Sievo Procurement Analytics release notes
Stay updated on the latest and greatest Sievo functionalities. For any questions, please contact your Sievo representative or our service desk.
Please note that visibility of some features are dependent on user role and company subscription.
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New functionality will allow superusers to assign reviewers from the list of eligible approvers to individual reclassification requests. Additionally, the full list of eligible approvers will be made available in CSV exports. The new workflow will make it easier to follow up on the backlog of pending reclassification.
Reclassification interface receives new, side-panel design. New design allows for better use of space, and guides the users to the most optimal of available workflows (e.g. direct reclassification).
This new feature for Sievo Materials Forecasting improves the user experience and accuracy of volume adjustments. Previous development has included: 1) providing logic to estimate supplier-level split from historical data when supplier-level planning volumes are not available; 2) enabling adjusting the same material for different suppliers and plants in the same view. Now we are further improving the manual volume adjustments view, to enable even easier volume allocation between suppliers. The feature includes locking quantities in the volume adjustments view, adding and removing suppliers, adding placeholder suppliers, applying volume allocations from source rounds to new rounds, and merging forecast rows.
With this update users can improve the level of detail of the forecasts and make corrections more efficiently when the source data in systems conflicts with the latest expectations (e.g. new suppliers missing in the source data systems
The visibility to the rounds is enhanced by providing more metadata, more calculated summaries, and more information of data sources used in the rounds. It is possible to see e.g. metadata of who created and closed the round and when, where the price or volume data of a row was retrieved from, and summaries on how many rows there are with manual, automatic or missing price or volume data.
Better visibility to the round specific information improves the user experience and efficiency to validate that the round was created and adjustments are progressing as planned.
Round duplication enables making a copy of an existing budget or forecast round. It is possible to adjust, analyse and compare the duplicated rounds similarly to normally created rounds.
Round duplication provides an efficient way to create additional projections for scenario modelling. After creating and adjusting the official budget/forecast round, you can duplicate the round, adjust the inputs of your interest, and see another scenario that can be further analysed and compared to the other rounds.
Global bookmarks allow you to share bookmarks and collaborate with colleagues in a more seamless manner. Everyone can see the changes made to Global bookmarks, and they will appear in the bookmark lists of other users automatically. Global bookmarks can be managed by all users with the permission to edit Global bookmarks. This update also improves on some of the issues previously reported with the old bookmarks service.
Changes include
As part of rollout of the new service, bookmarks have been migrated from the old bookmarks service. Bookmarks with more than 10000 selections for a single dimension, or bookmarks that exceed the service size limits have not been migrated to ensure performance of the new service.
Attachments and bulk uploads of custom emission factors allow users to add attachments in custom emission factors and bulk upload these custom factors in the CO2 mapping tool. Please note that the bulk upload of factors does not mean uploading of mappings. These updates are part of our initiative to ensure your data is as accurate and detailed as possible as well as making the tool easier to use.
Snapshot data amounts grow continuously as time passes, causing unnecessary performance impact to SPM analytics, with snapshots from years far away from present. This update adds a configuration to limit historical snapshot data loaded to analytics.
A new dashboard within PO analytics to help data managers and super users monitor PO data import process of PO analytics module. The main KPIs being tracked to achieve the purpose are PO value deviation and currency deviation.
Data managers need to ensure the regular (monthly or weekly) data import process of PO analytics is smooth and help detect possible issues within the data. Sometimes super users will conduct similar process as well. Productizing this regular tracking process help increase efficiency.
Being able to select payment date or posting date to report diversity statuses on if it is at any point relevant. Being able to manually update the diversity status of custom assessed suppliers for customers who are custom assessing diversity statuses.
This will allow for more support and flexibility in diversity reporting. Please contact your Sievo representative for implementation if it is relevant to you.
Material prices agreed with suppliers may have complex structures that can be broken down to components. One part of the price can be fixed and the rest of the price can fluctuate depending on diverse factors or indices agreed during contract negotiations with suppliers.
Price components enable breaking the material prices down to components.
Price components will enable a higher accuracy when forecasting or budgeting material spend when the price per unit can fluctuate based on differ factors agreed with suppliers. Price components can also increase the understanding of how the spend is expected to fluctuate, and which part of the forecast is expected to be more stable.
Please contact your Sievo representative for implementation if you would like to use this feature.
We have fully redesigned Sievo Academy and added a bunch of interesting content to help you make the best out of Sievo. You'll find the link to Sievo Academy at the bottom of the main navigation.
We have revamped the SPM videos in Sievo Academy. In addition to the updated videos under Basics of SPM, you can learn How to track emission reductions in SPM and check out the greetings from our SPM Product Manager Julius Seppänen.
You’ll find the Spend FAQ and Glossary now from Sievo Academy! We will tackle some of the frequently asked questions and open the logic behind the commonly used measures in Sievo Spend Analytics.
You now have a calendar for selecting how far back you want to see the approved and discarded reclassification requests. We’ll show you the requests from the current and previous months. This update will help you focus on the most recent reclassification requests and vastly improves the loading speed of the page.
We have added user specific activity numbers and other enhancements to the user telemetry dashboards. This will allow users with permissions to get an even better view of which users and types of users might need support with using Sievo. With this update you can be confident all your Sievo users know how to use all functionalities. To ensure user privacy, this feature will be hidden by default. Please contact Sievo to enable this feature.
The user telemetry dashboard will fully replace the old user activity reports. Once the new features are rolled out to all customers, we will be removing the old user activity report (Qlik View based) from Sievo after 30 days.
