Guide

GETTING THE BASICS RIGHT

It’s All About

the Data
Introduction
Growth is a key measure of success for most organizations.
But without the right solution, the effort to produce the
insights that fuel growth can actually slow your progress. The
goal is to find a way to remain nimble, efficient, and productive
as you grow. But how can you achieve this when your team is
stuck in the perpetual cycle of data aggregation and reporting?

What if you had a system that streamlined your key processes such as
consolidate and close, or plan to hire? What if you could reduce redundancies
and eliminate unnecessary reconciliation? What if you could plan financials and
head count; execute all finance, HR, and payroll processes; and continuously
analyze as you grow? A single system that connects your data, gives you the
power to answer all these what-ifs, and more.

It’s All About the Data | 2

Data working against you. Data interdependencies for finance, HR,
Without a uniform data model, your data is disconnected and can create and payroll.
unnecessary complexity that works against you. In fact, according to recent
At a fundamental level, we think of financial management systems capturing
HBR research, achieving data-driven leadership remains an aspiration for
debits and credits, revenue and expenses, assets and liabilities; human capital
most organizations—just 26.5% of organizations report having an established
management systems capturing personnel-, demographic-, and benefits-related
data‑driven organization.
data; and payroll systems capturing data related to salary, bonuses, and stock.
When data is siloed in systems across finance, HR, and operations, running
But these systems also share common data structures, such as cost center
an agile business is next to impossible. You can’t effectively analyze or plan
hierarchies and supervisory organizations. Unfortunately, these structures are
because the data is dispersed, leading to drawn-out decision-making and
too often duplicated in disparate systems, leading to data inconsistencies. For
second-guessing. And the lack of timeliness and security, plus the duplication of
example, what happens when a cost center is changed in one system and that
disconnected data, can tax an already overburdened workforce.
change isn’t reflected in the other? In addition, data can often mean different
things in different systems. Take the word “location,” for example. In HR, this

The value of data interdependencies. could denote a physical office or a training facility; in finance, it could reference
an inventory location (for example, a bin or shelf) or a geographic sales region;
How can you make your data work for you as you plan, analyze, and execute
in payroll, it could differentiate between a state of residence and a state of work.
across your organization? You need a single solution that delivers depth and
It’s one word spoken in different organizational languages, and these multiple
flexibility, and configures processes to work with—not against—one another.
meanings create disconnects and inhibit true insights and growth.
Workday accelerates decision velocity by making data accessible to everyone
who needs it in a consumable way, while maintaining data security and privacy. The benefit of having a single system for finance, HR, and payroll is that these
Only Workday AI and machine learning (ML) technologies paired with a uniform separate departments are more likely to share in the ownership of data and data
data model provide built-in real-time access to insights that enable all users structures. Subject matter experts across the organization are at the same table
to confidently make faster, data-driven decisions in the context of business to uncover and understand data interdependencies. Questions can be addressed
processes. such as, “How can HR use data normally housed in finance and payroll to gain
insight into employee productivity?” and “How can finance use data normally
What does this mean for you?
housed in HR to drive allocations?”
When your system recognizes data interdependencies, you can go beyond
The power to fully exploit data interdependencies starts with the right
analyzing and answering simple questions such as, “What’s my current revenue
foundation: a single core system of record for finance, HR, and payroll.
booked for this quarter?” to asking more strategic questions such as, “What’s my
current revenue booked, who is the talent most responsible for it, and when can Let’s look at some scenarios that highlight the importance of data
we compensate them appropriately for it?” interdependencies.

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1. How finance benefits from HR and
payroll data.
Without interconnected data: With interconnected data:
• Finance has limited visibility into the makeup of one of its major costs: the • In Workday, there’s one system and one version of the truth. Your costs
workforce. There isn’t a line of sight into pay discrepancies or visibility into and assets are tied to employees. Pay information is available and
the supporting details. There also isn’t any understanding of what makes up accessible at an employee/manager level. You can view pay by component,
the pay components down to the department, manager, or employee level. by department, and through other lenses, then view fluctuations and
trends over time. You can use outside data to compare with your peers or
• Travel and expense costs lack supporting detail in the general ledger
understand how external factors impact workforce costs through further
regarding the employee/manager, project/campaign, on/off contract, or
analysis. You can also view that data in real time to get ahead of the curve,
in-policy/out-of-policy amounts.
which is especially helpful when looking at overtime.
• Head count is a static number often updated once a quarter. HR has one
• Travel and expense data is tied directly to the employee/manager, and
version and finance has another. As a result, the allocation of shared
real-time analytics can detect out-of-policy violations. There is no need to
costs such as IT, which are based on head count, are often wrong due to
replicate cost center or supervisory structures.
the inability to reconcile the differences between the static number and
real‑time state. • Head count in Workday represents an actual person. There is no longer
a need to reconcile between two versions. The value is automatically
• In addition, there isn’t a way to track assets to employees. Laptops
updated based on hirings and terminations, thereby streamlining the
assigned during onboarding cannot be accounted for nor collected during
allocation process.
off-boarding.
• While viewing the employee record, you can also view any assigned assets
and their respective lifecycles, such as when the asset was purchased or
the assigned depreciation method. When the employee leaves, the asset
can be accounted for and collected as part of the off-boarding business

“
process.

