Torchora
Back to Home

Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for HRSS Workday Reporting Analyst

💰 $ - $

Human ResourcesWorkdayReportingHRISAnalytics

🎯 Role Definition

The HRSS Workday Reporting Analyst is an HRIS-focused reporting and analytics specialist who partners with HR Shared Services, HR Centers of Excellence, payroll, and finance to design, build, and maintain Workday reports, dashboards, calculated fields, integrations, and data governance processes. This role translates business requirements into scalable Workday Advanced Reports, Matrix/Composite Reports, Prism/Analytics models, and integration solutions (EIB, Workday Studio, Cloud Connect) while ensuring data accuracy, security, and compliance through thorough testing, reconciliation, and release management. The ideal candidate balances technical Workday expertise with strong stakeholder engagement, documentation discipline, and a continuous improvement mindset.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • HRIS Analyst
  • HR Shared Services Analyst / HR Generalist with Workday exposure
  • Data Analyst or Business Systems Analyst with HR domain experience

Advancement To:

  • Senior Workday Reporting Analyst
  • Lead HRIS/Workday Reporting Specialist
  • HRIS Manager / HR Analytics Manager

Lateral Moves:

  • HR Business Partner (with analytics focus)
  • Payroll Reporting Analyst
  • Compensation & Benefits Reporting Specialist
  • Workforce Analytics or People Analytics Analyst

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  1. Lead analysis, design, development, and maintenance of Workday Advanced Reports, Composite Reports, Matrix Reports, and Delivered Reports to meet HRSS and enterprise reporting requirements, ensuring accuracy, performance, and data security.
  2. Translate complex business requirements from HR Shared Services, HR Operations, and HR Centers of Excellence into detailed report specifications, data models, calculated fields, and report filters within Workday.
  3. Build and maintain Prism Analytics datasets and dashboards to deliver self-service HR dashboards, headcount and turnover analytics, and operational KPI visualizations for HR and business leaders.
  4. Author and optimize calculated fields, custom report fields, and custom report data sources to standardize metrics like FTE, headcount, hire/termination reason codes, and time off balances across the business.
  5. Configure and manage Workday Security Groups, domain and report-level security, and data access policies to ensure appropriate role-based visibility to sensitive HR data.
  6. Design, develop, and support integrations between Workday and downstream systems using EIB, Workday Studio, Cloud Connect, REST APIs, SFTP, and middleware while maintaining robust error handling and monitoring.
  7. Validate and reconcile Workday data against source systems and downstream payroll/financial systems to ensure data integrity during monthly payroll cycles, month-end reporting, and audits.
  8. Create, maintain, and version-control technical and user-facing documentation: report specifications, test plans, runbooks, data dictionaries, and change logs for auditability and continuity.
  9. Partner with HR Shared Services leaders to establish SLAs and operational processes for report requests, prioritization, triage, and ongoing maintenance of ad-hoc and recurring reports.
  10. Serve as primary point of contact for report troubleshooting, incident response, root-cause analysis, and escalation for Workday report issues and data discrepancies.
  11. Execute unit, system, and user acceptance testing (UAT) for new or modified reports, integrations, calculated fields, and Workday tenant changes, coordinating cross-functional test plans and sign-offs.
  12. Maintain a release management cadence for Workday updates: assess impact of biannual Workday updates on reports, identify deprecated fields, test functionality, and implement required changes.
  13. Implement data governance practices for HR reporting—standardize naming conventions, taxonomy, Worktags, and metric definitions to eliminate reporting inconsistencies across teams.
  14. Develop and deliver training, knowledge transfer sessions, and documentation for HRSS team members and business users to enable self-service reporting and reduce dependency on IT.
  15. Monitor performance of high-volume reports and optimize report design (paging, paging size, calculated fields placement) to minimize tenant load and improve run times.
  16. Build scheduled and on-demand report distributions, analytics subscriptions, and automated report delivery mechanisms for HR operations, compliance reporting, and leadership dashboards.
  17. Participate in cross-functional projects such as M&A HR system consolidations, Workday module rollouts (Absence, Time Tracking, Payroll), and global HRIS harmonization efforts to align reporting standards.
  18. Develop and execute data extraction processes for regulatory and compliance reporting (EEO, ACA, payroll reporting) and support external audit requests with accurate data pulls.
  19. Use SQL, Excel (Power Query, PivotTables), and BI tools (Power BI, Tableau) to enrich Workday data, create blended analytics, and deliver deeper workforce insights beyond Workday-native reporting.
  20. Continuously review and recommend process improvements, automation opportunities, and best practices to reduce manual effort, improve data quality, and scale HR reporting capabilities.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory data analysis.
  • Contribute to the organization's data strategy and roadmap.
  • Collaborate with business units to translate data needs into engineering requirements.
  • Participate in sprint planning and agile ceremonies within the data engineering team.
  • Assist with HR data remediation initiatives, clean-up projects, and master data governance activities.
  • Coordinate with IT security and compliance teams to support data access reviews and privacy controls.
  • Mentor junior HRIS/reporting team members and participate in hiring and onboarding activities.
  • Maintain vendor relationships for third-party reporting tools and integration providers.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Workday Report Writer (Delivered/Advanced/Matrix/Composite) — design, development, optimization.
  • Workday Prism Analytics — dataset modeling, data blending, dashboard development.
  • Workday Integrations: EIB, Workday Studio, Cloud Connect, REST API experience for inbound/outbound integrations.
  • Workday Security & Domain Configuration — security groups, domains, role-based access control.
  • Calculated Fields and Business Process Configuration — complex expressions and conditional logic.
  • SQL and relational data modeling — data extracts, joins, transformations for downstream analytics.
  • BI and Visualization Tools — Power BI, Tableau, or equivalent for complementary dashboards and visual analytics.
  • Advanced Excel — PivotTables, Power Query, complex formulas, and macro-aware processes.
  • Data governance and metadata management — data dictionaries, naming conventions, lineage tracking.
  • Scripting / data formats — XML, JSON, XSLT familiarity for integration payloads and transformations.
  • Testing & QA methodologies — UAT coordination, test case creation, regression testing.
  • Version control and change management — release planning and impact assessments for Workday updates.
  • Knowledge of HR modules: HCM, Absence, Time Tracking, Payroll, Benefits, Compensation reporting.
  • ETL / Data Integration concepts and tools — understanding of batch/real-time processing and error handling.

