions and data security policies control access to worksheets and ensure that users can only view and modify data they are authorized to access. Find below the screenshots of the same Worksheet accessed by different users. As a People System Admin As a Manager Key Benefits of Workday Worksheets 1. Enhanced Data Accuracy: By utilizing Workday Worksheets, organizations can eliminate the risk of manual errors that often plague traditional spreadsheet-based data management. Worksheets offer built-in data validation rules and formulas, ensuring that the information entered is accurate and consistent. 2. Real-time Collaboration: Workday Worksheets empower HR teams to work collaboratively and seamlessly within a centralized platform. Multiple team members can access and edit the same worksheet simultaneously, improving communication and efficiency. 3. Simplified Reporting: With Workday Worksheets, generating comprehensive reports becomes a breeze. The ability to customize calculations and formulas allows HR professionals to create insightful reports tailored to their organization’s unique requirements. Additionally, these reports can be shared with stakeholders, providing transparency and facilitating data-driven decision-making. 4. Streamlined Processes: Worksheets enable HR departments to streamline various processes, including compensation management, performance evaluations, and budgeting. The platform’s intuitive interface and automated workflows simplify complex tasks, freeing up time for HR professionals to focus on strategic initiatives. 5. Seamless Integration: Workday Worksheets seamlessly integrate with other modules within the Workday ecosystem. This integration allows for efficient data flow between different HR functions, eliminating duplicate data entry and ensuring consistency across various processes. Best Practices for Utilizing Workday Worksheets: To harness the full potential of Workday Worksheets, consider the following best practices: 1. Design with Purpose: Carefully plan and design your worksheets, keeping

Design Workday Authorisation and Authentication As businesses grow, managing employee data becomes increasingly complex. The security of sensitive employee data is essential, and companies must take steps to ensure that it remains safe from unauthorized access. Workday is a cloud-based software platform that offers HR, finance, and accounting solutions to businesses. In this blog, we will explore Workday security, its features, and best practices to secure employee data. Workday Security Overview: Workday provides a range of security features designed to safeguard employee data. These features include: 1. Authentication and Authorization: Workday uses multi-factor authentication (MFA) and single sign-on (SSO) to verify users’ identities. MFA requires users to enter a password and a second form of authentication, such as a fingerprint or one-time code, to access their accounts. SSO allows users to access multiple applications using a single set of login credentials, reducing the risk of stolen or weak passwords.There are many Identity Providers like Okta , Azure AD etc which are known for their Identify providing services. Organizations usually do not have to onboard new Identity Providers as Workday provides Identity provisioning Integrations seamlessly integrating data to these providers . Not going into too much detail , here are few screenshots on how to configure SSO with an identity provider in Workday. While we discussed how Identity providers check the identity , Workday also provides configuration options in grouping Administrators and providing them different routes to access Workday. A typical example would be to create a backdoor entry for HR Administrators and Security Admins to access Workday using Username and password if the SSO is down due to an issue at the Identity provider. This can be configured using the Manage Authentication Policies task in Workday. This picture gives an idea on configuring access to Security Admins to bypass SSO using Username Password and MFA on Authenticator App.  Until now we discussed about Workday integrating to an other Identity provider , However Workday can also be used as a SAML Identity Provider to sign in to other systems via SAML SSO Link. The most common use cases include if you would want your employees to stay in Workday and access links Out side Workday. These external links can be configured as quicklinks on the Business processes , Worklets or even Announcements where you can redirect employees to your company portals.  IP Ranges : Workday also provides us the facility to control (allow or Deny) Access from a particular IP Address or IP Address range. You can control this on the manage authentication policies page for blocking IP Addresses and Maintain IP Range to define IP ranges to access Workday. A Typical Use Can be allowing access for Admins into Workday only from Organisation’s Virtual Private Network Range.  