One question I get asked most often as an AMS Manager is, “What best practices do you recommend for a newly implemented Workday tenant?”
My number one answer? Don’t touch it. Don’t touch anything. For now, take those fingers off the keys and just breathe.
I say this entirely in jest, but there is some validity to my point. Right after a system like Workday goes live, you realize there are no more dress rehearsals. The lights go down, the curtain goes up, and you are LIVE in that tenant, staring your audience—your users—in the face.
That abrupt shift into production can cause angst, and because Workday is so configurable, you may feel the urge to change something simply because you can. After all, SaaS solutions are incredibly empowering. They take the changes that used to go to IT or to consultants and put them at the very fingertips of the people running the business processes.
But don’t do it. Just breathe. Instead of turning your tenant into a version of the Wild West, where’s there’s no consistency, let your users learn the system and how it fits into their day-to-day activities.
You don’t have to lock things down completely, but at the same time, how often do you just get into the car and start driving towards a destination hoping you eventually run into it?
To keep your Workday tenant on course, the smartest thing is to put some guardrails in place. This can mean something as simple as a review committee of key stakeholders, or a roadmap for all Workday efforts for the next 12 to 18 months to orchestrate and guide your Workday support efforts.
But the best plan as you navigate from implementation to live support is consistency through careful collaboration. Carry forward some of the ownership and the processes you created for review during implementation to ensure that your creation keeps moving forward, not backwards—or worse yet, into the Wild West.
