ORD (Online Report Designer) is a front end tool which allows users to create reports and queries using a number of data sources such as Adhoc using live data, Advanced Reporting using detailed reporting which pulls data from Employee Central and other modules, Work Force Analytics.
In order to provide valuable reporting without having big data warehouse technologies, not having costlier reporting tools and maintenance less application, ORD (Online Report Designer from Success Factors) is best chosen for HR reporting.
Before going to the features of Success Factors reporting using ORD (Online Report Designer), we need to know whether ORD reporting is an additional component to Employee central or it is an inbuilt component. Yes, ORD is an additional component, where we need to integrate with Success Factors to make use of reporting.
Here we will come across a question, do we require a data model for developing a report using ORD. Then answer is yes, we require a data modelling, but we do not require an additional data-modelling tool. ORD reporting which itself act as a data modeler and report designer. Data modelling in ORD will be done by using basic joins between the tables, the joins used here are Inner join, Left join and Outer joins.
Please find the below screenshot where it shows how the joins in the modelling are performed,
- Data Modelling in ORD Reporting
- Joins used in ORD Reporting
We need to drag and drop the list of tables into modelling area and join them accordingly to satisfy the requirement to get the proper set of data for the required fields.
ORD (Online Report Designer) is fully self-serviceable; with this tool, you are able to build your own reports. Meaning we do not require much developers.
As other reporting tools provide many options, ORD also provided many options which are helpful for reporting limited but helpful in achieving lot of functionalities. Let us see what are various reporting options available in ORD.
Static Filters:
Static Filters are the filter applied after the user selections are applied at the start point of execution of the report. These filters are not modifiable by an user after execution of the report. Please find the below screenshot how the static filters are look like,
Run time Filters:
Run time Filters can be called as prompts as we call in many reporting tools. It is used to filter out the data before opening the report output.
Sorting:
In ORD, we have Ascending and Descending sorting.
Date Options:
Unlike other reporting tools, ORD specially provided an option called Date Options where it determines Time dependency automatically based on the driving table date (Driving table is the base table used for ORD modelling). In HR Reporting always, time dependency plays a crucial role because HR reporting always dependent on the time. Here I would like add a point by comparing the reporting with SAP BW, in SAP BW we require to add much functionalities/procedures to achieve Time dependency, which consumes lot of time for implementation. However, ORD gets Time dependency functionality very easily.
When you observe the above screenshot, we have two tabs “Data Options” and “Overrides”. In Date Options tab, we will have all the primary table / driving table time dependency evaluation information. This is the base for the time dependency calculation for the other tables in the data model. In Overrides tabs, the time dependency evaluations for all the tables apart from the driving table. In Overrides we have three options No Override (When we set this property for the table, time dependency will work based on the driving table Date type), Overridden (When we set this property for the table, time dependency will not work based on the driving table, but time dependency can be applicable for the respective table Date type information) and Date Options Disabled (When we set this property for the table, time dependency will gets switched off).
Defining People Scope:
This option is provided to define the access to Line manager, where Line Manager can access to their Employees data. Where as HR managers, Regional managers etc can access Employees data based on the roles designed for them.
Calculated Columns:
Calculated Column option is provided to define a new calculated column based on the existing field or another calculated column. Even not many options provided, with in the options provided its worth full. The few options provided are If else statements, left trim, right trim, middle trim, getting time data based on the existing date field, concatenations, all arithmetic operations, free texts etc.
Report Distributor:
Report Distributor will execute the reports, which are included in the bundle and send to the list of user’s offline in the formats such as Excel, CSV, PDF, and Word.
In the above screenshot, Items tab will have information of reports needs to be distributed, Destination tab will have information what could be the destination E-mail, Run-offline, FTP, Recipients tab will have information to whom the reports to send, Schedule tab will have information at what time the report should schedule.
To visualize the output by the user can be done offline (Meaning need to perform export to excel operation). User can export the report data to the file formats such as Excel, CSV, PDF, and Word.
Advantages of using ORD Reporting:
- Less number of developers are required to develop or support the reporting application.
- Low cost for implementation and maintenance.
- Maintenance will take care by Success Factors.
Dis-advantages of using ORD Reporting:
- Look and feel of reporting will not be as good as other reporting tools.
- Difficult for analysis of reports when executed online.
- Report execution time may be more based on the complex report design.
- Less Speed of report processing.
