Defining your Report precisely to ride the Analytic Wave in IDEA

Hi,

Erasmus quotes "In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king."

One of the most interesting challenges in data analytics is the process of defining your report sought to be gleaned from IDEA.

Precise report definition is the sine qua non to use analytics.

As an example there is a common tendency to define a report as 'Identify rate variances in procurement'.

While there is nothing wrong in the definition it lacks articulation for application of the right function in IDEA.

Consider the same report repositioned as 'Identify the same material bought at the same location on the same date for the same currency having different unit prices - exclude unapproved and deleted purchase orders'

Now this statement allows the user to quite easily convert the detailed report definition into its equivalent function in IDEA i.e. Duplicate Key Exclusion where you would match Material, Plant, Currency, Date and choose Unit Price as the field that must be different along with a criteria to capture approved and active orders only.

Notice how a clear and crisp report definition allows the user to intuitively tick off the right fields in the Duplicate Key Exclusion dialog box making the process of IDEA skill set adoption a breeze.

So the next time anyone cites difficulty in application of IDEA feature/s to the IDEA report/s ask them if they have defined their report clearly.

While defining the report do keep in mind that it should follow a narrative as if you were explaining its intention to a simpleton.

Kind Regards

Jairam