Budgeting Planning & Forecasting

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Charts in Planning Analytics Workspace

July 18, 2023 by Revelwood

Charts can be an incredibly powerful tool for communicating complex data in an accessible and visually appealing way. In the world of enterprise planning, IBM Planning Analytics provides users with the ability to create detailed and informative charts through its workspace interface, Planning Analytics Workspace (PAW).

This blog post is based on a recent webinar on creating PAW charts in the New Experience. We explore some of the key features and techniques for creating charts in PAW and how they can help your organization make more informed decisions.

Getting Started: The Basics of PAW

Before getting into creating charts, it’s worth taking a quick look at the basics of PAW and how it works. PAW is a web-based interface that allows users to easily access and analyze data stored within IBM Planning Analytics. It includes a range of features and tools for exploration, analysis, and reporting, with the ability to create custom dashboards, reports, and visualizations.

PAW offers two different versions, Classic and the New Experience. While the Classic version is still available, the New Experience offers a more modern and intuitive user interface, with added applications and plans, Watson-related components, and changes to administration and charting functions.

Types of Visualizations

Once you have a basic understanding of PAW, it’s time to start exploring the different types of visualizations that can be created. PAW offers a variety of chart types that can help you visualize your data, including comparison, composition, and trend charts.

Comparison charts are useful when you want to compare two or more data series side-by-side, such as comparing actual versus forecasted revenue. Composition charts, on the other hand, are used to show the composition of a single data series, such as the breakdown of sales by product category. Trend charts are ideal for highlighting trends and patterns over time, such as changes in website traffic or sales revenue.

Creating a Chart: The Three Approaches

When it comes to creating a chart in PAW, there are three main approaches you can take. The first is to convert an existing Exploration to a chart, which can be done using drag-and-drop functionality and a subset editor. This approach is great when you already have an Exploration with the data you want to visualize.

The second approach is to duplicate an existing chart and make tweaks to it as needed. This is useful when you want to create multiple similar charts quickly without having to start from scratch each time.

Finally, the third approach is to manually create a visualization from scratch in a book. This approach allows for the most customization, as you can define the axes, filters, and formatting of the chart yourself.

Once you’ve chosen your approach, it’s time to start customizing your chart. PAW provides a range of options for bars, length, start, target, repeat, and filters, allowing you to fine-tune your visualization to best suit your needs. You can also add value labels to the chart to provide additional context and make it easier for viewers to understand the data being presented.

Tips for Effective Chart Design

While creating a chart in PAW is relatively straightforward, there are some best practices to keep in mind to ensure your chart is as effective as possible. Here are a few tips to consider:

Consider your audience: Who will be viewing your chart? Make sure the design and content are appropriate for your intended audience.
Keep it simple: Don’t try to cram too much information onto one chart. Focus on the key data points and keep the design clean and uncluttered.
Use the right chart type: Make sure you choose the chart type that best suits the data you are presenting and the story you want to tell.
Label everything: Be sure to label all axes, data points, and categories to ensure your chart is clear and easy to understand.
Use color wisely: Colors can be a great way to highlight important data points, but be sure to use them sparingly and consistently across all your charts.

Conclusion

Creating charts in PAW can be a powerful way to communicate complex data in a clear and accessible way. With a range of chart types and customization options, PAW provides users with the tools they need to create informative and visually appealing visualizations. Keep these tips in mind as you start experimenting with creating charts in PAW, and you’ll be on your way to creating clear, compelling reports that drive informed decision-making.

IBM Planning Analytics, which TM1 is the engine for, is full of new features and functionality. Not sure where to start? Our team here at Revelwood can help. Contact us for more information at info@revelwood.com. And stay tuned for more Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks weekly in our Knowledge Center and in upcoming newsletters!

Professional Services Firms Need Future-Ready Forecasting

June 29, 2023 by Revelwood

This is an excerpt from a blog post from our partner Workday Adaptive Planning. It highlights some approaches for professional services firms to keep up with the breakneck pace of work.