We have to make the right strategic decisions at the

right time. We needed a unified system to ensure
that all our financial and people‑related data would
be secured in a single location, with easy access on
demand.
Groupe Lucien Barrière
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2. How HR benefits from finance and
payroll data.
Without interconnected data:
HR typically determines top talent within the organization based on performance
and potential. Disconnected data makes it impossible to view top performers’
generated revenue and its impact on the financials, or to view top performers by
line of business. Therefore, there’s a risk of making uninformed decisions and not
rewarding or recognizing top talent, which leads to highly regrettable attrition
and low employee morale.

With interconnected data:

With a single system for finance, HR, and payroll from Workday, you have the
ability to view revenue generated by employee, line of business, and sales
campaign, to name a few. There is no need to use a multidimensional database
to slice and dice the information. Drill into revenue on a financial statement
to see the underlying details. Who is your top performer? Are they properly
compensated? Would you like to award a one-time bonus or send feedback?
You can do all of that—and more—in Workday.

“
You need to link HR and finance processes to
make them more holistic and intelligent, like we
did in Workday. Then you can allow managers to
contribute as business analysts, translating data
into business insight.
Bill Gosling Outsourcing
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3. How payroll benefits from finance and
HR data.
Without interconnected data:
When changes to cost centers occur in the financial system, whether due to
reorganizations or restructuring, they’re not reflected in the payroll system. If
employees are promoted in the HR system, tying the new cost center allocations
to payroll is a manual effort. Paychecks are often incorrectly allocated because
they don’t reflect up-to-date data, and reconciliation is arduous, causing
frustration across the business.

With interconnected data:

With Workday, cost center structures are shared across the functional domains.
If a change is made in one area, it is automatically reflected in the others. This
reduces the time you need for manual reconciliation and auditing.

“When you are able to integrate your talent,

your performance, your pay, your equity, and
your diversity, you can tell a better overall
company story. Workday is truly holistic, giving
you everything you need in one system, one place.
Adcorp Holdings Ltd.
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4. How IT benefits from unified data.
Without interconnected data: With interconnected data:
Organizations increase their data security risks without a single system The unified source of truth with Workday provides the business with contextual
connecting their financial, HR, and payroll data. Access to data varies from security, always-on audit, data governance, and complete compliance. A
system to system and could result in bad actors getting their hands on sensitive single report built in Workday can service the needs of many. Workday built‑in
data and Personal Identifiable Information (PII). Innovation suffers because application security ensures users only see the data they are entitled to see.
IT must direct precious resources to managing disparate data sources over You have the complete picture of your business across planning, finance,
deploying new capabilities that drive the business forward. Decision-making and HR thanks to the relational nature of Workday applications and the
slows due to incomplete data and analysis taking place outside of where action ability for Workday to integrate with third-party data sources. Workday is the
will take place. only vendor that connects enterprise applications to a unified data model
that blends Workday financial and HR data with operational data external to
Workday, enabling swift and more confident decision-making. Interconnected
data and a unified data model such as Workday enable the quick build and
use of trustworthy ML models. It ensures a connected view of data through
applications with interoperability, creating a single view of the truth in the
application or enabling data to coexist with third-party applications. This new
data framework enables you to ingest, manage, and deploy data with integrity.

“
Workday architectural principles around the way
data is organized are quite powerful and unique.
Western Sydney Airport

“
Speed, accuracy, data consistency, and aligned
processes—we’ve gained them all with Workday.
Evotec SE
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The all-in-one system that’s altogether better.
When finance, HR, and payroll no longer operate in a vacuum, you can bring data Workday provides our customers with a unified and trusted view of data across
together to drive better business processes and make more strategic decisions. their organization so they can:
You also benefit from a single system that understands data interdependencies
and allows you to plan head count and financials so you are prepared for what’s
next, can execute your business processes in a way that works for you, and
are able to analyze your performance as you go. Freed from the complexity of Gain a complete picture of their business in real time
disconnected data, your technology is no longer a hindrance to growth. Your
company can keep a pulse on the business with the confidence of real-time
data—and set its sights on a brighter future.

Accelerate time to action with data-driven decisions

“
Save time and increase efficiency

There’s an opportunity to use the data you

have to run your company differently. Modern
systems such as Workday capture the data Secure external customer and internal operational data
so you can analyze it behind the scenes. This
digital infrastructure is designed to give you the
transaction trail that is necessary to run global
companies at scale and with increased nimbleness.
To learn how a Workday solution can work for you, please contact Sales at
Nasdaq workday.com/contact or +1-877-967-5329.

To learn more about Workday for the medium enterprise, visit:

“
workday.com/medium-enterprise

We know that Workday will scale with our business

and it gives us that competitive edge.
Airtable
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+1-925-951-9000 +1-877-WORKDAY (+1-877-967-5329) Fax: +1-925-951-9001 workday.com

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