To increase the accessibility and searchability of Workday instructional information, all public-facing finance and planning job aids have been added to a new finance and planning portal managed through the ServiceNow platform. The portal is the last of three that has converted job aids to the new format, joining IT services (April) and human resources (August). Users can consistently use ServiceNow for all Workday-related instructional information.
"Users can browse for knowledge by category or simply do a search for what they need," said Rachael Gross, finance delivery operations manager. "For example, if they know they need some guidance on completing an expense report, they would search 'expense report,' and up pops all the knowledge base articles related to expense reports."
Self-service
ServiceNow knowledge base portals
The knowledge base articles provide a repository of information to help users troubleshoot and resolve common questions. Gross said the growing collection is a mix of frequently asked questions, how-to's and standards. Articles will replace the job aids available in CyBox and on the WorkCyte resources page with a modern and maintainable solution.
"Our initial focus is to enhance our self-service capabilities," she said. "We'll continuously add and update knowledge base information, including the documents finance delivery teams use to help faculty and staff across campus. This is the first step in building user tools."
Next steps will include adding information on requests such as getting reimbursed for employee travel, correcting a transaction account, making a cash sale or billing another department. Gross said the finance and planning portal will become the one-stop solution for initiating finance delivery help.
Why the change?
By migrating the knowledge to a portal within ServiceNow, finance delivery team members will be able to access and share helpful knowledge within the system from which they are receiving service requests. The portal search feature allows users to search the content of articles, not just titles, as is the case with the CyBox system. Additionally, articles added to a ServiceNow portal are more digitally accessible thanPDF versions.
If users have questions that aren't addressed in the available knowledge in the portal, Gross recommends they contact a finance service delivery team member assigned to their tree.
"Users can create a ticket right there in the finance and planning portal, submit the question by email (finance_delivery@iastate.edu) or contact their finance delivery team member by locating them in the finance service delivery directory," she said.
Update your site's links
Departments whose websites contain links to job aids, such as those relating to accounting, grants, expenses and procurement, are encouraged to relink to corresponding articles on the finance and planning portal using the available permalink. This will ensure readers always are directed to the current version of the article.
