The "flexible strategy model" allows you to customize the framework and the entities, and we just want to give you much more flexibility. What is flexibility without letting you to customize the way you want to strategize, so that there's more relevancy to what you're trying to achieve.
While we've provided you with a list of fields that're most common, we've now enabled "personalization" of your workspace where you can configure your own custom fields like Budget Spent, Budget Allocated, Hours worked, Weightage, Priority, MoSCoW, RACI, Project code, etc. Custom fields allow you to capture, track, and manipulate specific data points (qualitative or quantitative) of interest to your strategy and organization. These custom fields exist on templates, which are used to group one or more custom fields together. These templates can then be applied to your plans, thereby providing you with more scalability. In short, you'll need to
- Configure custom fields and save them as templates
- Apply these templates to the plans (Apply Templates with Custom Fields to Plans)
- Populate data against these custom fields to track, and build insights from Reports (Populate Data against Custom Fields)
Why should you use custom fields?
While it's not mandatory that you define custom fields, configuring these provides:
- Flexibility - track qualitative or quantitative data that is relevant and is of interest to your organization, alongside the objectives, measures, and actions on your strategic plan.
- Scalability - once configured, these custom fields and templates can be re-used across multiple plans.
- Unlock strategic insights - the data points captured in these custom fields can then be visualized and reported on to assess performance (for example, funding allocations, operating cash flows, etc.) of your strategy and help in decision-making.
How to configure custom fields?
From the profile picture/initials, click Admin > Settings > Custom Fields tab. Click Create New Template - this is essentially a set of one or more custom fields that are organized into groups specific to each entity. You can search and view the list of any existing templates that are created.
- Give a name to your template. Replace Untitled with the template name by entering into the text box. Remember that this needs to be unique as two templates cannot have the same name. Let's call it "Strategic Initiatives" in this example.
- Now, select an entity (Objective, Measure, Project or Action) for which you need to add the custom field, and click Add Group. This reveals the group configuration section as this'll be used to organize the related custom fields together.
- Click into the New Group text, and enter the name of the group. Let's name it "Effort" in this example. In the relevant entity's sidebar, you'll see only the group ("Effort" in this example) displayed and all the fields added to it will be seen only on expanding the group. Click the trash icon to delete a group.
- Click into the New Group text, and enter the name of the group. Let's name it "Effort" in this example. In the relevant entity's sidebar, you'll see only the group ("Effort" in this example) displayed and all the fields added to it will be seen only on expanding the group. Click the trash icon to delete a group.
- Click Add Field to proceed. Let's now get into the field configuration options for this "Effort" group by defining the Field Type (numerical, drop-down or Endorsements as these're the only options supported at this point of time) and Label (field name). The other fields are disabled until these values are defined.
- Choose Numerical or Text or Dropdown or Endorsement from the Field type list, and give it a name.
"Endorsement" field type can be added only for Objectives.
- Enter the name of the field in the Label dropdown and click <Field name> - New numerical or text or dropdown or endorsement field to add a new field.
- The remaining configuration fields are optional and can also be defined later. As and when you fill in the details, you can see a preview of it.
If you choose Numerical field type (see Custom Fields: Numerical Values for more information),- Minimum value - lowest possible value for the field
- Maximum value - highest possible value for the field
- Default value - Prefill the field with a specified value
- Unit - In case of numerical data, specify the unit of measurement. If you do not find the unit of your choice, enter the text, and it'll prompt you to add it as a new option. Click on that and get that added to the list.
- Decimal Places - Choose the number of decimal digits that you want the field to display - defines the level of precision for displaying the populated fields.
- Required - Select this check-box to make this field mandatory, otherwise it'll be optional.
- Character limit - Enter a number to limit the amount to characters that can be used in when filling in the field.
- Default value - If needed, prefill the field with a specified option.
- Required - Select this check-box to make this field mandatory, otherwise it'll be optional.
If you choose Dropdown field type (see Custom Fields: Dropdown Lists for more information),
- Options - enter the values or options that you want the dropdown to list
- Default value - Prefill the field with a specified option
- Allow multi-select - this option on selection will allow you to choose multiple dropdown values against the field.
If you choose Endorsement field type (see Custom Fields: Endorsements for more information),
- Endorsement type - choose whether the change or update requires endorsements or just a review
- Endorsement for - choose what change needs the endorsement. At this point, endorsement is supported only for progress change in objectives.
