Workday & Your Data Analytics Strategy

Last week, one of our most recent projects completed a major milestone with their launch of Workday. Like any large software deployment, the most solid and well executed ERP transformations will still cause significant disruption to an organization's existing data & analytics landscape. Based on our experiences it is critical for data leaders across the organization to engage early with the program to align and refresh their core data foundations to ensure a smooth delivery. This is true for enterprise, divisional, and departmental leaders. 

As a part of the ERP design and implementation, data designers, developers, and analysts will need to be enabled in learning new data structures & concepts, new technologies & interfaces for working with data, and new ways of integrating core data domain objects with existing data analytics environments. In many cases, those analytics environments may also be in play as a component of your organization's overall digital transformation initiatives. 

Here are a few best practices that the vantadata team recommends to organizations that are heading into a Workday (or any ERP) initiative:

Peel Back the Data Network Onion

Most teams implementing Workday are replacing an existing ERP system, and most likely one that has been in place for quite a long time. A long enough time that teams across the organization have created layers upon layers of co-mingled and shared data operations across security & access, integration, synchronization, analytics & reporting. 

Building an understanding of these systems (both internal and external) and data flows is critical to gaining a robust understanding of your organization's data complexity and the impact that Workday's implementation will have upon it. By using knowledge graphing tools such as Neo4J Bloom, data architects can build a robust and understandable view of your data network. This understanding will help you quickly see a full picture of the systems and teams that need to have a direct role in the ERP system's implementation.

Define Acceptable Data Integration Patterns

In many cases, moving into a Workday solution is also a large modernization effort across multiple areas of technology. As the scope of the data network comes into view, the data architecture team should also define the optimal and approved tools, technologies and design patterns that will govern data exchanges between systems, both internally and externally to the organization.

Defining data integration standards, along with a decision tree / matrix to help guide teams in the re-architecting of data flows will cut down on design confusion and also help to unify the overall data landscape within the enterprise. This may involve establishing an enterprise API data delivery capability, creating a shared operational data hub, or exploring event driven and data mesh via tools such as Confluent. Set the ground rules early and launch new capabilities alongside Workday to level up the organization's data integration environment.

Plan For A Shift In Your Analytics Dimensions

From a data and reporting lens, a Workday implementation can be very disruptive. Moving from your existing financial chart of accounts to Workday's multi-functional foundational data model (FDM) will be a huge undertaking across business teams, as well as analytical staff building reports, dashboards, and other analyses. Use the planning and design phases of Workday to also outline how the FDM will impact data hierarchies & rollups, data granularity & cardinality, data quality metrics, and domain filtering & segmentation within your analytics scheme.

If your organization has implemented a data governance program, this would be an excellent time to leverage their knowledge, expertise, and command of the organization's data domains to guide teams in Workday's delivery. If you have not yet implemented a program, an ERP transformation initiative provides a great focal point to begin organizing within your enterprise around data governance principles.

Create A Data Specific Change Management Sub-Program

Change management must be a major initiative within a Workday implementation. In our opinion, a well executed Workday technical rollout is meaningless without a top-notch change management program to accompany it. Given the scope of considerations we've mentioned above, extending the change management program firmly in to the arena of data & analytics is an imperative. This is especially true of implementations that are replacing long-lived programs (7+ years). 

A mature legacy ERP program has an untold number of tools, systems, and databases that rely on it as a data source to power not just enterprise, but departmental applications, and analytics teams across the organization. Over time, these teams have employed all manner of data process to obtain, transform, and utilize legacy ERP data. Bringing these teams into the early Workday design phases to understand its reach, capabilities, and impacts can ensure that data literacy is spread far and wide. Leverage the change management program to provide a robust level training and coaching to reinforce unified data patterns.

Key Takeaways

Embarking upon the journey to move your enterprise's business operations into Workday is a prime opportunity to re-evaluate your data & analytics strategy. Data leaders must be at the table of early planning steps to ensure that key data architectural components, processes, technologies, and staff skills are aligned to the ERP program's overall goals. Take advantage of this transformational time within the organization to improve and level up your data strategy, mission, and execution.

About us: vantadata is a data & analytics consultancy that specializes in strategy, design, and implementation for Workday and other ERP systems, among other data initiatives. For more information, visit us at vantadata.co.