Professional services firms don’t have the luxury of gradually adjusting to an evolving digital environment. For them, the digital future is pretty much here. More than one-third of professional services firms expect that at least 75% of their revenue will come from digital by 2025, according to a report by PwC and Workday.

As an additional sign of the changing times, a growing proportion of firms are investing more than $50 million in artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and advanced analytics, according to the report. And with recent advances in generative AI, investments are likely to continue to grow. That’s further blurring the line between professional services and digital services—a distinction that will only get fuzzier in the future.

“Digital first is our new reality. That isn’t going to change,” shared Joe Golden, vice president of services, IBM, at a Workday event.

Yet, despite how adroitly many professional services firms adapted to wide-scale changes brought on by the pandemic, some lack visibility around past behavior and likely future outcomes. “Professional services organizations can be surprisingly opaque when it comes to insight,” IDC reports.

To succeed, firms must solve their data, talent, and technology challenges. But many have yet to embrace this new reality. Among professional services leaders, 57% say there’s a growing gap between where their business is and where it needs to be to compete, according to a recent Workday study on digital transformation. And only 23% say their digital strategy allows them to keep pace with or exceed the demands of the business.

Firms will need to bolster their access to high-quality, always-available data, along with having staff with the necessary data literacy skills to make sense of it all. Of companies with fully-accessible data, 76% say they are well-equipped digitally to ensure business continuity in times of crisis, Workday finds. Small wonder, then, that advanced analytics and data visualization are the skills most sought after by IT leaders (35%) and finance leaders (34%).

“Access to data is the crux of most technology issues in any company,” says Jennifer LaClair, CFO, Ally Financial.

To better understand what the future might hold for professional services firms, industry thought leaders shared their predictions for three of the biggest trends the industry will face. The following excerpt focuses on how professional services firms can benefit from more sophisticated forecasting.

Data Silos Disappear as Organizations Race to Future-Ready Forecasting and Adaptability

To drive productivity and profit and to forecast accurately, future-forward professional services firms will need more integration and less separation of their people and systems. “Today’s professional services organizations simply cannot operate with functional silos as the lines between sales, delivery, and finance become blurred,” SPI asserts.

Unfortunately, these organizations’ data too often sits trapped within silos. “The reason most companies can’t forecast their revenue more accurately is because they have different systems and data across their lines of businesses and services,” Joseph says. “And all those different systems mean that you have data that’s going to be wildly inconsistent.”

Almost half (49%) of business leaders—and almost two-thirds (62%) of professional services leaders—say their inability to connect operational, people, and financial data to business outcomes impairs the organization’s agility, according to a Workday survey of senior business executives.

But firms with accessible data tell a different story, the Workday survey reveals. A towering 85% of leaders whose companies enjoy fully accessible data say the organization can embrace change readily. All of which points to the urgent need to overcome siloed data sources.

For ERPA, a consulting and enterprise application managed services firm, adopting professional services automation slashed the time needed to calculate revenue from a full day to just 15 minutes. And the firm gained a stronger forecasting ability in the process.

“From week to week, we’re able to get a really good sense of our forecasted revenue for projects in the next four to 12 weeks,” says Jon Milkovich, director of Workday financials at ERPA. “So it’s really provided a lot better real-time insight into what our forecasted revenue will be.”

That’s a need that best-in-class firms are meeting head-on. They’re 82% more likely than other firms to be able to share financial and operational data with the extended enterprise through a central repository, Aberdeen finds in its report: “Leverage Demand Planning and Forecasting for Best-in-Class Performance During Volatile Times.”

Learn more about how professional services firms can adapt and change in our recent webinar, Streamlining Professional Business Services with Workday Adaptive Planning.

Read the full blog post on the Workday blog.

