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Purpose of Smart Reports

Typical reports generated from application software tend to be operational/transactional data spanning multiple pages. While this is generally appropriate for operations personnel, senior managers often need reports that go beyond the mere presentation of data and help extract the key information for decision making by bringing it into high visual relief.

In some organizations, high-level executives use reports as their primary form of interaction with Siebel eBusiness Applications, and reports provide their typical means of accessing an application's data. It is important to provide such users with reports that include summary information and performance metrics in graphical form in a concise and intuitive format. Siebel Smart Reports help senior managers users characterize a situation, analyze various issues, and take appropriate action.

For example, sales representatives, sales managers, and call center managers can use Smart Reports to measure their performance against recommended best practices, analyze trends, identify exceptions, and take appropriate action. Smart Reports are organized to start with summary information and proceed to the most detailed information. The contents fall into three sections or categories of information:

• Dashboard section. The first section in a Smart Report is a dashboard. The dashboard provides intuitive graphical indicators for the key measures of utility and an order of merit. This helps the reader gauge the situation being studied: whether an opportunity is worth pursuing, whether the pipeline is healthy, and so on.
• Summary sections. When the reader has identified the key issues, the reader can proceed to the summary sections and analyze them. These sections contain charts and diagrams that aid analysis. For example, a summary section may include a Pipeline versus Quota chart that helps pinpoint the region that is in danger of missing targets.
• Detail sections. Having analyzed the issue, the reader can drill into the underlying detail sections and take appropriate action. These tend to present information in a format similar to those of conventional standard reports. The manager can target key decision makers with activities that address their main decision issues, or identify the opportunities in the pipeline that need attention.