SharePoint has grown into the most widely embraced collaboration and content management platform, encouraging smooth teamwork. Most organizations have vast dependencies on SharePoint as it has become their hub for storing the most valuable business data. And this data carries insights that help you stay ahead of the competition. When nurtured with care the data residing in SharePoint can help you make business-critical decisions and perform course corrections with optimum confidence. Let us take a scenario to explain the common practices in business reports preparation from SharePoint data.
Douglas is the Sales head of his organization. He has been asked by the management to justify his sales team’s value and budget. He needs to present an impactful sales report to the management within a few days. A lot depends on this report. Douglas can use any of the below-mentioned processes to prepare the report.
Option #1: Manual Creation of Report
9 out of every 10 SharePoint users would create reports using this tedious, repetitive, and needlessly complicated process. You would copy and paste data from a SharePoint list into an Excel sheet. Anyone who has used this process knows how tedious and time-consuming this ritual can be. While copy-pasting the information is only the first part, you still need to arrange and group the data. Finally, the data needs to be represented in an impactful manner using graphs. There are high chances of errors and your report might not be able to meet the standards expected by the management.
Option #2: IT Intervention
Fearing failure, some non-professional SharePoint users might turn to the IT department for help. The plan is: the IT would create a custom coded app fit for the purpose. However, the problem is that the IT department is already overburdened with its commitments and struggles to meet this additional task. As a result, you can expect a protracted wait period. Not an ideal scenario when you need to prepare the report within the next few days, right? Such a process can support only the long-term vision and not tasks that need quick turnarounds.
Option #3: No-Code Customization Solution
This is the simplest and quickest way to create reports and dashboards. A No-Code SharePoint customization solution empowers SharePoint business users to create custom apps without any coding and in rapid time. You can add features to the app using the point and click configuration. QuickApps is the best example of such a solution.
Build impactful business reports with QuickApps
Logically Douglas uses powerful web apps of QuickApps to complete the task at hand. He utilizes qListView web app to create a dashboard by combining data from multiple lists (even across sites), site collections, and web applications. Once completed, he unleashes the qChartView web app to represent the information in compelling 3D charts. QuickApps allows Douglas to complete the task with precision in a few hours as opposed to days.
Furthermore, QuickApps can be used by the SharePoint On-Premise and SharePoint Online business users alike to:
- Create insightful Dashboards & Charts
- Automate business reports
- Data Consolidation and Aggregation
- Create Dynamic Navigation and Dynamic Forms
Take a Free QuickApps Trial Now, to see how it can help you prepare impactful business reports with SharePoint data.
Associate Director – Product Development
Amit Gupta plays a key role in incubating and establishing best SharePoint practices at AgreeYa. He is closely associated with the Product Development and Delivery team and works to find new solutions based on Microsoft technology and optimize performance and responsiveness for our clients. He can be reached at amit.g@agreeya.com