The FDM – Workday Hierarchies
The Foundation Data Model (FDM) is the Data Model used across Workday Financials and HCM that establishes the foundation for transaction processing and reporting.
The FDM is WashU’s chart of accounts, essentially the accounting structure for a business or organization. It drives how expenditures, income, assets and liabilities are classified.
This framework supports all financial, management, and operational reporting across the university. The structure is composed of data elements called “worktags” and allows for multiple worktags on each transaction for greater reporting capabilities. The FDM makes it easier and faster to understand WashU’s financial health from the university-level to the school- or unit-level.
The FDM provides the ability to answer 4 key questions:
- Who is responsible for the transaction?
- How is the transaction funded?
- What was the money used for?
- Why was the transaction performed?
FDM Hierarchies
FDM components, such as Driver Worktags and Related Worktags, are all part of hierarchy structures.
- A component can sometimes have multiple hierarchies. For example, Grant has 2 hierarchies: a departmental hierarchy and a SPA hierarchy.
- Within each hierarchy, a Grant or Grant Hierarchy can only have one parent. The same is true for all FDM hierarchies.
Key Concept: Hierarchy Levels Vary in Depth
The hierarchies can vary in depth – they are “ragged” – which means that each Grant or Cost Center will not have the same number of levels in its hierarchy.
Here are a couple of examples for Cost Center:
| LEVEL | COST CENTER HIERARCHY |
|---|---|
| 0 | All – All |
| 1 | CH00001 – Washington University Reporting Hierarchy |
| 2 | CH00003 – Danforth Schools |
| 3 | CH00524 – Olin Business School |
| 4 | CH00741 – Olin Business Instructional Programs |
| 5 | CH00865 – Olin Business Graduate Programs |
| 6 | CH00110 – Olin Business – Grad Prog – Online SMP |
| 7 | CH01222 – Olin Business – Grad Prog – Online SMP – Admissions |
| 8 | CH01278 – Olin Business – Grad Prog -Online SMP – Admissions – Operations |
| 9 | CC0005039 – Olin Business – Grad Prog – Online SMP – Admissions – Operations – Technology |
| LEVEL | COST CENTER HIERARCHY |
|---|---|
| 0 | All – All |
| 1 | CH00001 – Washington University Reporting Hierarchy |
| 2 | CH00002 – School of Medicine |
| 3 | CH00423 – School of Medicine Clinical Departments |
| 4 | CH00123 – Orthopedic Surgery |
| 5 | CH00111 – Orthopedic Surgery – General |
| 6 | CC0001377 – Orthopedic Surgery – General – Research |
- The first Olin example uses the maximum of 9 levels of hierarchy. The cost center is at level 9. The Med example only has 6 levels, with cost center at level 6. The number of levels can vary within a school or area as well. The same concept applies to all FDM component hierarchies.
- In order to use the standard hierarchy dimensions for reporting, the report author will need to know which level and which values they are looking for. An example would pulling in Level 3 = ‘CH00423’ to get all med clinical data, then including levels 4, 5, and 6 to see the additional breakdown.
In other words: The hierarchy levels do not have steadfast definitions – for example, the School will not always be on the same level within all hierarchies. (see above tables)
If you do not know the level of the value you’re looking for, you may consider using the Journals: Hierarchy – Any Level Cognos package, which includes a special filter that will allow you to select any level of hierarchy and pull back data for only the selected hierarchy value(s).