Workday Adaptive Planning Review - why 4.5 stars?

Shlomi Lavi / updated: Dec 28, 2022

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What is Workday Adaptive Planning?

Adaptive insights (now Workday Adaptive Planning) is a cloud-based budgeting & CPM software designed for business planning, modeling, budgeting, and forecasting towards making better and faster decisions. The software comes with features such as:

• Workforce Management: Workday Adaptive Planning help end-users plan and analyze their headcount with agility and confidence with effective hiring plans, identifying gaps, and aligning with financial performance and business goals.
• Revenue Management: This feature helps end-users accurately forecast revenue with integrated financial and sales planning, with collaborative revenue forecasts and sales plans that streamline their finance, sales, and service organizations.
• Expense Management: Workday Adaptive Planning help end-users streamline and manage their business and access key cost drivers on demand. End-users can simplify and accelerate expense forecasting, planning, and analytics.
• Capital Management: End-users can facilitate the management of their capital through planning and analysis. They can streamline capital planning and report for the complete life cycle of their assets.

Workday Adaptive Planning is a budgeting & CPM software that started in 2003. The company is headquartered in Palo Alto, California, United States. The company has a workforce of up to 1000 employees. Gartner named the company as a Leader in the 2021 Magic Quadrant for Cloud Core Financial Management Suites.

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Who is it best for?

Workday Adaptive Planning is intended for large enterprises looking for easier ways for preparing cash flow projections, balance sheet forecasting and sales planning. Workday Adaptive Planning has customers in the Business Services & Consulting fields. Examples include Aztec, United Data Technologies, Knowledge Networks, ProKarma and Synovate.

Customers relying on this software in the manufacturing sector are AGCO, Yamaha Motor, Toyota Danmark, The Greenfield Group, Philips Lifeline Systems, Nissan and Bridgestone Industrial Products.

Other sectors that will certainly need this software are banking, insurance, Media & Publishing, Computer Hardware & Networking, mining and nonprofit organizations.

Main features and functionalities

Workday Adaptive Planning was developed to help you achieve world-class performance management. It can be used to help you reduce CPM cycles by automating the data consolidation and integratiing with other systems.

The software can be used to make better decisions based on facts with the use of a centralized application that compares actual data to plan data.

Workday Adaptive Planning can also help a business person improve participation among management team by providing an interactive tool that facilitate data collection and real-time reporting.

What is the actual cost?

Workday Adaptive Planning offers per-seat pricing model starting at 15,000 USD per license for a large range of businesses from small nonprofit or startup to large multinational enterprise.
They also provide a pricing structure for Workday customers that aligns with Workday HCM and Workday Financial Management pricing.

ITQlick pricing score is 8 out of 10 (10 is most expensive). Access ITQlick pricing guide for Workday Adaptive Planning. You can also find here pricing information from Workday Adaptive Planning's website.

Pros

• Adaptive Insights offers features including audit trails, notes, role permissions, and security
• The software is a cloud-based tool that enables end-users to forecast and budget different scenarios
• Adaptive insights customer support is highly responsive to detailed technical questions
• Adaptive Insights improves participation between team members
• Adaptive Insights is accessible through the cloud, allowing flexible access options

Cons

• Steep Learning Curve: One of the biggest disadvantages of Workday Adaptive Planning is the steep learning curve. Users often require extensive training to understand the software features and functionalities. In comparison, some of its competitors offer more user-friendly interfaces and easier-to-use tools.
• Limited Customization: Workday Adaptive Planning may lack customization options that some of its competitors offer. This can limit the software adaptability to specific business needs, which may not be ideal for certain industries or organizations with unique requirements.
• Pricing: Workday Adaptive Planning is known to be one of the more expensive options on the market. This can be a disadvantage for small to medium-sized businesses or those with limited budgets. Other competitors offer more affordable solutions that may better fit their financial constraints.

How it stacks up?

Access a head to head analysis of Workday Adaptive Planning vs alternative software solutions.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Is Workday Adaptive Planning right for you or your business?

Workday Adaptive Planning (formerly Adaptive Insights Business Planning Cloud) provides enterprise planning solutions for companies of all sizes across all industries. Target industries include energy & utilities, Insurance, the Public Sector, Software companies, Healthcare, and Life sciences. Customers seeking to improve their business agility and make profitable decisions will fit into the budgeting and CPM system of Workday Adaptive Planning.

The software offers purpose-built modeling, reporting, and analytics solutions for finance, workforce, sales, and operational planning. Examples of customers using Workday adaptive planning are ChristianaCare, Denny, Goodwill, HubSpot, Microsoft, Steve Madden, etc.