8 Hours Might Be Available

Here’s the Deal

I’ve just added a quiz along with a certificate to my online course on Management Reporter. If you pass the quiz with 70 or higher, you’re taken to a page that shows your name, date, name of the course, suggested 8 hours credit, yada yada.

Here’s the Fine Print

1. Only paid members have access to the quiz.
2. I’m not an official sponsor with either NASBA or any state board.

[That said, for my own CPE I’ve taken many unsponsored courses. My state allows unsponsored courses; you just have to complete a form that explains why you took a course from someone who isn’t a sponsor. And how the information increases your professional competency as a CPA. I usually answer something like “This is the only source from which I can obtain this information”, and “Learning this software is critical to my job that involves creating financial report formats”. I haven’t had one disallowed yet. Crossing fingers.]

Anyway, if you’re already a paid member, head over to the newly added Module 10. The quiz covers Modules 1 and 2 only. You’ll find a Readme with lots more information. Plus the quiz itself.

If this quiz proves popular, I’ll probably add more.

Cheers…Jan

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Microsoft’s answer is No, but here’s more information

May 30, 2016

Pam Misialek states in the Dynamics GP Community:

Management Reporter for Dynamics GP will continue to be supported and ship now and in the future releases of Microsoft Dynamics GP.  Large features like going fully to the cloud and other major enhancements will not be made to Management Reporter for Dynamics GP.

The Management Reporter for Dynamics GP product will not be discontinued.

Then in response to the firestorm that creates, she says this:

The Management Reporter team has decided to not make major enhancements for GP and SL.  It will continue with AX.  It will continue to be available, so if MR works for your needs it’s still a solid solution that will be supported.  Any pains you have experienced with MR will not be corrected.

The GP team is a different team in Microsoft, so this message doesn’t relate to the GP future direction and roadmap.  Since MR is not going fully to the cloud and has other limitations, we have been working with the ISV community to solve those needs.

Since MR will continue to be available, there isn’t a formal announcement because it’s not being retired or discontinued.  For example, you won’t find any announcement on Project Accounting not getting new features because it’s still available.

I gave partners a heads up on the direction because I felt it was the right thing to do.  Financial Reporting is a critical component and partners need to understand what the best options are.  Management Reporter will continue to be part of GP and for on prem deployments is a great solution.  Existing customers investments are still safe.  For situations where more is needed, the ISV community is the place to go.

I hope this helps.

June 20, 2016

And here’s more information from Ryan Sandness in response to the above.

In response to the many questions we have been getting lately…we want to clarify the product positioning for Management Reporter.

1. Management Reporter is the preferred financial reporting solution for Microsoft Dynamics AX, GP, and SL.
2. Management Reporter will continue to be supported through the lifecycle of the ERP versions it ships with.
3. Management Reporter has been renamed to financial reporting in Microsoft Dynamics AX ‘7’.

My Take

The handwriting’s on the wall. And it has been for a long time. This is just the first public acknowledgement that M-R continues “without enhancements”. We’ve been waiting for it to catch up to FRx for YEARS. And honestly, how ironic is waiting/wanting it to catch up to FRx (a product that was last updated back when dinosaurs roamed). [snark]

Here’s one of my posts from EIGHT years ago re missing features in M-R: FRx vs. Management Reporter: Got Functionality? Seems like most of them are still missing. [sigh]

I do wonder if a more reliable data mart counts as a major enhancement. [snark]

Cheers.

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Whoa, Nelly! Never thought I’d be posting this, but here’s how to use FRx with GP 2015

With all the talk about maybe ditching Management Reporter, here’s a post from Constance Quigley on how she got FRx to run with GP2015.

And some great information from Jen Kuntz along the same lines: how to run FRx with GP2015.

Meanwhile, be careful and read the caveats.

And extreme thanks to Constance and Jen.

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What in the world is up with Management Reporter?

There’s no roadmap. But here’s what’s up.

From GP MVP and all-round channel leader Mark Polino on January 4, 2016: It is Time to Rethink Management Reporter. Amen to this; I couldn’t agree more. A very important post, whether you run GP or not.

A Partnership between Jet Reports and Microsoft

Bottom line—Jet Express will be available as a download for GP in June 2016.

May 17, 2016: Mark’s comments on the just-announced partnership between Jet Reports and Microsoft.