More from our FP&A Done Right Series:

Enterprise Planning Helps Professional Services Firms Adapt to Changes

FP&A Done Right: Trends in Accounting and Finance

Leveraging IBM Planning Analytics for xP&A

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Headcount Analysis

June 27, 2023 by Revelwood

Did you miss our recent webinar on headcount analysis? Here’s a high-level recap of what we covered. In short, IBM Planning Analytics is a powerful, flexible tool for headcount analysis.

Headcount analysis is a critical component of any organization’s workforce planning and management strategy. Headcount analysis helps organizations understand their staffing requirements, analyze performance metrics, and identify areas of inefficiency that can be addressed through better HR practices. IBM Planning Analytics provides powerful capabilities for headcount analysis. In this blog post, we will explore headcount analysis with IBM Planning Analytics and discuss key features and benefits of this solution.

Watch the webinar here!

IBM Planning Analytics enables organizations to create sophisticated headcount models that can track a wide range of metrics related to employee performance, retention rate, demographics, compensation, and benefits. With Planning Analytics, organizations can analyze trends in headcounts, understand factors driving variations in headcounts, and identify opportunities to optimize their workforce. For example, you can use Planning Analytics to compare headcounts across different geographies or business units and to identify trends in staffing changes over time.

The solution provides a flexible and user-friendly interface that makes it easy for HR teams and other stakeholders to analyze headcount data. They do not need to be Planning Analytics power users. Planning Analytics includes a variety of pre-built dashboards, reports, and visualizations that enable users to explore and collaborate on data. Users can drill down into specific data points, filter data based on different criteria, and customize their views to suit their needs. The solution also includes a built-in report writer that enables users to create customized reports with ease.

IBM Planning Analytics integrates seamlessly with a variety of data sources, such as ERP and HR systems, to provide a holistic view of headcount data. This means that organizations can extract data from multiple sources and integrate it into a single model for analysis, without having to rely on complex data transformations or manual data entry. This integration capability also ensures that headcount data is accurate and up to date, which is essential for effective decision-making.

Additionally, IBM Planning Analytics provides advanced analytics features such as predictive analytics, what-if scenarios, and trend analysis that enable organizations to forecast future headcount requirements, costs, and risks. Predictive analytics models can use historical data and machine learning algorithms to predict future staffing demands and highlight areas of staffing volatility. What-if scenarios enable organizations to simulate the impact of different staffing strategies, such as hiring freezes or increased retention efforts. And trend analysis enables organizations to understand the impact of different factors on headcount, such as seasonality, economic trends, and business cycles.

The solution also provides robust collaboration and workflow capabilities that enable HR teams to work together effectively and efficiently. The solution includes a variety of collaboration features such as commenting, task assignment, and alerts that enable teams to share information and coordinate efforts. The solution also includes powerful workflow features that enable teams to automate routine tasks and streamline processes, such as approvals and reviews.

Finally, IBM Planning Analytics provides security features that ensure the confidentiality and privacy of headcount data. The solution includes granular access controls, data encryption, and other security measures that enable organizations to protect their sensitive data. The solution is also compliant with a variety of security and privacy regulations, such as GDPR and HIPAA.

In conclusion, headcount analysis is a critical component of any organization’s workforce planning and management strategy. IBM Planning Analytics is an advanced analytics solution that provides powerful capabilities for headcount analysis. The solution enables organizations to create sophisticated headcount models, analyze trends in headcounts, and forecast future headcount requirements, costs, and risks. The solution also provides a user-friendly interface, integrates seamlessly with a variety of data sources, provides advanced analytics features, enables robust collaboration and workflow, and includes security features that ensure the confidentiality and privacy of headcount data. If you’re looking to optimize your workforce and improve your HR practices, IBM Planning Analytics is a solution worth exploring. Interested in learning how to leverage your investment in Planning Analytics by adding headcount analysis into your environment? Let us know – we can help!

