Data Integration and Analytics Blog for UKG

Here’s a list of all our UKG Pro related posts. Let us know if you have questions or other topics you’d like to see covered.

UKG Data Integration

• UKG Pro
  • UKG Pro Rest API Example in Postman and PowerShell
  • UKG Pro – Reports as a Service vs Rest API
  • UKG Reports as A Service in Postman
  • UKG Pro – Assigning Platform Configuration Field Values to Business Rules
  • UKG Pro – Importing Simple Business Rule Values
• UKG Pro WFM
  • Kronos – UKG Dimensions API Postman Example
  • Kronos Workforce Central to UKG Dimensions: Does SQL Still Matter?

Data Warehouse – Power BI/Other Tools

• UKG Pro
  • Using Power BI with UKG Pro/UltiPro
  • Power BI and UKG Pro
  • Connecting UKG Pro Employee Job History to your Data Warehouse
  • Connecting UKG Pro to your Data Warehouse – Payroll Detail.

UKG Reporting

• People Analytics – Cognos BI
  • Before you train on UKG People Analytics
  • UKG People Analytics Quick Tip – Cut Your Columns
  • UKG People Analytics Quick Tip  – Parentheses in Formulas
  • UKG Pro People Analytics – Labeling Data Items and Pages
• UKG Pro WFM
  • Data Hub vs People Analytics for UKG (Kronos) Dimensions
  • Figuring out the apply date in UKG Kronos Dimensions Datahub

Companies implement Advanced Scheduler in UKG Pro WFM to control overtime.

But having the system isn’t enough. Payroll told you THAT you had overtime.  Now, you want to know why.  Where to start?

Here are some key metrics we’ve developed  to help you drive overtime down.      

• Worked vs Scheduled:
  You know someone’s schedule.  You know each day how much they worked.
  you schedule Joe for eight hours on Monday. He worked twelve.  There’s a good chance he’ll be receive overtime by the end of the week.
• Early in/late out.
  Yes, employees have grace periods.  But some folks are consistently 14 minutes early and 14 minutes late out.  Do that five days in a row and you have 2.5 hours a week.  That adds up.
• Working but not Scheduled
  Getting folks scheduled is the cornerstone of successful management.  Lots of unscheduled time points to process issues.  The systems not helpful if you have lots of unscheduled time.
• Hours entered without swiping
  Time keeping devices aren’t perfect.  But they are consistent.  When some folks are consistently worse at swiping in than others, you have a problem.
• Short Staffing
  It’s sad when folks try to cut overtime when they’re short staffed.  Position control, applicant tracking and open shifts in Advanced scheduler identify this problem.  And if you have it, advanced scheduler can help, but it won’t solve your underlying problem.

These are just some things our clients have found useful.  What have you used to get your overtime down?

In California if a person doesn’t take a break after five hours, they receive extra pay. Unless they attest that it was their choice to skip the meal. A similar rule applies for rest breaks.

UKG has standard functionality to handle this but it’s not straightforward. Our client had an added challenge. Some of their employees use a different system to enter time and attestations. that data needed to be interfaced.

I thought about writing up the entire process in detail. But it’s just too much for a blog post. Here are some key lessons learned:

1. There are many ways to create the pay code edit for the penalty. You can use:
   1. A bonus rule attached to a work rule attached to the pay rule for the employee.
   2. An Attestation workflow
   3. A Boomi Extension.
      Choose one so you don’t get more entries than you expect.
2. If the meal break pay code is created automatically, you may want to cancel it. You can do this:
   1. With an Attestation workflow. The pay code edit will show as cancelled in the timecard. Users may be confused.
   2. With an API to delete the pay code edit.
3. Just because the process works on the screen, DOESN’T mean it will work when called via the API.
   We had an issue where the attestation button created a pay code when the button was used from the tile on the user’s home page.
   It didn’t work when the same button was “punched” via API. Support provided additional code to resolve the issue.

You can’t understand an API unless you understand the system. If you want help bridging the API/Application gap, contact us.

You’re here because you want to use Power BI with UKG Pro Data.

You’re not the only one. Here’s a solution that might interest you.

The solution comes with all the code you need to run reports in UKG People Analytics and have the data show up in Power BI. The Power BI model has measure based on payroll amounts and hours. We’ll be adding head count statistics shortly. All the basics are included – like Job and org Level information.

So, let’s point out a few key things for business users and technical folks:

Our last post discussed payroll history challenges and your data warehouse.

Today, you’ll learn about challenges involving Employee Job History

You know that it’s not enough to know what your job counts and job titles are today. You need to know what they were last month, last quarter, and last year.

You want your UKG Pro data in your Data Warehouse. We’ve touched on why we -recommend reports as a service here. You’ll never pull all your UKG data into your data warehouse. It’s too large and too much of it is only important for HR, Benefits and other compliance purposes.

So, what should you put in your data warehouse?

Why We Use Reports as a Service over Rest APIs with UKG Pro

You need to decide how to get your data from UKG Pro. We recommend Reports as a Service (RAAS) even as we also support Rest APIs. Here’s the data.

1. It provides the most data
   We’ve found all the data we need in People Analytics. While the API list is long, it’s not FULLY comprehensive. For example, the Employee Pay Statement shows everything the employee sees on their check. It doesn’t show Org Level Job allocations. If you do a lot of payroll analysis, this doesn’t work. If you’re like all my customers, you have at least SOME people that work in multiple departments and even in multiple jobs. If someone has found an API that provides this detail, please, please, please let me know I’m wrong.
2. RAAS leverages user knowledge.
   There are plenty of folks who know how to use people Analytics. We want to leverage that knowledge. Consulting time is expensive. You should pay for what you need, not for what you can already do. Of course, if you don’t have People Analytics expertise, we are happy to help
3. RAAS is one thing to learn.
   There are lots of APIs. And they all work. But they all work differently. Which means every new piece of data means something new to learn. We’ve learned most of them. But it wasn’t fun.

UKG Pro Rest APIs have their place. If you want to build your own user application, APIs can be the way to go. But for analytics, we think RAAS is the way to go.

Two other options before we leave.

UKG Pro also supports Informatica. Informatica is a complex tool and resources are expensive and not easy to come by. We prefer widely known tools like PowerShell. When you choose an approach, you want to make sure that you’re not dependent on a particular resource.

If you already have a cloud data warehouse like Snowflake or RedShift, you have another option to consider. Portable.io has created a pipeline to take data from UKG Pro directly into several cloud data warehouse like Snowflake and RedShift based on the APIs. We’ve been working with Snowflake for other purposes and as we learn more, we’ll be sure to post.

What have you been using to get your data from UKG Pro?

You want to understand how to run People Analytics Reports as A service (RAAS). If you just want the sample Postman code, you can request that here. Please note that the last step of the process requires a few lines of PowerShell outside of Postman. For your reference, here’s the UKG documentation.

If you work with HR data, you want it be useful for the business. And so, if you’re like me, you keep up on the latest in People analytics. Here’s a worthwhile article from SHRM reassuring you that lots of folks aren’t where they want to be in People Analytics.

There are many UKG Pro/UltiPro/Kronos/Dimensions consultants out there. And if you’re searching for help, all the websites may have started to merge together.

Everyone has years of experience, focuses on their client and delivers great results.

Why would you choose us?