It is now possible to select all available time in Savings Project Management analytics with one click. All time selection will be available for analytics dashboards, Self service and project list as a module specific option. All time selection will give easy access to all projects independent to the savings allocation and make it easier for the users to find their projects.
We want to support you in not only reporting the CO2 data but also, improving data quality and ultimately reducing emissions. This is why we have launched a amazingly easy way to find CO2e related insights. You’ll find this new dashboard at the top of your CO2 Emissions solution area in the main navigation. The CO2e dashboard gives insights into:
You can now export reclassification requests to a CSV file. Select one of the views between pending, approved or discarded and find the export button from the top right of the page. The export will include only the information available in the interface.
This will allow you to perform additional analysis on reclassification data.
This update will be available with the March 2023 software release.
What?
We added a new dashboard within PO analytics to help data managers and super users monitor PO data import process of PO analytics module. The main KPIs being tracked to achieve the purpose are PO value deviation and currency deviation.
Why?
Data managers and super users need to ensure the smoothness of the regular data import process of PO analytics, and help detect possible issues within the data. Productising the regular tracking process will increase efficiency.
Availability
Will be available to all PO analytics customer during April.
What?
We have introduced configuration options to SPM that allows you to track the CO2 emission reduction impact together or independent of savings impact. On top of that, there is a new dashboard available that helps you analysing the emissions reduction journey towards set target, such as net zero emissions. This can be rolled out to any customer using SPM that wishes to start capturing emissions reduction figures.
Why?
Procurement impact is expanding beyond savings at an increasing pace. With 80% of company emissions coming from the supply chain, procurement is in a unique position to drive significant emissions reduction initiatives and communicate the targets around them. This feature allows you taking action i.e. on the CO2 analytics findings and identified hot spots.
A more detailed description is available in Sievo Academy Savings Program Management playbook.
Our new real-time adjustment grid replaces the old grid, delivering a much faster performance. With the new grid forecast adjustments are immediately visible, which results in much more fluid user experience.
At the same time we also updated the interface related to single row adjustments. These improvements will give us more freedom on releasing more and more improvements on how users can adjust and work with price and volume forecasts.
What?
This new update allows you to:
Track changes in emission factors over time
Set start and end dates for validity for the emission factors.
We added a date selector when creating a mapping or emission factor: this new feature allows you to set up a baseline / freezing date, that will permit changes only after that date; please contact your Sievo representative if you wish to it set up.
Editing history is no longer possible for regular users, unless the default date or user rights are changed. The permissions for editing history can be allowed by the super users or by Sievo representatives.
We also added a new tab in the mapping tool that allows you for editing these custom processes, along with a better support on custom emission factors (=supplier specific data).
A more detailed user manual is available in Academy.
Why?
To better support tracking progress in CO2 analytics.
When?
Automatically live in all customer environments by the beginning of April.
In order to improve the performance of the reclassification request list page, we split the results into multiple pages; it will also be possible to set how many results will be shown within one page.
You can now map multiple selections (“this iPhone X from this specific Apple Supplier”) to an emission factor, instead of simply mapping only one selection (“Apple” as a supplier OR “Mobile Phones” as a category).
This allows for an even more precise emission factors in our calculations.
You can find the functionality in the CO2 mapping tool by breaking by a category, vendor, or material. Please see the CO2 mapping tool user manual in the Sievo Academy for more details and instructions.
We have added new Basics of Contract Management videos to Sievo Academy.
You'll now find video guides explaining the contract input form as well as the analytics dashboards. Together with the previously published text guides, you'll be able to get a comprehensive look into contract management in Sievo.
You'll always find Sievo Academy at the bottom of the main navigation. Happy learning!
When creating a new reclassification request, it is now possible to choose between current time selection and all available historical data to be included. Extending a reclassification request to all historical data, when appropriate, will result in higher data integrity and better AI learning capabilities. It is possible to configure which one of the two options you would prefer to have as default, reach out to your point-of-contact at Sievo for the modification.
We’re happy to announce that Craftboards are now available in all Sievo standard solution areas. Each solution area has its own My Craftboards link, which can be made available for users that have access to that solution area’s analytics dashboards. Craftboards allow users to build their own custom dashboards from charts or self service within a solution area.
To ensure performance there are currently a few limitations. Each user can create up to 5 Craftboards and each Craftboard can contain up to 10 charts, 2 of which can be tables or pivot tables.
We have done a bunch of improvements to the CO2 mapping tool to make it even better.
We have been adding new Contract Management material to Sievo Academy. You'll now find a checklist for investigating why the spend from a certain supplier is not under contract, even though a contract exists for this supplier. We'll also delve into the contract management permissions and document level scopes, so you'll be able to get a better overview how the different permissions work together. Additionally, a Contract Management FAQ is now available, have a look at the new materials here!
We have added new content into our existing Super User 101 course - which might be familiar to you through our Super User Certificate program. We focused to user adoption & engagement part and described in details how to create a motivating onboarding experience for your users. We also added some tips and tricks and templates for you to use. If you are already past the onboarding part in your organization, you can skip to continuous learning.
You'll always find Sievo Academy at the bottom of the main navigation. Happy learning!
With this new feature, super users can easily make sure that responsibilities have been assigned to the level of granularity their category managers need and can ensure that they are not the sole responsible for all reclassification reviews, if that is what they want.
The new tabs called Category and Organization will show the whole tree and present the status on each level as follows:
Check mark (✓): This means that there are users assigned as Approvers and Reclassifiers. It can be inherited to lower level items in the category or organization tree.
Some assignments missing: This means that the node has only approvers or only reclassifier responsibilities specifically assigned.
All assignments missing: This means that there are no specific assignments to approve or reclassify.