Enterprise Planning Helps Professional Services Firms Adapt to Changes

June 23, 2023 by Revelwood

Professional services firms make money based on the number of hours they service clients. These companies need to have many consultants with desirable skills as billable as possible. They also have to have enough resources available to start new projects as soon as the contracts are signed. In short, professional services firms need to make the best use of the people they have, understand the needs they will have in the future and then appropriately plan for changes in a dynamic market with a history of being a “lumpy” business.

This can present a big challenge. In fact, according to Workday, “Only 29% of professional services leaders say they are confident in their organization’s current financial and business plans.”

This is where enterprise planning can help. With enterprise planning, professional services firms can easily perform demand planning, which can then integrate with project revenue planning, financial forecasting and reporting. These models use the same data and provide the firm with consistent and accurate information.

Enterprise planning is a key resource for these firms. Professional services companies can perform ad-hoc analysis, asking questions of the data, such as:

How many consultants are available/currently “sitting on the bench,” not earning revenue?
What skill sets do our current consultants have and what skills are missing?
Which new projects are best served by onshore staffing and which new projects are best served by offshore staffing?
Do we have enough staff to take on this new project?
If a project ends unexpectedly, what existing projects can use those resources?
Are we optimizing our people in the most profitable way?

Learn why more and more professional services firms are embracing enterprise planning. Watch our latest webinar on Streamlining Professional Business Services with Workday Adaptive Planning here.

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Waterfall Charts

June 20, 2023 by Revelwood

Did you miss our webinar on waterfall charts in IBM Planning Analytics? Here’s our take on best practices and how and why to use waterfall charts.

Waterfall charts, also known as bridge charts, floating column charts, or cascade charts, are a data visualization tool used to represent changes in a value over time. They are particularly useful for showing how a specific value, such as a company’s profit or revenue, has changed from one period to another and the impact of different components on this change.

Waterfall charts are named after their appearance – the bars in the chart resemble a waterfall cascading downward. In a common example, the initial value is displayed as the starting point, and each segment of the waterfall represents the change in value due to certain factors. The length of each bar segment represents the size of the change, with upward bars indicating increases and downward bars representing decreases.

One of the advantages of using a waterfall chart is that it helps users easily identify the contribution of each component to the overall value. For example, a waterfall chart can show the contribution of different revenue streams to a company’s total revenue, thereby highlighting areas of strength and weakness in the company’s income stream.

Another common usage of waterfall charts is to show how an investment or project has affected the financial performance of a company. For instance, a waterfall chart can demonstrate the cost and revenue distribution of a new product development project over time. This can help in identifying areas where costs could be optimized or where revenue could be increased.

In enterprise planning and analytics, waterfall charts are crucial in depicting the impact of different scenarios, period-over-period comparisons, and identifying performance gaps. These charts allow professionals to identify key drivers of revenue or costs and identify areas that require improvement. It is also useful for businesses to use waterfall charts to identify performance trends, forecast trends based on prior data, and determine areas that require resource allocation.

Creating a Waterfall Chart

Creating a waterfall chart is relatively easy. A waterfall chart can include as many segments as required to represent the changes that need to be visualized.

To create a waterfall chart in Excel, start by creating a table that contains the total initial value and the changes in value. The table should represent a timeline that goes from left to right. The first column will contain a description of the different components that make up the initial value. The second column will display the size of the initial value. The subsequent columns will display the changes that occur within each segment. Each column will represent a change in the value of the previous column, either positive or negative. For example, a positive value could represent an increase in sales revenue, while a negative value could represent a rise in production costs.

Once the table has been created in Excel, the next step is to insert a waterfall chart. Select the table contents, including the initial value, then select “Insert” on the top menu bar and choose the “Waterfall Chart” type. The chart will then be created, showing each segment’s component and how it contributes to the overall value.

When using Planning Analytics, the process follows a similar outline. You will first need to create a table that houses the total initial value and the changes in value across time. The processes available with Planning Analytics are more user-friendly and automated than those of Excel, making the analysis of the chart trend even easier.

