The FDM is the backbone of Workday’s Finance (FIN), Research (RES), Human Capital Management (HCM), and Payroll system. The FDM serves as a multidimensional framework for organizing financial and people operations data, replacing the legacy PeopleSoft Chart of Accounts. It is helpful to view Workday as a new house, and the FDM serves as the foundation for the framework of the house.
The FDM establishes the foundation for all Workday transaction processing and reporting. Examples of key FDM data elements include:
Please note, some of the examples above are cross functional. Watch for more details about each of these elements in the weeks ahead.
A Worktag is an FDM dimension that allows users to tag transactions with a label. Worktags assist in defining the purpose of a transaction. Worktags make transactions easier to find, help clearly label the business purpose of a transaction, and facilitate reporting and data summarization.
In the current myUFL system (PeopleSoft), ChartFields serve a similar purpose to Worktags in Workday, classifying and organizing transactions. Both systems use these elements to ensure detailed reporting and accurate data management.
Reporting in Workday will bring several enhancements and changes to the current reporting process. Workday’s reporting capabilities are designed to be more intuitive, flexible, and user-friendly, providing a more streamlined and efficient experience for users. Workday’s reporting capabilities include real-time data access, self-service options, and standardized templates.
Throughout the implementation, our team will prioritize data formatting consistency and will ensure all reporting data are uniform. As part of FDM governance, we will establish and maintain FDM dimension standards for Workday to ensure data consistency and accuracy. These standards will cover naming conventions, permissible characters, character lengths, sight logic, and more.
All FDM dimensions will have a defined list of associated values. When inputting these dimensions onto transactions, end–users can select the value by searching using a Workday ID or name, or by selecting from a picklist of values for that dimension. Only one value can be selected per dimension type when inputting dimensions onto transactions. Depending on the transaction type, certain dimensions and values will be permitted and/or required. As part of FDM governance, the Empowering UF team will define naming conventions and standardization rules to ensure the input of FDM values is straightforward for end users.
Through Design sessions to be held in the spring of 2025, new job profiles may emerge with various needs, such as unique positions throughout the university. All finalized Workday job profiles will be communicated once the Design phase is completed.
An academic appointment tracks a worker’s academic career and is associated with an Academic Unit (Workday’s terminology for an academic department). Appointments do not track pay or compensation, rather the worker’s academic track, rank, title, start, end, and review dates, and tenure status, if applicable. The appointment can be associated with a worker or a position.
Employees will be able to click on their profile to see their position, supervisory organization, reporting structure, and academic appointments. This will help track tenure, academic appointments, and changes to position and salary in one place.
Visibility into tracking academic appointments and changes in Workday will be determined by security configuration established during the implementation. This will be designed to ensure that only authorized personnel have access to relevant data.
In most instances, no. The single data source of the FDM should meet most of your data needs, given the FDM is the “core” of Workday financials. All transactional information in Workday is centralized for streamlined access, simplified reconciliation, and reporting. However, it may depend on your specific data need. There may still be special instances in which external systems are used for processing outside of Workday. These integration points, system remediations, and processes for interacting with other systems will be further defined during the implementation. During the project, the project workgroups will define and backlog the historical data that will be available outside of Workday upon go-live in 2027.
With Workday, we will be able to create cross-functional business processes as opposed to the current starts and stops as transactions switch hands between Finance and HR. With the new integrated platform in one system, UF will have access to real-time reliable data. Additionally, Workday reporting will provide simplified visibility into performance and better cohesion of data, allowing for better transparency and easier reconciliation of budget and payroll data.
Yes, the Student Information System (SIS) will remain in PeopleSoft. All student processes will continue to be initiated and maintained within PeopleSoft, with data from the student system integrated into Workday.
Our Organizational Change Management (OCM) Team is developing resources, including, but not limited to, the following: a robust Workday training program, a Workday glossary, brief Workday videos on key topics, a printable project summary, FAQs, and key talking points.
To provide feedback or ask questions of the Empowering UF team, please email empowering@ufl.edu.