Note that the statuses ignore if there have been assignments for “All”.
You can now switch between value and quantity on the Open commitments dashboard in PO analytics.This update enables the flexibility of defining any purchase order status (or other indicators) as whether or not you expect open commitment, which solved the problem that only one purchase order status or indicator is not enough to define if further invoicing is expected. Besides, it is now possible to choose to base the comparison against invoices on either spend or quantity metric in case of poor maintenance of quantity and/or unit of measure data.
Cheers to the New Year, may it be full of health, happiness and certificates. Let us present you Sievo's Super User Certificate program for Spend Analytics.
The Super User Certificate program is an onboarding that inspires and motivates both experienced super users and newcomers. The learning path consists of 6 different courses that can be studied at one’s own pace. This equals about 2,5 hours’ worth of video training and text materials around Sievo’s Spend Analytics module and the different super user responsibilities. At the end of the program, your Sievo representative verifies your accomplishment and goes through your organization’s own unique set-up in an individual assessment meeting together with you. As a result, you will have the needed skillset to shine in your role as a Sievo super user. After completing all the courses in the program, you will receive a certificate that can be shared for example in LinkedIn to demonstrate your achievement and proficiency in Sievo Spend Analytics!
With this certificate program you:
We know how much you love Self service charts, and now you can turn those into full dashboards! With the Craftboards feature, it’s now possible to build your own custom dashboards. With only a few clicks, you can now experiment and discover which combination of information fits your use case.
You can add any chart from existing Sievo dashboards as well as self-made charts from Self service to your Craftboard - mix and match however you like. You have full control of the Craftboard. Once you have created a Craftboard, you can edit the layout and positioning of the charts to suit your needs.
To ensure that the Craftboard experience is as smooth as possible, we have some restrictions on the amount of Craftboards and charts:
Craftboards is currently only available for Spend Analytics module. For those of you that don’t use Spend Analytics (you really should!), we expect to release Craftboards to other solution areas before the end of the year. For more information on how Craftboards work, please check out this Craftboards introduction video in Sievo Academy.
With our latest release, you can limit the scope of reclassification permissions not only by category but also by organization. With this change we are able to support better decentralized category responsibilities where spend needs to be reviewed within a limited organization scope, for example: region, country, company, business unit, etc. The definition of Organization is up to you and the permission can go to the most generic level, like a region, or down to the most granular, like a specific plant or production facility.To enable users with wider scopes to review affected organizations, it is possible to filter and sort the Pending requests list also by Organization.
When Materials Forecasting is set up and configured, Forecast row definition defines on what level of detail the forecasts are made.
Supplier is often part of this definition. Previously it has been possible to include supplier only on the level of the consolidated supplier group. However, if source data quality is good enough there are benefits for having this on the ERP supplier level instead:
We have added bunch of features to the CO2 mapping tool:
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We have added dashboard training tips to all the dashboards that have corresponding Sievo Academy material available. Having the right training available on the dashboard will make it easier for users to start using unfamiliar dashboards. With the onboarding tours and gradual training tips released earlier, users are now empowered to take full advantage of all Sievo features.
To improve visibility on the reclassification requests lists (Pending, Approved, Discarded) we have done the following changes:
We have changed reclassification request button in the analytics ribbon to a drop-down as seen on the image below. The view all requests link on the request submission popup has been removed as it is now more user friendly to access the list directly from the dashboards instead of creating a false request. This will make it much easier for users to find and manage their pending requests.
We now display to which organizations a reclassification request belongs to. Depending on your setup, the organization information can be region, operating company, business unit or something else. The organization information provides more context to the request, and it is particularly relevant for decentralized organizations to determine who should be reviewing a particular request.
We have also introduced a new “verifying” state of reclassifications triggered from analytics. With this change we can ensure more secure data handling by capturing all the changes that may happen to the reclassified transactions. In addition to more accurate data representation, this will also mean that every request will always have up to date information on the organization dimension, which will enable us to release organizational responsibilities functionality in the future.
Lastly, the Transaction data tab will no longer be available after 30 days of a request being approved or discarded. With the new state of verifying the requests, we ensure that data behind a request remains up to date, however after having the request reach its final state, we will stop refreshing the data. We instead want to encourage you to review the needed information by viewing the request in Analytics via “Open in Self service”.
We have done improvements so that transaction data exports from Spend analytics are more reliable than before. Thank you for you continuous feedback, we are continuously working towards you getting your data as quickly as possible, in any format you need it.
With our latest changes, we are able to identify even more relevant words to be utilized in Product classifications in cases where master data fields are not reliable or existent. For example in cases of indirect purchases, where only the invoice line description provides meaningful information. We will be taking this into use in the cases where it makes the most sense if you have our Classification service contracted.
It’s now possible to expand any chart to be full screen, by selecting the expand view option from charts in standard Sievo dashboards. Filters and drill downs still work as normal when in the expanded view. This is a much requested feature that helps you focus on e.g. a specific insight and see all the details of the chart. Pro tip: you can even export the full screen image. giving you a higher resolution export.
We made some adjustments to our menus, meaning that it’s now a bit easier to navigate charts and their options menus using a keyboard.
We now added a new option for expanding pivot tables, which enables users to expand into new columns, instead of expanding everything in one column.
From now on, changes done on the projects will be reflected in the analytics faster than before. We have done improvements to how we load the historical snapshot data to analytics, and in most cases this has cut down the average refresh times with 50-85%. For customers with a lot of historical snapshot data, the improvement can be measured in minutes.
