WIGO - business intelligence reporting

Introduction

When using any software as intricate as ERP, easy-to-use reporting tools are key for making information available and ready to use at any time.  Paragon has several features that allow you to extract important information from your data.  WIGO is the next level of BI reporting.  Paragon offers this versatile tool for a variety of report options - mainly focusing on detailed reports for your transactions.  

Where to find WIGO reports

To access most report options in Paragon, head over to the reports menu from the more button.

The reports menu includes a list of all available reports in Paragon.   As with any report, you can navigate to it by either clicking on the report title on the sidebar or by selecting a report title from the cards shown on the main reports menu page.

Once a report is selected, the default layout for that report will be displayed.  This layout will include any basic information corresponding to the data module you selected.  The best part about this feature is that, since it uses the flexible and configurable grid features we love - as seen with the add item and select company modals, and with the transaction grid - you can configure each report to your liking and then save your version of the report for later use.

Filtering WIGO reports

If you happen to have extensive data in your build, it can affect the amount of time it takes to load your reports. When this happens, a modal will pop up allowing you to filter your reports, limiting the amount of data that is displayed.

You can filter your WIGO reports by date, status, and/or attributes depending on the report type, which are: reference reports, transaction reports, or combo reports. You can also click I'm okay waiting to load your full data.

If your chosen filters still take too long to load, the filter modal will appear again allowing you to condense your choices or click to wait. Any filters you attempted to apply will still apply after clicking I'm okay waiting.

If you made changes to the filters and clicked to wait before applying the new filter, they will not be applied to your search. Navigating away from the report will also remove your chosen filters

Reload

If you would like to add attributes to your report that don't already have their data loaded, you can quickly reload your report and update the selected attributes using the green reload button in the top right corner. This can help with the performance of the WIGO feature since the report will only reload the list of selected attributes, rather than all attributes. 

First, you expand the Columns menu on the right-hand side. From there, you can select the attribute(s) you want to add to your report using each attribute's corresponding checkbox.

In this example, we've chosen to add the attribute Quantity. You can see that the data for that attribute is not loaded into the report because the column is blank.

Once done selecting the attribute(s) you want to add to your report, you can click on the reload button in the top right.

From there, the same modal as earlier will appear. Simply click on the I'm Okay Waiting button, and your report should reload, including the data for the newly selected attribute(s).

Your previously selected layout will still be respected after the reload.

If you navigate away from the report and then back, your selected filters should still be respected.

Transaction reports

These include all detail and summary reports for each of the corresponding transaction modules, such as order, invoice, and vendor credit. These reports can be filtered by date and status.

Please note that if you create a transaction without lines, you may notice a discrepancy between the summary and the detail transaction reports.

For instance, if you create a credit without lines, the transaction won't show up in the credit detail report because the detail report is based off of the credit lines. However it will be displayed in the summary credit report. 

Reference reports 

These include each listing report (Customer, Vendor, Partner) along with the Inventory Available report and can be filtered by company status along with any attributes you have set up for these modules.

Combo reports

These are reports that can be filtered by date, status, or attributes and will include your history reports (customer, inventory, etc.) as well as GL Balances and Product Profitability 

Inventory by Location report will not have a date filter and the GL Balances report will display fiscal years and periods instead of dates.

Configuring WIGO reports

As with most grid features in Paragon, you have full control over what information is displayed and how it is filtered/sorted, as well as how the data is to be grouped and totaled.

Selecting a report

When you have selected a report you wish to look at, you will be informed that your report is loading

Default layouts 

We have analyzed various requirements from several sources and have compiled the most common report layout designs.  When you first access any WIGO report in Paragon, our default or standard layout for that report is displayed.  This layout can be changed in many ways, but don't worry, you can always revert to the default if you aren't happy with any changes you have made.

Default credit report:

This default layout will include one line for each transaction in the module which can be expanded to show detail lines as well.  In our examples, we have shown the credit module.

Transaction sources in WIGO

WIGO summary and history reports include source type and source ID columns, which will show you which transaction was used to create each transaction in the report. For example, if an invoice was created from a shipment using the create this from that modal, the source type would be Ship and the source ID would be the ID of the original shipment. This also makes it easy to filter your reports to see all the transactions that originated from the same source during your workflow.

Adding and removing columns

WIGO reports allow you to decide which pieces of information are most important.  Any attribute that is configured for the module you selected will be available in the column selector on the right side of any report.  Select an attribute to be added to the report by putting a checkmark next to that attribute.

Of course, to remove any column, just remove the checkmark in the column selector.

You can also add columns to the report by dragging and dropping them from the column selector to the report.  To do that, click and hold on the box of dots next to the attribute in the column selector.

