The Real-Time data system for all organizations!
November 18, 2019

The Real-Time data system for all organizations!

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Adaptive Insights, a Workday company

We are only using the product in our Accounting and Finance department. Mainly, Adaptive Insights has enabled us to perform a plethora of tasks, ranging from month-end reporting, break-even analysis, ad-hoc requests, and as a data warehouse to store multiple systems worth of necessary data that helps with business decisions. We have not fully used every aspect of the system, however, we are driving towards that now. I have only been using the system for the last 4 months and all I can say is, the features, the cleanliness and the organization of Adaptive Insights has given, not only myself, but our overall team a very useful, business tool.

Pros

  • The customer support services have been very quick and useful to all my pertinent questions relating to the development and issues associated with the sheets, formulas and any other question I may have.
  • Many of the instructional guides and examples enabled me to ramp up quickly, learning the system. This not only benefited myself, but the team as a whole.
  • The Torchbearer Community has been a wonderful resource. I have been able to explore similar questions other analysts have had, that I had, and examine how they resolved nuances or issues with their associated questions.

Cons

  • It would be beneficial to me, as a user, if there was a library of documentation for every type of feature. This could be something regarding formula building, understanding how attributes work, with examples, or a location for basic and advance documentation on Sheet/Model/Cubes.
  • I would like to have the ability to directly assign some dimensions to accounts easier. A drag and drop feature for that would be interesting. This has been a challenge for me when new dimensions are built and I am unable to assign them to new accounts.
  • I would also like to see some more formulas or an easier way to do some basic tasks. For example a simple YTD function instead of running a simple, yet long string of texts for the formulas. Or the option for selecting YTD features, removing the need of the formula all together.
  • Adaptive Insights has had a positive impact on organizational expansion. With our break-even analysis we have created, what would once take place in a notebook or Excel, we have created templates and can run a conservative estimate on revenue and costs quite quickly. We have cut back on research and time on expansion by months this way, to mere hours.
  • One negative impact is the costs with implementing connections between our other ERP systems with Adaptive Insights. Currently, we would like to have near real-time data, but cannot due to the costs. Currently, I am tasked with uploading from multiple systems and this can be time consuming, especially during a close.
  • Overall, positively we have had an excellent experience. The ease of the functionality and the easy learning curve have enabled everyone on my team to have an enjoyable experience.
The speed and the lack of lag time with Adaptive Insights is amazing. The ease of building and maintaining reports, dashboards, etc. has been wonderful. SAP Business ByDesign has a lot of lag, not user friendly, bulky and no ability to build/modify reports, and many other problems. Adaptive Insights is worlds apart from SAP Business ByDesign.
I believe that Adaptive Insights is appropriate for any size organization and industry. This has made an ease of reporting for us in our Accounting and Finance department. Other departments may not be well suited for this, but I do see the application can be used by an HR team. That would be beneficial for keeping up with benefits, costs, training, new/terminated employees, etc., and making the budgeting and forecasting simpler on the finance and accounting side.

Workday Adaptive Planning Feature Ratings

7.8
Long-term financial planning
8
Financial budgeting
8
Forecasting
8
Scenario modeling
6
Management reporting
9
7.0
Financial data consolidation
Not Rated
Journal entries and reports
Not Rated
Multi-currency management
Not Rated
Intercompany Eliminations
Not Rated
Minority Ownership
Not Rated
Local and consolidated reporting
7
Detailed Audit Trails
Not Rated
7.8
Financial Statement Reporting
9
Management Reporting
10
Excel-based Reporting
7
Automated board and financial reporting
5
XBRL support for regulatory filing
Not Rated
8.0
Personalized dashboards
8
Color-coded scorecards
Not Rated
KPIs
Not Rated
Cost and profitability analysis
8
Key Performance Indicator setting
Not Rated
Benchmarking with external data
Not Rated
10.0
Flat file integration
Not Rated
Excel data integration
10
Direct links to 3rd-party data sources
Not Rated
BI Standard Reporting ()
Not Rated
Ad-hoc Reporting ()
Not Rated
Report Output and Scheduling ()
Not Rated
Data Discovery and Visualization ()
Not Rated
Access Control and Security ()
Not Rated
Mobile Capabilities ()
Not Rated

Using Adaptive Insights, a Workday company

For basic usages, like check actuals for month-end close or for budgeting purposes, Adaptive Insights is great. Building out more complex and business oriented features, can be a challenge and a lot of going back and forth until the data is correct. This can be time consuming and not particularly useful in a time crunch. OfficeConnect does resolve this time issue, but from my experience, Excel is helpful when needed to build random reports quickly.
ProsCons
Like to use
Easy to use
Well integrated
Convenient
Feel confident using
Unnecessarily complex
Requires technical support
Slow to learn
Lots to learn
  • Building the dashboards once all the proper formulas and test sheets had been created.
  • The OfficeConnect feature is amazing. Useful when an ad hoc analysis is needed quickly and there is no time to build a sheet or report, if the request is complex.
  • The ability to view multiple levels or versions and bounce back-and-forth quickly.
  • Building metric accounts and not having all the needed or understanding of each components of the formula. Different logic is used and as a user of less than 6 months, still having a challenge with building new metric accounts.
  • Unable to build accounts using multiple dimensions. As well, reassign dimensions.
  • The limited ability of functions in dashboards. Cannot display YTD data at times.

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