Waterfall charts are a critical representation tool in enterprise planning and analytics. They play a significant role in identifying the drivers of revenue or performance, identifying gaps in performance, and providing a retrospective review of trends in a business’s performance. Furthermore, the ability to create data-driven visualizations in IBM Planning Analytics and Microsoft Excel (amongst other tools) has allowed businesses to quickly adapt to new data insights. As a result, they are valuable tools in every data-savvy professional’s toolkit.

Workday Adaptive Planning Tips & Tricks: Reordering Parent and Children Cube Accounts in Cube Sheets

June 14, 2023 by Gary Leiffer

This week’s Workday Adaptive Planning tip pertains to the manual process of reordering Cube accounts to enable a desired hierarchy of accounts. While an Account Attribute could be tagged onto the accounts as an alternate hierarchy structure, a full restructuring of the main Accounts is often required.

In the following screen capture the Summary/Top level cube account has 9 children accounts t1-t9:

The client requested that two summary levels be added below the Test Account: A1 which will house t1, t2 and t9 and A2 which will house t3-t8.

The summary accounts will also require a “Total.” Therefore, they will be developed as standard accounts. As they are added to the Test Account, they are placed automatically at the bottom of the set of current children accounts as follows:

The following screen capture displays the result of attempting to drag the t1 account into and below the A1 account- it is not successful as the A1 new account is a child and can’t accept a child. It ends up simply “moving” below the A1 account and still rolling up to the Test account.

To enable the t1 to be added into the summary A1 account, a temporary “dummy” account is required to be developed and placed into the A1 account, thus activating it as a parent/summary account. The following warning message is displayed to confirm that the A1 account is being transformed into a summary account by the add-account action.

The temporary child account can be named anything as it will be deleted once the transformed A1 parent account is activated and a valid child is moved under it.

After saving the temporary account, the set of accounts now show the A1 as a parent/summary account with temp1 rolling into it.

Upon selecting and “dragging” the t1 account into the A1 parent account the following confirmation warning is displayed:

Confirming by checking the “move account box” and saving, results in the t1 account rolling into the A1 account.

As A1 is “activated”, the temp1 account can now be deleted with following warning displayed before clicking on the “ Yes” button to complete the deletion.

The result of the process in the following screen capture shows the t1 account as the current sole child of the A1 parent account:

The next step in the process is to drag/move t2 and t9 to roll up into A1. Dragging t2 into the A1 summary places it above the t2 child. This requires reordering the accounts by moving down the t2 account below t2 for proper account display in reports and the sheet itself.

This process takes extra time and can be avoided by selecting t9 (the third account of A1 to be moved) first, and then t2 and t1 in sequence. With only three accounts to move this is a quick process. However, with many accounts it can take a lot longer, and sequencing can easily be developed incorrectly. The import account option can also be utilized after the “dummy” account is manually created under A1.

The final screen capture displays midway thought loading the A2 parent account– starting with t8 and then moving t7 into A2 thus starting with correct account sequencing and not requiring reordering as occurred in the A1 development process. Next, the accounts t6-t3 can be added to A2 in that order.

In summary, reordering, changing, and restructuring the main account structure of Cube and Model accounts can be handled with the “special” temporary “dummy” (not so dumb after all!) account created as a child below the account turning into a parent. This “activates” the parent account enabling the children to move into the newly developed parent accounts (last to first to not require subsequent reordering of all the accounts.) This process also works when working with GL Accounts- setting up parent accounts and adding them to Root Accounts. An earlier Workday Adaptive Planning Tips & Tricks article I authored describes Root Accounts and their function in the application.

Visit Revelwood’s Knowledge Center for our Workday Adaptive Planning Tips & Tricks or sign up here to get our Workday Adaptive Planning Tips & Tricks delivered directly to your inbox. Not sure where to start with Workday Adaptive Planning? Our team here at Revelwood can help!