Here it is straight from the horse’s mouth (Jet Reports) on this splash page on the announcement for Jet Express for GP. Plenty of links on this page, plus learn more about a webinar scheduled for June 15, 2016.

And this from MSDynamicsWorld on May 18, 2016 re the new partnership between Microsoft and Jet Reports.

M-R Speculation

Interesting to think about seeing the handwriting on the wall for M-R.

Is it a bit odd for me to be talking about ditching M-R when I make my living teaching an online course on M-R? Well…the way I look at it—it’s not about me. It’s about YOU, and doing what’s right for you. As I’ve said many times in the past, don’t accept M-R just because it comes with Dynamics.

Is it time to ditch Management Reporter? Only you can answer that.

But I just heard from an AX client who’s managing Management Reporter with an eye to move to Jet Express.

Add to the mix all of M-R’s missing features and buggy releases…maybe it’s time for a change. I think it’s coming.

PS. Up next is a post on running FRx with GP2015. I feel like I’m in an alternate universe…

Update on 6/2/16: Duh—somehow I neglected to mention a VERY important article. By Les Wright (longtime consultant), it’s on LinkedIn Pulse.  Will Excel Replace Management Reporter? is his can’t-miss post on the new Jet partnership, and it contains some interesting speculation.

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That, my friends, is a quote from long-time Dynamics MVP Mark Polino.

I couldn’t agree more.

You gotta read his post It Is Time to Rethink Management Reporter over at MSDynamicsWorld.

For years, I’ve encouraged people to explore their options and not just accept Management Reporter because it’s the default.

My frustration with M-R is part of the reason I named my new site Irreverent M-R: it’s partially about pitfalls and workaround and what not to do. Sigh.

Maybe it’s time for a change. Cheers, sort of…Jan

The post “Management Reporter is not good enough.” appeared first on FRxBuzz.

I was furious. [For once, not at Microsoft!]

Frustrated and overwhelmed. By new software.

I was in over my head and just needed to get a few simple things done without reinventing the wheel.

What was I doing? I was trying to learn online course software so I could launch my new online course on Management Reporter.

I did get through it, but I have a new appreciation for learning anything in a hurry.

As it turns out, learning a few essential basics first is key to making sense of everything. 

Management Reporter Essentials—free

So when I launched my online course at Irreverent M-R, I made the first two modules FREE. In the first two modules, I show you the essential things to know about Management Reporter, as well as how to put together a trial balance:

This will get you going in the right direction. Don’t miss it.

To sign up, go to the course signup page, scroll down to Essentials, and click Join Now.

Recipes for Year End Reports

The rest of the modules in the course aren’t free, but they do contain “recipes” for specific reports.

Reports you can use for year end close.

For example, Module 4 has ten P&Ls, almost all using the same row definition. There’s a departmental P&L using a tree, a 12 month trend, a quarter end, a budget variance, a department list, and so on. And there’s a lesson on how to drill down to transaction detail:

These modules aren’t free, but they sure will save you some time.

There are a total of 9 modules covering balance sheets, cash flows, mistakes to avoid, timesavers, and other things in the “good to know” category.

For immediate access, head to the course signup, scroll down to the Whole Course and click Buy Now.

Lots more information

These reports come from my 20 years of consulting and teaching experience with M-R and its predecessor FRx.

Meant for use by consultants and end users on SL, GP and AX.

There’s lots more information on the course sign-up page. Yell if you have questions.

Cheers to your breezing through close! Jan

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I’ll be short and sweet. [For those who know me, just a little joke.]

What you need to know—I’ve boiled it down to 3 essentials:

1. Start with the Main Account

   —aka Natural account or Object code. Don’t try to mix in other dimensions in the row (departments, funds, locations, etc.) until you’ve got a report with the Main account done and tied out. I know you can—and I know other people say you can, but they don’t live in the real world where you have to be concerned about accuracy.

2. Enable Drilldown

   By default, drilldown is not enabled [sigh]. First thing to do when you set up a report definition: select Financial & Account in the Detail Level dropdown. Now you can drill down to detail when your report generates. This is one of MR’s most important features. Thank me later.

3. Check Accuracy

   Anyone can churn out MR reports. Whether they’re accurate or not is another story. Here’s how you can tell—add a “check accuracy” row to the bottom of every P&L—it should pull a range of the accounts covered by the report, so that you can compare your report’s calculated bottom line to what the total really should be. Want a few more details? Column B should read “check accuracy”. Column J should read 4000:9999—or whatever your P&L range is. On the following row, I always include an ‘out of balance’ calculation too—so you can see the exact amount it’s off.