So now that we are aware of different mechanisms an employee can access Workday , the next question that pops up is , but to what data does he have access to? This question is answered in the next section.  2. Role-Based Access Control: Workday’s Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) system assigns users specific roles and permissions based on their job responsibilities. This helps ensure that employees only have access to the data they need to perform their jobs. Diving a bit deep into the technicalities , Workday secures each object with something called a domain. Example : Employee Gender is secured using a domain called Person Data : Gender. Anyone who has access ( View/ Modify) to this domain can see the data that is secured using this domain. This is where experts play around on implementing the best policies of grouping people and defining WHO needs access to WHAT. The pic explains how Gender is secured. HRIS Administrator has both View and Modify access while Benefits Partner only has access to View Gender Grouping options can be configured both static where in a user’s assignment to a group can be driven offline through approvals or it can be sometimes automated based on their geographical location / job profile / organization etc. Here is an example : Workday’s Role based Security provides the flexibility to control access based on the position. A Very simple example could be people from the HR Business Partner Community/group. HR Business partner shall only be able to support employees from his/her location and not from any other location. A HR Business Partner in Sweden cannot and shall not support employees working in Australia. While HR Business Partner is a single group in Workday , Role based security access in Workday allows an admin to configure the support scope based on organizations/locations and also have the flexibility to intersect any such permutations. Roles as seen below can be defined on organizations limiting the access to employee data in only the organizations they support.  Workday also provides the flexibility to configure user based groups which have global scope. Such a configuration can be used for example to group administrators from recruiting/ talent / benefits etc communities to work on configuration at a global scale and also give the flexibility with employee data at a global level. Such a security group is called a User based security group.One point to consider with such a scenario : An Administrator when leaving the organization shall also be removed from this user based security group and the person coming next into the admin role is not auto assigned to the admin group. 3. Access Restrictions: Some Organizations take one step further in controlling access by restricting access based on the Network Employees are connected to. A typical example is Organisations restricting Managers / HR Advisory to view the Compensation details of their Direct Reports on Mobile outside office Network. Such Restrictions can be configured using the Create Access Restriction Task. Another example would be to restrict Employees/ Managers from downloading attachments outside the Office Network.  4. Scrambling: If you are reading this blog , you may already know Workday’s Tenant Structure. Any Organisation running on Workday would have an implementation tenant , Sandbox

Workday Workday Prism Analytics Workday is a cloud-based Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software provider that offers a range of sophisticated reporting tools to help organizations make informed decisions. Although these tools are mature, they can only provide insights from data hosted within Workday. Organizations typically rely on multiple systems for their functioning, resulting in data being scattered across various platforms. For example, organizations may use Workday for their HR application while employing MyLearn as their learning application. Combining data from these systems has been a challenge, and this is where Prism Analytics excels. With Prism Analytics, Workday empowers organizations to import data from various systems, combine it with Workday data (e.g., HR/Finance/Payroll), and gain valuable insights for making informed, data-driven decisions. How is Workday Prism Analytics leveraged in most organizations? Numerous use cases exist across industries. To illustrate a few, let’s consider a realistic example: A travel industry organization utilized Prism Analytics to gauge and drive their customer care department’s employee performance within Workday. By harnessing the power of Prism, they combined HR and Finance data from Workday with call center data to make decisions about average call answer times, shift utilization, performance trends, and cost per call by location, agent, manager, and region, as well as customer satisfaction rates by cost center. Custom dashboards were built into Workday for managers to support employees in their customer care department effectively. Additionally, some customers integrate internal benchmarking tool data to make smarter decisions within Workday. For example, customers use the Workday Prism