The new CO2 mapping tool allows users to change emission mappings directly in the tool as well as bring in supplier specific emission factors. This update also brings CO2 into its own environment on the left hand menu bar, while showing the relevant dimensions in self-service. We are currently rolling out this feature. Most customers can expect to have the tool in place during October and November. CO2 users can also expect to get more communications on this closer to getting the tool in place. Please note that any custom solutions of CO2 will not be getting the tool into use just yet.
Round creation may have been somewhat frustrating trial-and-error process especially in set-ups where web-uploads have been used to bring in source data for budgets and forecasts. Out first step to make round creation more intuitive for the users is by providing overall visibility to the source data status when creating new rounds. This new feature helps users to determine if source data is in such shape that they can create a new round and also allow them to manually update all source data or specific source data sets if needed. For now, this only provides visibility when source data has been transferred to Materials Forecasting solution. It does not tell when the source data itself has been updated or uploaded - this you still need to check with other means. However, this an area we most likely will improve in the near future.
New interactive onboarding tours live on a checklist on the home page, so users can take them at their own pace. The tours introduces users to all the key Sievo features and dashboards. These tours will replace the old single tour, letting users play around with the features between tours, instead of going through everything in one go. The product tours will ensure all Sievo users get to know the basics in a easy and intuitive way.
Gradual training feature tips will inform about Sievo features they have not used previously. For example if you have never visited the Transaction data dashboard, you’ll get a popup telling you about the dashboard and guiding you towards Sievo Academy training. To make sure gradual training don’t interrupt work, we’ll only show you one tooltip a month and only for features you have not used previously. You may also opt out of all the gradual training tips at any time. Gradual training ensures our users get to know all the powerful Sievo features.
We have revisited our approach to identifying reversing accounting entries from your data, which are excluded from payment terms KPIs on the Payment terms dashboard. You will now find the avg. invoice-to-due and invoice-to-pay metrics increasingly accurate, as well as more relevant payment term opportunities.
Self-service has been expanded with an option to create Mekko charts. Mekko charts offer a great alternative to classic, stacked bar charts. You can use the Mekko chart e.g. to Identify the highest working capital opportunity in different parts of your organisation for strategic suppliers. Note that you always need to select two dimensions and one measure to create the Mekko chart.
The calendar dropdown has been enlarged so you now see and can select up to five years in one go. Previously there was only space for two full years. This makes selecting more months & years much easier!
The time selector now gets updated to reflect the time selection saved in the bookmark and shown on bookmarked charts.
The chart options menu (three dot button on top right of each chart) is now always visible and no longer requires users to hover over it - meaning it is now easier for users to find and access the tools available for each char.
Jaxu's pic (our beloved seal mascot) has been updated on the self-service home page. Note that Jaxu is visible in self-service only if the user doesn't have any self-service bookmarks created.
Have you been looking ways to test your own or your team's Sievo skills? Spend analytics exercises are here to help! These are exercises that learners can do at their own pace in their own Sievo environment, using their own categories and suppliers. The exercises can also be downloaded as powerpoint file, which means that you can run them in a live session with your team, and adjust the exercises with your organization's context! Difficulty level increases with each exercise, and if they get too tricky, instructions for completing the tasks are also given.
We have also added two new lessons to our CO2 analytics - course and complemented the classification related instructions by: Classification feedback tool: Approver's guide.
You'll always find Sievo Academy at the bottom of the main navigation. Happy learning!
You can now require users to suggest a better classification when they send a request. To do this, we can simply disable the option to submit unspecified reclassification requests - this way, your approvers will only see requests with suggested target 🎯 category. This configuration will allow you to hide the “I don’t know the correct classification” option. This configuration can’t be targeted to user groups so changing it will apply to all your Sievo users. The change can be made by your Sievo administrators - please reach out to your point of contact if you want to know more.
Some charts have been showing G instead of B for billions and some other mysterious letters for smaller spend figures as well. This bug 🐛 has now been fixed.
You can now flip any analytics charts in to a table 🤯 This gives you a additional view of quickly viewing the numbers and significantly improves accessibility of all Sievo users. Simply hit the Swap to Table in the chart menu (the tree dots in the top right corner …) of any chart and voila, you get the same data in a table format. You can even continue building on the chart in Self-Service by selecting Open in Self service from the same menu or hit Swap to Chart view to flip back to the original chart. Best thing since sliced bread indeed! Please note that Swap to Table is currently not available with sankey charts, maps and boxes containing multiple charts on the Insights Overview dashboards.
The old round selector was sometimes a bit frustrating to use, so we made a new and improved version for you. You can now very quickly see and select both the current and baseline round.
Sometimes you don’t have all your materials up-to-date in your budget volume upload, when creating a new budget. No worries, this won’t be a problem any more. The new Add new rows feature, enables you to fix your source data for the round and then add new rows based on those fixes. No more deleting and recreating round when all you need is to add few new rows. You’ll find the Add new rows button at the bottom of the round management page.
All new Sievo users now get taken on a product tour introducing them to the key features of Sievo spend analytics. The tour is a quick and easy way to learn the basics of dashboards, charts, filters, bookmarks and all the essential analytics features. You can also remind yourself of the features by launching the tour at any time by clicking the question mark under your name on the Sievo home page.
Learn about User management topics and tasks in an easy to digest way on a revamped course. User management covers the basics of user management in Sievo, and Classification user management includes all you need to know about managing user accesses in classification tools. Find answers to the most frequent questions coming from users on the User management FAQ. Find the new content under Sievo Academy Super User section
We’ve updated the reclassification requests lists to make reviewing new pending requests even easier. All the tables are now sorted by the date of the request, with the newest on top so you never miss a request again. The header row of the requests table is now locked, so when you scroll to older requests you can still know which column refers to what. Happy reclassifying!
