When to use Workday® Studio

At one point or another, every Workday® organization is going to need to integrate external data into or out of their system. Whether this be for payroll, benefits, or something else vital to business, it will need to be done. Workday knows this, which is why it offers a number of ways to help you integrate data with your system. 

In this post we are going to look at what options there are when it comes to integrating with Workday, as well as why you might need some Workday Studio integration help.

Three Major Types of Workday Integrations

When it comes to the Workday Integration Cloud, there are really three types of integration solutions you may encounter:  

1. Cloud Connect 

2. Enterprise Information Builder (EIB) 

3. Workday Studio 

All three have advantages as well as limitations, selecting one really depends on your specific needs.  Cloud Connect is a great choice if you use a third-party vendor for which Workday already has a solution available. If all you really need is to export or import data into or out of Workday, EIB is the solution for you. When it comes to anything more complicated this is when Workday Studio comes into play.

When to Use Workday Studio

Workday Studio is an ideal solution for more complicated integrations, like when you need to do the following:

• Add custom Java, Spring, or 3rd-party service capabilities

• Create rules for what the system should do to handle error conditions gracefully

• Deal with very large data sets (up to 10s of GBs)

• Execute several rules and reports to get your data

• Include complex looping or branching logic based on dynamic data or external variables

Composed of plugins to the Eclipse IDE, Workday Studio provides users with a graphical environment that allows them to drag and drop reusable components into a flow. Even better, integrations built through Workday Studio are not limited to just one data source, transformation, or destination. 

If you know what you are doing, you can use Studio to create sophisticated integrations that take multiple reports and Workday Web Services into account, as well as multiple transformations, and deliver results to several separate destinations. Someone skilled in the application can configure, launch, monitor, and audit even advanced integrations with ease.

How to Determine if you Need Help

Experience Counts If your team does not have experience successfully handling integrations (or even an integration) with a wide variety of payroll systems, benefits providers, and more, they may not be ready for a this task. You are better off recognizing this and finding a partner or someone who knows what they are doing at least the first time or two around.

Maxed out Bandwidth Expertise aside, Workday Studio integrations take time and effort to setup correctly. Time and effort your core team may not have to spare on top of their day-to-day. Using a consultant to set up your integration will not only make sure it is done correctly but doing so will prevent you from exhausting internal resources.

Minimize Risk If you are integrating sensitive information with your Workday HCM, half measures will not cut it. If you plan on integrating your security badge system for authorized entry of only active employees, your tax filings, your new amber-alert security system, your parking access, your sub-ledger feeds for accurate financials, or anything along those lines, a highly trained consultant will ensure everything is setup safely and securely.

At Makse Group we aim to empower businesses with the tools they need to support their Workday environment. We focus on providing our clients with solutions that increase productivity, maximize efficiency, and enable timely business decisions. If you would like to learn more please don’t hesitate to contact us.