Analytics platform to incorporate data from third-party travel booking tools and internal benchmarking data. The resulting Travel & Expense (T&E) dashboard provides comprehensive tabs that display non-compliant purchases with their travel and expense policy and evaluate how well travel plans align with cost-saving practices. Furthermore, the dashboard offers in-depth insights into individual teams’ travel spending habits. Source : Community.workday.com  Another common use case across industries involves generating insights into employee health by importing worker health data from government portals and linking it to Absence Module data from Workday. This helps address questions about burnout vulnerabilities and manager performance in maintaining staff health and fitness. While employee sickness data is sensitive, organizations increasingly opt for a dual-dashboard strategy: one providing high-level aggregated data without revealing employee details, and another offering employee details to HR Advisory community members while maintaining role-based access constraints (e.g., HR Advisory of Netherlands will only have visibility of employees in the Netherlands, and not England, Germany). How does Workday Prism Analytics work? When considering Prism’s architecture, there are three main facets: 1 Connect and Integrate: This includes all mechanisms for importing data into Workday Prism from various databases for analysis. To inject data into Prism, you can use Workday Custom Reports (RaaS), Manual Load, SFTP, Studio Prism Connector, or Prism Analytics APIs. Data sources created from multiple databases can then be published to create reports and dashboards within Workday or used to inject data into BI Tools or Enterprise Data lakes. Below is the most common example used across industries to create insights into Employee Learning and Development . The screenshot explains how learning data from multiple systems is brought into Workday and merged with employee data to create learning history data sources. 2. Transform & Analyze: Workday’s Intelligent Pipelines form the base for the transformation phase. These pipelines are intuitive and provide the necessary capabilities for data preparatory activities, including offering user suggestions for selecting the primary key among data tables and predefined functions to maximize output with minimal time and data, reducing dependency on IT for complex transformations. 3. Manage & Administer: The Data Catalog stores all Prism artifacts. With numerous datasets, tables, and data sources, planning in advance to maintain the data is crucial. Workday offers a reportable data source containing metadata of all datasets and tables in Prism, providing the option to create custom reports and analyze the health of the Prism data catalog. Workday plans to introduce Workspaces, which will allow for more granular control and governance over artifacts related to specific projects or departments. Prism Automation To ensure seamless data integration without manual intervention, Workday provides users with various mechanisms to inject data into Prism and extract data from Workday Prism. Integration consultants play a crucial role in connecting systems (e.g., data from various systems to Workday Prism or data sent from Workday Prism to Enterprise Data Lakes). Here are a few examples: Example 1: Send CSV Data to Prism Analytics Workday Studio’s Prism Analytics component enables you to send CSV data to Workday Prism. This process requires creating an API client for secure interactions between external systems and Workday. By configuring a listener service in Workday Studio, you can automatically import files from an SFTP folder into Prism, eliminating manual work. Example 2: REST API for Prism The Prism Analytics REST API allows you to programmatically run data change activities created through the UI to alter the data in a Prism Analytics table. You can modify the data in a table or on a regular automated basis. URL: https://{hostname}/api/prismAnalytics/V3/{tenantname} Prism Security: When discussing data to and from Prism, it is essential to address data governance. One advantage of Workday Prism is the ability to extend the security model of Workday’s object model to Workday Prism. Each data source created in Workday Prism can be secured using a custom domain, giving administrators the flexibility to grant access to users based on their roles. Workday also offers flexibility in entity-based governance, allowing Prism admins to grant access to specific user groups while controlling their ability to view data of employees from only the cost centers they originally support. Conclusion With Prism Analytics, organizations can gain a comprehensive view of workforce, financial, and operational insights, capturing the value of essential data all within Workday. Prism Analytics is designed to handle large volumes of structured and unstructured data that traditional transaction systems cannot manage. It is 100% cloud-based and integrated with Workday. While Prism has solved many problems, making insights even more

