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Requirement

What-if scenarios can be shared with a subset of users with specific data excluded

Functional Area

Collaboration

Industries
All
Tags
Security
Sharing
DETAILS

Description

What-if scenarios can sometimes contain plans for the organization that can be bad for morale if leaked. This requirement enables specific users to access, review, and analyze hypothetical scenarios without exposing them to sensitive data that they do not need or should not see.

Example Use Case

Scenario: The executive team uses its planning software to develop what-if scenarios related to the company's financial performance. They have a scenario with a 25% reduction in force. They require certain inputs from the sales team to determine if the RIF is necessary but are afraid of the scenario leaking to the staff.

Solution: The planning software allows for the creation and sharing of what-if scenarios with the sales managers, excluding workforce data and associated drivers. Sales managers can interact with these scenarios by adding in sales forecast data without seeing the associated drivers that shift workforce needs for the positive or negative.

Considerations

What-if scenarios can be viewed positively or negatively depending on the viewer. Most products allow some sort of security on specific scenarios or versions, but that security might not be granular enough. For example, if you need to restrict access to a potential downturn in unit sales, but can only restrict users from the workforce model, the functionality is not valuable. You'll end up back in Excel for that scenario.

Make sure that the tool can get very granular with what components are exposed to the user, and which users can access the version. This may be down to specific people or groups of users, like the sales team in the example above.

Questions to Ask a Vendor

  • Data Exclusion: How granular can we get when sharing a scenario? Can we restrict groups or individuals? What about specific parts of the plan?
  • Show Me: Can you login as a restricted user and show us their view?
  • Scenario Copies: If we copy the scenario, will all the security restrictions be carried over with it?