There’s lots more to know, of course. But I promised short and sweet. Cheers. Jan

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Writing a blog post on stolen content isn’t what I had planned for today. I had volunteer work to do for Austin Pets Alive today, helping homeless animals find forever homes.

But instead, here I sit, about to discuss plagiarism.

I started consulting in 1994, and started writing this blog in 2006, long before it was popular to write about software. So because I’ve been around a while, and have truly expert content, I enjoy a nice search engine ranking.

So my blog gets found and followed by end users and consultants alike. I enjoy helping both.

What I don’t enjoy is a consultant who steals my content and passes it off as their own.

The first time it happened, I was furious. A partner copied my Shootout post [a post which took forever and cost tons of money] on comparing FRx to Management Reporter. The partner handled it admirably; I can’t give details due to a legal settlement, but I did get an apology and they removed the offending post quickly.

Second time, the partner was horrified and removed the post immediately.

The third time was infuriating. Big Dynamics AX partner who should know better. It was the Shootout post yet again, pulled pretty much word for word. It took DAYS for anyone to respond to my myriad complaints. There was quite a delay in removing their post, but they did eventually remove it. But they also left me with a bullshit response from their attorney: apparently I’ve “improperly confused plagiarism with copyright infringement”. Oh, and my blog posts aren’t “registered with the US Copyright Office.” Seriously? Guess they missed the definition of plagiarism…and the copyright notice at the bottom of every page. Thanks [name deleted].

[They did have one consultant who reached out long after the fact, who sincerely apologized and investigated further. I had a deep appreciation for his interest.]

And now—a FOURTH time. [Name deleted], a GP and SL partner in the northeast, has plagiarized my Top 12 Tricks post. Their 12 are exactly the same as mine, and they couldn’t even bother to change the order. They paraphrased the wording on the website, but they used my content verbatim in an MR webinar. Two days ago, I initiated contact via their website, facebook page, linked in page…and have had no response whatsoever. [Update 11/13/14: the offending post has been removed. Webinar too.]

Be careful who you work with—there are far too many frauds posing as experts out there. And I’m not the only expert to whom this has happened; there’s lots of this going around. What ever happened to honesty and integrity?

I can’t stand having this kind of negativity in my life. So I’m off to do some good for homeless animals. Jan

The post Kicking Ass and Taking Names—Quit Stealing My Content! appeared first on FRxBuzz.

Microsoft released Cumulative Update 7 for Management Reporter a week or so ago. Here’s what’s up:

• You can now Drill to Dynamics from the web viewer if you’re running AX 2012, GP 2013, or SL 2011.
• Currency translation for AX 2012 has arrived. AX does the translation and Management Reporter reports it. Here’s a Microsoft post on how to set up currency in AX.
• AX users can use the web viewer to view both functional and reporting currencies. There’s a new currency icon in the web viewer that will allow the user to switch currencies on the fly.
• AX users can specify the order for their dimensions in MR. They’ve been in alphabetical order(!), but now you can specify Main Account as the first dimension and see it first when either drilling down or while inserting accounts. Here’s how to enable this. In AX, go to GL, Setup, Financial Dimensions, choose Financial Dimension Configuration for Integrating Applications, and you’ll see the Management Reporter option. Use the list of dimensions to order them as you wish. This is a big usability improvement. I haven’t had a chance to test this Sort by Natural option to see how it impacts the new order, but suffice to say it might need to be unchecked.
• For AX, the Fixed Asset Acquisition Date has been added as an attribute. 

Cheers! Jan

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I just finished writing my third Management Reporter training manual: Creating Reports in Management Reporter III — How to Create 1 Cash Flow Statement With 3 Variations and Optional Link to Excel.

Bottom line, I teach the simplified technique for cash flow that I’ve been using for years. It’s made me look like a superstar on more than one occasion. I walk you through it with commented screenshots that look something like this:

Besides the MTD/YTD cash flow, I show how to create:

• January to December Trend cash flow
• Rolling 3 Month cash flow
• Quarter End cash flow
• And how to link to Excel to pull in FASB-style information for each

There’s lots more information here.

I’m heading off to go celebrate. This was a bear to write! Cheers—Jan

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