To make it easier for users to find the upload data section, we have renamed the “Supplier enrichment files” link in Spend tools to "Upload data". This change reflects all the possibilities you have to upload data to Sievo. Nothing has changed in terms of where you’ll find the tool or how it works.
The key performance indicator boxes, often shown on top of the dashboards, got a updated styling with new fonts and sizes to make them easier to read. This change is most visible on the dashboards with lots of KPIs such as Spend Overview, Insights Overview and Payment Terms simulation dashboards (both currently in rollout phase). You are now also able to copy graph header as you can select the header text.
In order to have a long enough time horizon for your volume forecast data, you almost always need to use volume forecast sources that don’t yet have complete information on the supplier you are going to buy your materials from. To overcome this issue, you have two options: 1) forget the supplier information in your forecasting or 2) somehow enrich your volume forecast data with supplier information.
Option 1 is not great as your prices are much depended on suppliers and giving price forecasts without supplier information can be a bit tedious. So, you would like to go with option 2, but manually enriching your volume forecast data is very cumbersome. But worry not, Sievo is here to help! Our new supplier split feature is designed to provide the option 2 in an automatic and integrated way. It splits your not-on-supplier-level volume forecast data to include supplier information based on your historical spend patterns or info record data.
Previously Materials Forecasting was limited to utilize only one source data set (for example planning volume forecast data) to define what rows (materials, plants and suppliers) are included in a new rounds. It turned out that this was too restrictive an approach to ascertain that new rounds always had all the needed rows. Luckily, the solution was quite simple and now you can add two source data sets to be used when rows are defined for a new round. Maybe next month it will be three - who knows?
The core of Materials Forecasting is forecasting volumes and prices on material level. However, this detailed approach does not always give the full picture on spend, savings and PPV when figures are looked on category level. Overlays enable users to enter higher-level overlays to adjust and complement the figures derived with detailed material level forecasts.
The new course will teach you how to use the new Insights Overview dashboard. Read about each insight area, their benefits and use cases with recommended steps to follow in your insight exploration, and view videos showcasing example scenarios.
You’ll find Insights Overview course in Sievo Academy. Navigate to Sievo Academy from the bottom of the navigation panel and find the course under Spend Analytics area or by using this link academy.sievo.com/insights-overview
Until now the pivot charts in Self-service have always been sorted based on the measure. Now you can sort the pivot by dimension as well by clicking on "D" in the top right corner! You can return to measure based sorting by clicking "M". Note that options for ascending/descending ordering are not available when sorted by dimension.
We are launching a brand new Payment terms simulation dashboard for doing cash-flow analysis. Using the new dashboard you can simulate various payment options (including discounts) and even compare two alternative approaches against the historical data. This new dashboard will replace the Payment terms scenario dashboard and becomes available to all analytics customers within the next months. Please contact your customer representative if you want to know more.
We are adding new data points by Duns and Bradstreet to the Supplier 360 dashboard. This data, collected during our external vendor enrichment, will help you better understand supplier parenting decisions. The data points available are Global Ultimate, Domestic Ultimate, Primary Name and SIC code on the Spend by ERP supplier table. These data points will become available once you select a single supplier to explore in the dashboard. Note that some exceptions apply and data will become available after an upgrade led by our Modernisation team.
You can now determine the amount of spend that users can move independently or suggest to move out of a category. The previously hard limit of 100 million (EUR, USD or default currency) was not always fitting for every situation. Let your Sievo representative know what limit works for you, and we’ll do the update.
We have now added a breadcrumb navigation to the Reclassification permissions page. This allows you to easily navigate back to the reclassification requests after e.g. editing user permission. In the past you needed to open this in a second tab or navigation back from the side navigation. This is a small improvement that will save you a many clicks!
When you open a new tab within same solution area (e.g. two different Spend dashboards), the new tab follows the same time selection as in the original tab. Previously the new tab opened with the default time selection (usually YTD) messing up your previous time selections. Now the time selection of each tab will always keep in sync and charts updated directly. Please note that the calendar selector dates you see in the new tabs, only gets updated when you refresh the page (F5) even if the graph get updated with the new selection on another tab.
The selected quick filters are now highlighted when you select any filter value from the dropdown. If there was any minor confusion over which filter was selected earlier, now that confusion is gone!
Opening a Self-Service bookmark on the home page, did not always include all of the dimensions and measures. This occurred randomly due to a bug that is now fixed.
Materials forecasting often needs to use different volume forecast data sets depending on what kind of round you are creating. Next fiscal budget rounds are often based on longer-term planning data sources, whereas forecasts made during the year are typically based on MRP type of data. By enabling budget volumes as a separate volume data source, we make managing rounds much simpler as the user can rely that they are building their budgets or forecast on top of the correct data set.
In the same go we added support for new price data source. SAP info records provide current pricing on specific materials and vendors and in many case are a solid source for future and already contracted prices.
We are happy to announce that we have launched the new Sievo Academy, an online learning platform for all Sievo users. Sievo Academy offers curated learning paths and courses to give Sievo users the knowledge and skills they need to succeed with Sievo. The new site has replaced the Training page. You’ll find Academy at the bottom of the main navigation.
Watch the intro video and start learning now!
We have updated a bunch of things in our classification feedback tool to make the flow easier for approvers and super users. Here is what we have updated:
You can now cancel any request retroactively, even when it has already been approved. If you for example make a mistake and click Approve before reviewing the data, you can simply go in and cancel that approval. The Cancel and discard button will be available in approved reclassification requests. The cancel option will be available for one month after the request was approved, to the original approver and super-users of the solution. Any decisions our AI has done because of the mistakenly approved request, will also be reverted.