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: HTTPPORTNUMBER

June 6, 2023 by Marc Assenza

Did you know that when you create a new TM1 / IBM Planning Analytics instance that the HTTPPORTNUMBER parameter is required? This setting is placed within the TM1S.cfg file for your model.

Some things to note when defining the HTTPPORTNUMBER parameter:

1. The valid port values are between 5000 and 49151.
2. The configuration like will look something like this:

HTTPPORTNUMBER=5005

3. The port used must be unique on the server for any service, not just TM1 / PA database services.

4. If you forget to assign a value within the TM1S.cfg file, then Port 5001 is automatically assigned to the model. This is important for multiple reasons:

a. Port 5001 may already be being utilized by another service which will prevent the TM1 / PA server instance from starting

b. If you have multiple TM1/PA models on the server and none of the TM1S.cfg files have the HTTPPORTNUMBER parameter defined, then the first server instance will start (if port 5001 is not currently being utilized). Every other TM1 /PA instance will then fail because each will also try to use Port 5001, but the port is already used.

That’s it! Just something to keep in mind when creating new TM1 / PA models on your server!

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: UNIQUE Function in Excel

April 4, 2023 by Revelwood

Have you ever needed to produce a list of unique values within a cell range in Excel? If so, the UNIQUE function can do this.

The example below shows a simple list of countries that includes some duplicates:

Table

Description automatically generated

To produce a unique list, simply pass the cell range of the original list into the UNIQUE function.

Application, table, Excel

Description automatically generated

The unique list of values will “spill” down from the original UNIQUE formula.

This approach will give you a quick and easy way to get unique values from a cell range.

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: On-Demand Webinars, Part 2

March 28, 2023 by Revelwood

Did you know we have a wide variety of IBM Planning Analytics webinars on-demand? We showcased two of our most popular webinars – Best Practices when Using Planning Analytics Workspace Charts and Creating PAW Charts Using the New Experience – in a recent blog post.

Here are two more of our popular IBM Planning Analytics / TM1 on-demand webinars.

Best Practices for Using TurboIntegrator

This webinar showcases some features of TurboIntegrator that you may not be using. We cover a series of functions and offer best practices for using them. We describe each function, explain how we use the function when creating models, and discuss the benefits you get by using these approaches.

Here are a few of the topics we review:

Making calls outside of a process
Modifying dimension structures
Creating views and subsets

Best Practices When Using Hierarchies in IBM Planning Analytics

In this webinar, we explain the concepts, the creation and the things to consider when using hierarchies within their existing models. We show examples of hierarchies that Revelwood clients use and how they create new reports and analyses.

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Charts in Planning Analytics Workspace

Getting Started: The Basics of PAW

Types of Visualizations

Creating a Chart: The Three Approaches

Tips for Effective Chart Design

Conclusion

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Professional Services Firms Need Future-Ready Forecasting

Data Silos Disappear as Organizations Race to Future-Ready Forecasting and Adaptability

More from our FP&A Done Right Series:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Headcount Analysis

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Enterprise Planning Helps Professional Services Firms Adapt to Changes

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Waterfall Charts

Creating a Waterfall Chart

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Workday Adaptive Planning Tips & Tricks: Reordering Parent and Children Cube Accounts in Cube Sheets

Read more Workday Adaptive Planning Tips & Tricks:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: HTTPPORTNUMBER

Some things to note when defining the HTTPPORTNUMBER parameter:

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: UNIQUE Function in Excel

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: On-Demand Webinars, Part 2

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

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Budgeting Planning & Forecasting

Getting Started: The Basics of PAW

Types of Visualizations

Creating a Chart: The Three Approaches

Tips for Effective Chart Design

Conclusion

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Data Silos Disappear as Organizations Race to Future-Ready Forecasting and Adaptability

More from our FP&A Done Right Series:

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Creating a Waterfall Chart

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Read more Workday Adaptive Planning Tips & Tricks:

Some things to note when defining the HTTPPORTNUMBER parameter:

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

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