Workday Human Capital Management and Financial Management modules positively impact businesses by centralizing disparate data sources for reporting. Human Resources, Transaction Line Items, Demographic Data, and many others all under one roof are powerful. Manipulating the data for analysis, however, requires export to a tool like Excel. Integrating Workday with other enterprise technologies, such as Alteryx, is essential to creating the most robust analytics. Workday houses large quantities of data, while Alteryx manipulates the data, cleans it, and prepares it for analysis; connecting the two creates one linked ecosystem. 

Connecting Workday and Alteryx directly comes in three forms: 

1. Connect to web-enabled report URL through Alteryx

Reports built in Workday can be configured as web-enabled, meaning it can be accessed outside of the Workday tenant in different forms. Alteryx connects efficiently to XML and JSON, both of which are output format options, so either language can be configured for the report, queried into Alteryx, and then parsed into tabular form. 

The web-enabled URL operates most effectively with Alteryx when connecting to more static reports, such as Headcount reports. The number of columns is consistent, but the row count will vary. Limitations are reached when connecting to objects like highly dimensional financial reports. 

2. API Connectivity

• • XML REST API 
  • SOAP API 

API Connectivity with Workday applies more robust querying mechanisms, which can handle more dimensionality. The two types of API connections, REST and SOAP, apply different querying approaches. The REST API is a heavier-duty connection design than the web-enabled report URL, but a lighter-duty connection design than the SOAP API. REST APIs require each query to be built individually, whereas SOAP APIs have the architecture to chain together queries. 

Both API connections allow Alteryx to pass parameters to Workday to query data, like someone building a report within their Workday tenant. When choosing between REST and SOAP, it’s important to weigh the number of parameters being passed through to create the report. The higher number, the more REST queries required, indicating a potential shift to SOAP. 

3. ODBC Connector

The last option is to connect to the rawest data in the form of Workday tables. Rather than querying a report into Alteryx, an ODBC connector allows for direct connection to data tables for query. Once in Alteryx, the report logic or any analysis can be built and replicated. These connectors are developed by third-party companies and utilize the SOAP API architecture but at an extremely stable level. When configured inside of Alteryx, an ODBC connector allows the end user to connect via SQL-like interface and choose whatever metadata. 

Do you have questions about integrating your systems? Capitalize can help! Email info@capitalizeconsulting.com to connect with our team.