Understanding the data behind a reclassification request is vital to making the right approve or discard decision. To understand the request better, you can for example explore the descriptions of master data points or split flagged spend to analyse if it actually belongs to different target categories.
To solve this, you can now very easily look at the data of each reclassification request in analytics. This provides a familiar context to slice and dice the data to relevant data points. Simply click View in Self service to see the rows affected by the request filtered. You can continue your analysis in Self service by adding dimensions or jump to any other dashboard like Spend Overview or Transaction data.
We are updating the Reclassification submitted message to highlight that it may take some time until the category responsible or super user reviews a request and approves the request. This keeps the users informed that the new classification won’t often be visible in Sievo immediately.
Purchase Price Variance (PPV) is often a key measure in materials forecasting analytics. Previously we have been able to calculate and show only the forecasted part of your PPV. Now we can also add the realized PPV figures, coming from and calculated in your ERP or finance systems. This way our Materials Forecasting solution provides you a with full view of how PPV is developing.
Your personalized analytics just got even more personal. You can now select your default non-system currency. Set your default currency by clicking the star ⭐ next to the preferred currency in your currency dropdown menu. This currency will from now on always be selected as your default, when you launch Sievo. You can still select any other currency, which will be used during the session. In your next session your default currency (or system currency if you have not selected a default) will again be selected.
We now have a great tool available to troubleshoot any connection issues. If you are having trouble connecting to Sievo, simply run the Sievo Connectivity Tester to get your problems fixed. If the tester finds any issues, you will receive instructions to get your connection up and running again. The connectivity tester is the fastest way to solve connection issues. You can always contact your Sievo representative if you are having trouble fixing the connection your self.
We now have two comprehensive playbooks available for using the Sustainability, Diversity & Supplier Risk modules. Have a look at the brand new Supplier analytics playbook and CO2 analytics playbook to see what the modules can offer you now and in the future. The playbooks are also always available in the training section at the bottom of your Sievo navigation.
We are now linking guides, tooltips and learning material to elements in Sievo. This will help you find new features and learn how to use all Sievo functionalities. Contextual guidance ensures all our Sievo users can make the most out of procurement analytics.
You now have direct access to your analytics bookmarks right from the home page. This gives you a very quick way to open your favourite bookmarks in one click. Users who don’t have any bookmarks saved, will see a link guiding them how to use the Sievo bookmarks.
Spend Analytics
All your insights in one place
Using the new Insights overview dashboard, you can identify opportunities in various different areas. It acts as a single point of access to a selection of curated insights to help you drive action. The insights identification ranges from savings opportunities to working capital and process optimisation, depending on which modules and data content you have in Sievo. Note that some of the insights require a subscription to other Sievo modules like Supplier risk or Payment terms tracking. We will contact our clients during 2022 with more information on when the Insights overview dashboard will be available in your solution.
Analytics
Set your preferred chart in self-service
You can now set your default chart type in self-service by clicking the star icon next to the chart name. After you’ve set the default chart, you’ll always see that chart type when you start building a new chart. The selection is saved between sessions, so if you mainly use e.g. the a table, you can now set to see it immediately. Note that the default chart selection holds across the solution areas. If you select Table as the default chart in Spend, it will be your default chart also in the Savings self-service.
Small change in Quick filters to have better visibility
We have increased the width of Quick filter bar slightly to show longer names better which makes it easier to find e.g. the supplier you are looking for. This improvement will show in other filter searches as well, including in table charts.
Info icon removed from analytics charts
We got good feedback that the small ℹ icon containing data publish date in every analytics charts was confusing, as the date was the same for all charts. Thank you for the feedback, we have now removed the icon and moved the information to the bottom of each dashboard, where it’s clearly visible.
Selections not always visible bug fixed
In some cases, the current selection bar was not showing filters e.g. from bookmarks. This has now been fixed.
Savings Lifecycle
Submit and approve all your project’s items at once
In many cases, SPM users finalize and approve multiple project items at once. We’re now introducing multiple selection to the input form’s item list, that allows you to select multiple items of the same project and submit or approve them on one go. This will speed up your work when you are working with big projects that are split to several items! The feature requires configuration, please contact your Sievo representative for more information.
Approval information in the project list and approval view
How to easily find the items that are pending for your approval or check whose approval the items are pending for? We’re introducing a few new features with the intention to provide a straightforward way for approvers to find the projects they have been requested to approve, and give insights on which projects should be checked first:
New fields in the project list will be automatically available for all customers. Please contact your Sievo representative for more information on the Pending approvals dashboard.
Bug fixes in SPM
A few bugs have been fixed around SPM, including:
Materials Forecasting
Access restrictions with security scopes
When it comes to data, we in Sievo in general believe that sharing is caring. But we do realize that it is not always possible to have all data and figures available to everybody. Security scopes have been used for a long time by many Sievo modules to restrict users' access to data based on for example selected categories or regions. Now we are happy to introduce security scopes also to Materials Forecasting. When you define Forecasting security scope to a user, it will affect both what data they can see in Materials Forecasting Analytics and what forecast rows they can edit.
Environmental, Social, and Governance
Track diversity status over time
Our diversity module now supports tracking past data on your suppliers' diversity status, meaning that the analytics takes into account how the diversity status has changed over time and not only views the latest status over the entire spend. Contact your Sievo representative for more information and implementation timelines.