Design Workday APIs and Authentication Workday’s Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) offer a powerful way for businesses to integrate their HR processes with external systems. In this blog post, we’ll explore the various Workday APIs and the authentication techniques that ensure a successful and secure data exchange. Understanding Workday APIs API stands for Application Programming Interface. In simple terms, APIs allow different applications to communicate with each other. Workday APIs consist of a set of web services that enable businesses to connect Workday HR management with their other applications. Workday offers a wide range of APIs, including SOAP and REST APIs, allowing businesses to create custom applications. Real-life Use Cases of Workday APIs Before diving into technical details, let’s explore some real-life scenarios to demonstrate how Workday APIs can be used in practice: Employee Discounts: Imagine a retail store offering a 5% discount for all its employees. When an employee tries to claim the discount at the billing counter, the system sends a REST request to Workday to verify the employee’s eligibility. This lightweight transaction is carried out using REST API. Learning Management Systems: Suppose your organization uses a learning management system (LMS) for employee training. You want to create calendar events for employees when they enroll in a course. In this case, the SOAP API can be used to perform the task with minimal coding. But wait a minute… how is this possible? How Do Workday APIs Work? Workday APIs follow a standard request/response model, where a client application sends a request to the server, and the server responds with the desired information. Workday APIs use standard authentication and authorization mechanisms, including OAuth 2.0, to ensure secure data exchange. Workday also offers a metadata API, which allows businesses to discover available APIs and their schemas. Documentation for SOAP-based web services, including WSDL and XML Schemas, can be found on the Workday website here. To test the web services, you can use SOAP UI, a free tool for testing web services, after downloading the WSDL. Note: You’ll need an account in a Workday tenant with proper authorizations to extract data from or send data to Workday. Authentication: Ensuring Secure Data Exchange with Workday APIs Workday supports both SOAP and REST API technology standards. SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol) and REST (Representational State Transfer) are web service architectures that facilitate communication between different software systems. However, there are some key differences between the two. SOAP is a protocol for exchanging XML-based messages over a network using HTTP, SMTP, or other application-level protocols. It heavily relies on XML and WSDL (Web Services Description Language) for communication and is typically used in enterprise environments. SOAP offers more comprehensive security and transaction features than REST, making it better suited for complex business transactions. Workday supports Basic, SAML, X509, and OAuth authentication methods for SOAP. Example of Data Exchange using SOAP protocols A Simple Example is shown below which is a snippet from a Workday Studio Integration which collects Candidate Data from Greenhouse (Recruiting System) and initiates Hiring in Workday. The picture above demonstrates Workday’s ability to call web services of third party applications, as well as web services hosted in Workday using Workday’s Integration Framework. REST, conversely, is an architectural style that uses HTTP methods like GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE to interact with resources. REST is simpler and more flexible than SOAP, making it easier to implement and maintain. Workday supports OAuth authentication for REST. API Clients will need to be created in Workday for any application to be able to collect/post data from Workday using REST protocols. API Clients are created as below and all the controls for the tokens, functional areas and restrictions based on IP addresses can be configured as shown in the screenshot below. Below is a table explaining different authentication mechanisms that Workday provides for data exchange using SOAP/REST. Authentication Method SOAP REST How is User Identity Validated Basic Yes Username and Password SAML Yes SAML Assertion containing Username X509 Yes Username and X509 Certificate OAuth Yes Yes Access Token based on OAuth grant type Conclusion Workday APIs empower businesses to integrate their HR processes with external systems, streamlining operations, reducing manual effort and errors, and improving data accuracy. Additionally, Workday APIs offer the flexibility to build custom applications tailored to specific needs. By leveraging Workday APIs, businesses can enhance their HR processes, cut HR costs, and remain competitive in today’s fast-paced business environment. So, get your APIs talking and let them handle the heavy lifting.