Soft Skills

  • Strong stakeholder management — ability to elicit requirements and influence cross-functional partners.
  • Excellent verbal and written communication — translate technical details into business-friendly explanations.
  • Analytical problem solving — root-cause analysis and corrective action planning for data issues.
  • Detail-oriented with high data accuracy standards and documentation discipline.
  • Prioritization and time management — handle competing ad-hoc and scheduled reporting requests.
  • Collaborative team player — works well with HR operations, IT, finance, and analytics teams.
  • Training and enablement — coach non-technical business users on report usage and interpretation.
  • Adaptability — quickly assimilate Workday tenant changes and evolving business needs.
  • Customer service mindset — provide responsive support to HR Shared Services and business stakeholders.
  • Continuous improvement orientation — seek automation, simplification, and scalability.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor's degree in Human Resources, Management Information Systems, Computer Science, Data Analytics, Business Administration, or a related field; or equivalent professional experience.

Preferred Education:

  • Master's degree or advanced coursework in Data Analytics, HR Analytics, Information Systems, or MBA.
  • Workday certifications (Workday Pro in Reporting, Integrations, or Prism) or equivalent HRIS certifications.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Human Resources Management
  • Management Information Systems (MIS) / Information Technology
  • Data Science / Analytics / Statistics
  • Computer Science
  • Business Administration / Finance

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 3–7 years of progressive experience in HR reporting, HRIS, or data analytics roles with at least 2+ years hands-on Workday report and integration experience.

Preferred: 5+ years of Workday HCM/reporting experience supporting HR Shared Services or enterprise HR functions, demonstrated proficiency in Workday Advanced Reporting, Prism, EIB/Studio, and delivering analytics to HR and business leaders.

Explore More Careers