User Experience
Manage your Sievo administration contacts
You can now manage who receives what type of emails from Sievo. Simply add the email address of a person who should be informed about Sievo updates, data loads, outages and billing to communication preferences, to keep track of who Sievo should keep updated regarding the different areas of interest. You’ll find the communication preferences page under: Administration / Super user communication preferences. Please note that this feature is only available to Super Users.
Export currency rates to excel
Sometimes you need the currency rates outside Sievo. You can now export all the rates in to a excel file using the export button in the top right corner of the Rates tab under System administration / Currency Management.
User telemetry bug fixed
We found a bug in user telemetry causing some events to be duplicated, skewing the data. This bug has now been fixed and all the incorrect data removed.
Note on the recent reports on the vulnerabilities CVE-2021-44228 and CVE-2021-45046 dubbed as "Log4Shell":
Our assessment has concluded that our software is not vulnerable to the Log4j related recent vulnerabilities. Our software stack is not using Java as we rely mainly on Microsoft technologies, i.e. .NET. The ported versions of the logging library are not to be vulnerable to the issue, which is related to a Java specific API (JNDI). This applies for the Sievo Web Application, as well as the Sievo Data Extractor which is used for data integration with many of our customers.
Spend Analytics
Improved Payment status visibility
Our Payment Terms Tracking module got even more specific, as we improve the payment status metric to allow you to get better visibility on how the payments of invoices have developed over time. We include, besides the initial 4 statuses of open, paid early, paid late and paid on time, an indicator when invoices have been paid but the data had been incomplete and the invoice lacks a due date (paid without due date). With this improvement, the invoices are no longer tagged as Open and you’ll get visibility on this odd bookings.
Analytics
Self-service bookmarks available on self-service landing page
Using self service just became even easier and quicker! The self-service landing page now contains all your self-service bookmarks, so you can open any chart you've created in one click! The same filters are also available that you see in your bookmarks drop-down. If you don’t have any bookmarks, try it out today by creating the chart you want, then clicking the bookmarks icon in the top right corner.
Self-service gets its own clear button!
You can now clear all your self service dimensions and measures in one click, using the Clear button at the left of the menu. Clearing all the dimensions and measures will give you a clean slate to build a new chart or select one of your pre-existing bookmarks. Please note that any filters you've selected will remain active in the top bar if you don’t clear those too.
Savings Lifecycle
Project header preferences
We got feedback that some of our users found it hard to find the expand / collapse button of the project header (top left corner of the individual project page). To make it easier to find, you’ll now see the button highlighted when you move your mouse over the header area. We’ll also save your preference, so that the header is always automatically expanded if you usually expand it.
Create new projects without a warning banner
We get it, you don’t want to be warned about missing information on the project when you’ve barely started. We no longer show the warning banner for missing data when creating a new project, mandatory fields will still be highlighted with a red frame.
Bug fixes in SPM
A few bugs have been fixed around SPM, including:
Export for material savings value lines now respects the formatting for a specific field, and no longer formats text as a number in Excel (an issue that trimmed off leading zeros for text fields)
When importing monthly values, the preview now sorts fiscal periods (e.g. FY21/Sep) correctly
Transition dates in the workflow now show up in user’s time zone
Materials Forecasting
Outbound API
Materials Forecasting provides the best Analytics experience out-of-the-box. However, you might also want to use the data in other applications, outside Sievo. So, we are happy to introduce Outbound API for Materials Forecasting, which allows you to use this data in your other systems and tools. In this first version of the API, Sievo is still keeping quite tight control of things and can provide you with Forecasting data extracts via SFTP. However, should you be interested to directly connect to the API we are happy to explore the possibilities.
User Experience
User activity added to user telemetry
We have added a new User activity tab, with two new graphs to user telemetry. Here you’ll find the amount of logins per day and how many new users have logged in. You’ll also see a breakdown of what countries users are visiting from. These datapoints will help you understand how often Sievo is being used and by which user groups. Please note that user telemetry is only available to Super Users, you’ll find it under Administration at the bottom of the navigation.
Home page news in rich text format 🚀
Finally you can make the home page news both beautiful and engaging. Rich text format allows you to format the news article to be easy to read, ensuring your Sievo users get all the information they need! The rich text format editor comes with the following features:
Header: You now have a Bold style you can use for headers
Italic: You can highlight things in Italic
Links: You can add unlimited embedded links pointing to external or Sievo pages.
Emojis: You can add emojis so even millennial can understand the news 
Date format: dates are presented in a easy to read 'days/weeks/months ago' format (i.e. 2 weeks ago) making it quick to see how recent the article is (exact publishing date is still shown in a tooltip).
Gain visibility into your Scope 3 emissions
Sievo is launching a totally new module, an extensive CO2 analytics solution with automated monthly refreshes to give you visibility into your emissions. Sievo’s CO2 analytics solution utilises your spend data to help you
See our press release and contact your Sievo representative for more information.
Highlight diverse suppliers that matter for you!
We have developed a way to “identify as diverse” only the suppliers that have diversity types relevant for your analysis and diversity program. For example, if you need to report only on Woman-owned businesses (WBE), Minority-owned businesses (MBE) & Veteran-owned businesses (VBE or VOSB) but not on Businesses owned by economically disadvantaged individuals (DBE), you can define only those relevant to you and measure how diverse your supplier base is.
Please contact your Sievo representative to setup this feature.
Spend Analytics
Reclassifications request transaction data available faster
From now on you won’t need to manually trigger the transaction data reload and wait for the data to become available. Instead the data is automatically loaded every night, following spend data imports. This will make it easier to review requests as soon as they are sent for approval.
