Picture this: Leadership asks how much each function spends on comp. So you eagerly build a beautiful matrix report that sums Total Base Pay by Job Family Group.

You hit run.

The number comes back.

Everyone nods.

Except the number is wrong.

Workday added some annual salaries to some hourly rates and gave you a total that's wildly understated 😳

You don’t figure this out until later. Or worse, someone else figures it out for you.

This kinda stuff happens constantly. And, that's what this issue is about — helping you avoid data misalignment by spotting it from the jump.

Let’s get into it 🤓

Every summarization type that does math — Sum, Average, Min, Max, Percentile — assumes the values it's working with are comparable.

A column of "compensation" values needs to be in the same currency. A column of "Total Base Pay" values needs to share the same time frequency (annual, monthly, hourly). A decimal field like FTE needs to be formatted with enough precision to be meaningful.

When alignment breaks, Workday doesn't always stop you.

Sometimes it returns "Invalid." Other times, it cheerfully sums an annual salary of $80,000 with an hourly rate of $36 and hands you $80,036 — looking like a real number, but not honestly telling you that you just combined apples and oranges.

In sum (😉), there are three classic places where summarization goes awry.

Each one has a tell, and each one has a fix.