Each field is auto-saved once populated. Click Add Field to add additional custom fields within the same group, or Add Group to create a new group of custom fields. While you can drag and drop the fields to reorder them within the group or move between groups, you can also drag and drop the groups in any order so that they appear the way you want them in the Sidebar.
Add or edit existing custom fields
Now, if there're some fields that're already configured in your workspace, then entering a label name will return a list of existing fields with the same name. These will be grouped alphabetically, and the configuration for each field name (minimum value, maximum value, default value, unit, mandatory/optional) will be listed below the field name.
Selecting one of the existing field names from the drop-down list will automatically populate the remaining configuration fields with the corresponding values. To modify any of the values, click Edit values. But remember that once you edit this value, it'll be changed in all the templates that its a part of. For example, if you already have a group "Budget" with its unit specified as "$", and now you need to have it configured in "AUD" too, then its advisable to create a new field rather than editing it so that it'll not affect the entities that use the "Budget" group in $.
Repeat the above steps for any other entities (Measures, Actions or Projects) that require custom field data to be tracked. Once done, click Save Template on the top of the left pane. When you click save here, it'll ask you a confirmation to delete any groups that're empty, i.e., if you created a group and did not add any fields, then the modal prompts you with how to handle this.
How to apply these templates to plans?
If you've different custom fields created in different templates but want all those to be applied to a single plan, then create all those relevant custom fields in one template and then select that template to the relevant plan.
- Go to the Plans and teams page, and select the plan that you wish to assign this template.
- Click the three dots against the "plan name", and select Plan settings.
- Choose the template from the dropdown list in the Custom field template.
See more details in Apply Templates with Custom Fields to Plans article.
How to populate data in these custom fields?
The custom fields applied to a plan will be available in the sidebar view of that relevant objective/measure/action/project. You can then enter data against them from the relevant Edit sidebar option.
Look at Populate Data against Custom Fields article for more details.
Can I get reports with this data?
Yes. The data populated against the custom fields in a plan can be pulled in the table column of your reports.
- Choose an Objectives table in a report, and select a time range.
- Click Edit table settings, and click Table columns.
- Click the Other fields tab - this'll display the custom fields created in your workspace.
- Choose the relevant custom fields, and close the settings. You'll see the values against the configured custom fields.
In the above screenshot, you can see "Department" values against objectives, "MoSCoW" values against projects, "Effort Allocated and Spent" values only against measures. This is because data against the selected custom fields will only appear across the entities to which it was configured for. The custom field for measure will show up empty for objectives, actions and projects.
You can also filter the objective's table by the custom fields added to it. See "Objectives table" for reporting on Objectives for details on custom field table columns and custom field filters.
What happens once the free trial is over?
The custom fields that you created during the free trial period will continue to show up, but you'll not be able to edit them. However, you can continue to add or remove them from plans, and populate data against those fields.
Even if you're an Admin, once the free trial is over, you'll not be able to create new templates or edit the existing ones.
FAQs
Who can create custom fields?
Only Admin role users can create or edit custom fields.
Can we apply multiple custom field templates to a plan?
No. You can apply only one custom field to a plan. However, the same custom field template can be applied to multiple plans.
I've already created custom fields for projects. I need to have the same for objectives as well.
You need to just manually create the "group". While creating "fields", the list will be auto-populated with the ones that're already created in the workspace, and you can choose the same custom fields that you created for the project for objective as well. See How to add existing custom fields for details.
Can I apply the custom fields only for certain entities in a plan?
No. Once applied, the custom fields in that template will be available to all the relevant entities for which the custom fields are added. For example, if the template has custom fields defined only for objectives, then this field will be available for all the objectives in that plan and you cannot restrict it to certain objectives in that plan. This'll be applicable to the nested objectives but not the shared or contributing objectives in that plan.
How do I get insights on the custom fields?
You can create a Discover widget and choose the custom fields as table columns and filter the data based on the custom fields to see what you wish.
Or, You can pull up an Objectives table in report and choose Other fields to select the custom fields that you want as table columns. Also, select custom fields and apply filters to see those entities (mainly objectives) matching with that criteria.
See Report with custom fields for details.
There's an existing custom field "Budget" with AUD as unit, but I want the same field with $. Should I edit the Budget field or create a new one?
Please check if the Budget field with AUD unit is applied to any plan and is being used for. If its no used, then you can choose this field, click Edit values, and change the unit to $ and save it. But remember that once you edit this value, it'll be changed in all the templates that its a part of.
However, our best practice recommendation to you is - create a new custom field "Budget in $" and have the unit type as $ instead of changing the existing one in AUD.