Supporting reports & dashboards

[BethanyMcCool]

As your companies have matured in supporting ServiceNow, how have you supported the insights portion of the platform (reporting, dashboards, performance analytics)?

We initially took the stance of providing information to our users, but leaving it in their hands to create the reports & dashboards relevant to them. However, we've hit a few snags in this model:

1. Users don't fully understand the data model or how to access the data they need.

2. Users don't have the time to spend on creating these reports/dashboards.

3. Users don't have access to the performance analytics.

4. Providing the proper roles/permissions for users to see necessary reports and dashboards has been a struggle.

We're interesting in hearing how other larger companies are supporting this capability. Have you tried the same approach? If so, how have you made it a success? Or, do you have a team devoted to creating reports, dashboards, and new KPIs for areas across the business? 

[Bill Claman]

our team builds any of that if it was included as part of the project AND we are the ones who are the primary builders of the app.  But we also have a Citizen Developer program for any of the more technical business users and we let them work on those with our review before anything is moved into production. The Citizen Developer program requires they understand the basics of SN app engine development and then they must complete our internal 10-12 week course of how to do development in our environment including dashboards, etc.

So far the program does not have a lot of repeat builders but most of what they are trying to do is low-dollar savings and does not hit the minimum threshold for our group to do it anyway.

[Dave Carlin]

For reports, it would be beneficial for SNOW to list all tables delivered with the base product, with metadata provided to explain the table entries, and identify the key fields that connect related tables.

For dashboards, we have started building our reports using the Filter "User is (dynamic) me", or "Manager is (dynamic) me", so that once they go to their dashboard, they only see information relevant to them or their teams.

For Analytics, we would benefit from a listing of all tables that could be used, once analytics are turned on.  Similarly, a listing of metadata of the fields available in each table would be beneficial as well.  Additionally, some samples of reports generated with analytics would be helpful to get our arms around how these analytics could be leveraged.

Thanks, Dave