Workday How did the pandemic change the course of the Future of Work? The post pandemic landscape has had a significant impact on the workforce in several ways. Many companies have shifted to remote work, with employees working from home due to lockdowns and social distancing measures. This has required companies to adapt their technology and management practices to accommodate remote work. In workplaces where employees cannot work remotely, the pandemic has led to changes in the physical workspace, with measures such as social distancing, increased sanitation, and the use of personal protective equipment. The pandemic has also caused economic disruption, with many businesses shutting down temporarily or permanently, and many workers experiencing job losses, reduced hours, or reduced pay. Significant impact on mental health, with many workers experiencing stress and anxiety due to the uncertainty and disruption caused by the pandemic which has blurred the boundaries between work and home life. Overall, the pandemic has accelerated trends that were already underway, such as the use of technology and remote work, and has required companies and workers to adapt quickly to new ways of working. The future of work is likely to be influenced by many factors. These include: Remote work and distributed teams: The pandemic has shown that remote work can be effective, and many companies are likely to continue to embrace remote work and distributed teams as a way to access talent and reduce costs. Hybrid work arrangements: Many companies are likely to adopt hybrid work arrangements, where employees work both remotely and in the office, in order to balance the benefits of remote work with the benefits of in-person collaboration. Technology-driven work: Technology will continue to play a key role in the future of work, with more companies using automation, AI, and machine learning to streamline processes and improve efficiency. Upskilling and reskilling: As technology and automation continue to transform the workforce, companies and workers will need to invest in upskilling and reskilling to ensure they have the skills required for the future of work. Well-being and flexibility: Companies are likely to prioritize the well-being and flexibility of their employees, recognizing the importance of work-life balance and the need to support employees’ mental health and well-being. Diversity, equity, and inclusion: As companies become more distributed and diverse, there will be a growing focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion, with companies striving to create inclusive cultures that support all employees. What will the office of the future look like? Since the way we work is changing, and the office of the future will look very different from the traditional 9-to-5, cubicle-bound workplace that many of us are used to, organizations need to adapt to the changing nature of work and prepare for the office of the future to stay competitive, attract top talent, and create a workplace that fosters innovation, creativity, and collaboration. Here are six steps that companies can take to prepare for the office of the future: Embrace flexible work arrangements: One of the defining features of the office of the future is that it will be more flexible, with employees working remotely, from home, or in co-working spaces. Companies need to start planning for this shift by investing in the technology and infrastructure needed to support remote work and exploring new ways of measuring productivity and performance. This could include investing in cloud-based software, communication tools, and collaboration platforms that enable remote workers to stay connected and productive. Redesign the physical office space: The office of the future will require a more flexible and adaptable physical space that accommodates new ways of working, including hot-desking, shared spaces, and collaboration areas. Companies may need to redesign their physical office space to support these new work arrangements, investing in new furniture, layouts, and technology to enable a more mobile, flexible, and collaborative work environment. Invest in technology: Technology will be a key enabler of the office of the future, and companies need to be prepared to invest in new tools and solutions to support their employees. This could include cloud-based software, collaboration tools, and automation technologies to help streamline processes and increase productivity. Companies should also invest in cybersecurity measures to ensure that remote workers can access the company’s systems securely. Prioritize employee experience: The office of the future will be focused on the employee experience, with companies putting more emphasis on creating a workplace that fosters engagement, creativity, and innovation. This could involve investing in employee development programs, flexible work arrangements, and wellness initiatives that support the physical and mental wellbeing of employees. By prioritizing the employee experience, companies can attract and retain top talent and create a workplace that inspires and motivates its employees. Embrace diversity and inclusion: As companies become more global, diverse, and dispersed, it will be important to prioritize diversity and inclusion in the workplace. This could involve developing new policies and practices to support a more diverse workforce, investing in training and development to build cultural competency, and creating an inclusive workplace culture that fosters creativity, innovation, and collaboration. By embracing diversity and inclusion, companies can tap into a wider pool of talent and benefit from a broader range of perspectives and ideas. Emphasize data-driven decision making: In the office of the future, companies will need to be more data-driven, using real-time data and analytics to make better decisions and respond more quickly to changing market conditions. This could involve investing in data analytics tools, training employees to use data effectively, and creating a culture that values and prioritizes data-driven decision making. By leveraging data effectively, companies can gain a competitive edge and make better decisions based on real-time insights. The office of the future will require a new approach to work that emphasizes flexibility, collaboration, employee experience, technology, diversity and inclusion, and data-driven decision making. By taking these steps, companies can prepare for the office of the future and create a workplace that is adaptable, innovative, and responsive to the changing needs of its employees and the market. How