Expanding multi-attribute columns

Most default WIGO reports will have at least a few default columns that can include values from multiple attribute entries - such as discounts or taxes.  Upon first opening the report, those attributes are collapsed into one line. You can expand those columns to show you all the values associated with that transaction record by clicking the arrow next to the column title.  Our example shows this feature with the discounts column.

Moving columns

Changing the location of any column on the report is just a drag and drop feature as well.

Grouping

Any great dynamic reporting tool should allow you to decide how the report is grouped.  You can change the grouped attributes at any time by dragging an attribute to the row groups section of the column selector.

Value aggregation

The default reports give you a subtotal by transaction record - so there is one line per credit in our examples.  Since each transaction may include multiple lines, that subtotal has to reflect summary values for the columns being displayed (like discounts, other charges, and taxes, for example).   

You can change that aggregation setting by clicking the hamburger in the column title and selecting the value aggregation option.

User record information

When you are looking deeper into your reports, you also have the option to view the user record information, which can be filtered by 4 columns; Created On, Created By, Modified On and Modified By. This will help you keep track of any changes made to your reports and navigate through their creation history. 

Associations in WIGO

When you create associations between your references, such as products and customers, you can view these connections from your WIGO reports. On every detail transaction report there are 5 association columns. When an item has an association with a company (or vise versa) that are both on a transaction line, it will show up in one of those columns.  This will help keep track of the associations you have between your references, such as inventory value or discounts for particular customers.

First, you will need to make sure that you have associations created for the necessary references. If you need help setting these up, don't forget to read our article on Associating items to customers and vendors.

Once your associations have been created, you will need to create a transaction with these associations; for example, an order for the customer with the products you associated.

In your reports, navigate to the corresponding WIGO report (in this case Order Detail) and tick up to 5 associations from the columns tab. 

Custom BOM on transaction detail reports

In Paragon, there are two types of BOMs (Bill of Materials) - an item BOM and a custom BOM. The item BOM lives on the item and is the estimate of what is required to manufacture. The custom BOM lives on transactions and is the record of what actually was used during manufacturing. Both are important to maintain in order to compare how accurate your estimates are or if a particular manufacturing process is going off track. 

Custom BOMs can be enabled on quote, purchase order, work order, and order (based on a setting in the my company page), all of which have corresponding detail reports in WIGO. You can view your custom BOM as a section to all of these reports to give you a more comprehensive view of the manufacturing side of your business. 

If you do not use custom BOM on some or all of these modules you will not see this information in WIGO. 

In this example, we will add a custom BOM to a work order

After adding a custom BOM, we can navigate to the corresponding detail report, in this case Work Order Detail (WIGO).

From the detail report we can find the transaction we just created with our custom BOM attached and see a dropdown available on the item in the name column. Click this drop down to reveal the custom BOM!

Purchase order BOM detail report

Paragon enables you to use the custom BOM on purchase orders to purchase prepacks or assortments and specify the individual items included in each pack. With the purchase order BOM detail report, you can see this custom BOM breakdown across all purchase orders in one place. 

WIGO range charts

You also have the option to view your WIGO reports as a chart. To do this, select your data in the grid, right-click, and click chart range. This will bring up the chart tool, with the default pie chart being displayed.

You can customize your charts using the toolbar on the right-hand side, changing chart type, the data you want to include, and the color palette.

What's next?

WIGO is a very flexible tool that may just be the game-changer you've been looking for. Maybe some of our other WIGO articles would be helpful: 

Create WIGO report layouts

Customer and Vendor History reports

Sales and Purchase journals

• Related Articles

• Sales and purchase journal WIGO reports

  Introduction WIGO gives you a breakdown of all your sales and expenses in the form of detailed and summarized reports for each module. However, you also have the option to collect this information and condense the important details into one report. ...

• Creating and updating the product bill of materials (BOM)

  Introduction Every manufactured product is made up of component materials (steel, plastic, fabric, nuts, bolts...). Chances are when you make your own company products, you'll also want to keep track of the materials and tools it was made from. You ...

• Customer and vendor history WIGO reports

  Introduction The purpose of the history reports is to see all the activity that has happened for a specific company from your customer or vendor list. The reports will allow you to view both summarized and detailed information at a glance for any ...

• Inventory reports WIGO

  Introduction Although you are able to check your inventory directly from the inventory module in Paragon, we have made it easy to navigate through your WIGO reports to break down the detailed information on your individual products and their ...

• Product profitability report WIGO

  Introduction Paragon performs costing automatically. It takes your costing method (FIFO or LIFO) into account when calculating a unit inventory value every time items are shipped out and received. The product profitability WIGO report allows you to ...