Get full visibility of your category scope with the new selector – coming in 2021
With the improved category picker on the Category 360 dashboard, you can now navigate trough the categories in a familiar way. Click the Select category to get a good overview of the full category tree and filter down to the level you need in one go. This makes finding the correct category level much easier and selecting the correct filter quicker.
Analytics
Improvement to numeric codes starting with a zero – coming in November
In rare cases, Sievo has incorrectly shown numeric codes starting with a zero (e.g. supplier account number 0486000 might have been shown as 486000 or 00486000). We will fix this so that there won’t be additional zeros added or removed from the codes. Please note that this does not affect the analytics values in any way, only the way numeric codes are displayed. These fields are often important references between Sievo analytics and source systems, hence we are doing this change across the platform to improve the behavior based on feedback received from our customers.
Sievo analytics will mostly continues to work as before, with better alignment to source data. However, there are implications to existing bookmarks which contain above described fields. To be exact, for such identifier/code fields that can contain numeric and text values, the numeric values will disappear from the bookmark selection. Based on our analysis, under 10% of all Sievo bookmarks will be affected. However, this ratio can differ by customer and individual users depending on the nature of bookmarks created. Super users have been contacted with more detailed information and instructions on this topic.
Your bookmarks available on the self-service landing page – coming in November
Instead of usage instructions, you will see a list of your latest self-service bookmarks, directly when you enter the self-service page. Before you had to click several times to get to your bookmarks, now they will be available to you directly.
Sorting available by measure in self-service bar charts
With the new sorting options, bar charts can be sorted by measure, even when a time dimension is selected. When selecting the time dimension, it will still be used for sorting by default, but now the sorting can be changed using the D / M toggle. Please note that sometimes the measure sorting might look a bit off, since the sorting order is based on the sum of measures. In these cases you can select stacked instead of grouped and the ordering is corrected.
Sorting bookmarks
You can now sort your bookmarks by dashboard, in addition to name, date and solution area. Your sorting selection will also be stored from one session to the next, so that the bookmarks are always sorted in the order you want them to be. This will make it even easier to find the bookmark you are looking for.
User Experience
Training and support pinned to the bottom of the navigation
The training section is now easier to find than ever. You will always find the link to training (and support for the customers who has that option available) at the bottom of the navigation. This helps users quickly resolve issues they might run in to.
Home page news in rich text format – coming in November
Super users, publishing home page news articles, will be able to add rich text format styles to the news like: bold, italic, links and of course emojis 🙂 News articles date now shows how many days / weeks / months ago it was published instead of the publishing date. These improvements will make it easier for everyone to keep track of important news.
Sievo Academy
Brush up your skills with new training videos – coming in November
Sievo Academy team has created new training content. New Classification in Sievo video takes you through how classification works in Sievo. We have also added a helpful FAQ to support you with taking new classification feedback tool into use. Additionally, a new training video on Sustainability has been published. You’ll find the Training page at the bottom of the side navigation. We would love to hear your feedback and ideas on future videos.
Savings Lifecycle Management
Compare your savings to spend in SPM analytics
You can now compare your savings pipeline and approved savings to spend in analytics. This will enable you to more effectively manage your savings pipeline and review performance across different dimensions when you have spend as a reference point. Please note that this requires that you have Sievo Spend Analytics in use. Contact your Sievo representative for additional information on adding spend data points in your savings analytics.
Combine SPM savings and realized savings in analytics
You can now combine savings from Savings Program Management & Realized Savings modules on the same dashboard. This allows you to verify across different dimensions how approved savings from projects are realizing based on the transaction data. Also, you can now have dashboards combining material price savings that are automatically tracked from spend data, and other savings with SPM projects. Note that this feature requires you have both Savings Program Management and Realized Savings Measurement in use. Please contact your Sievo representative for additional information on configuring combined reporting in your analytics. We’ve updated the Sievo Realized Savings Measurement Playbook to include the new analytics.
User Experience
See how dashboards are being used with user telemetry – coming in October
You will now be able to keep track of how many times each dashboard has been used and for how long. This will help you determine which dashboards are the most popular and which ones might need tweaking or targeted user training. The first user telemetry numbers will be page visits and average time spent on page, but we will keep adding additional data points in the coming months so stay tuned. Please note that user telemetry will only be visible to super users and others with the user telemetry permission.
Harmonised and intuitive admin pages
We have been busy updating all the administrative pages (like user and role management) to follow our sleek, white and blue style. Most of the pages are now updated making it easier for you to find what you are looking for and navigate on the page. There are still a few to go that we will be updating during the fall. Enjoy the beautiful new buttons and styles, we love them.
Analytics
Improvements to Open a graph in self-service from dashboard – coming in October
Last month we introduced a new feature for opening dashboard charts in self-service. In the first release, some of the charts including so-called combo charts opened in a reduced format in self-service e.g. showing only bar chart though the original chart had both bar and line chart combined. This has been updated so that these charts are opened now as table charts to avoid losing measures from the original charts. A notification will be shown whenever the original chart cannot be opened in its original format.
Self-service excel export issues – bug fix
We encountered earlier some formatting issues with measures in certain self-service export excels, e.g. Spend measure with zero decimals appeared with a comma at the end in the excels. The bug was more common with reports using US number formatting. This has now been fixed and the excel exports should not show additional commas anymore.
Spend Analytics
Supplier ethnicity in diversity analytics
We have added supplier ethnicity to the diversity dashboard. The ethnicity data point will allow you to get a full picture of your supply chain diversity. Please note that diversity data points availability depend on your data provider. Contact your Sievo representative for additional information on enabling specific data points.
Diversity certificates’ expiration date
It is now possible to build reports including the different diversity assessment certificates and their expiration dates in Self Service. This will help you keep the certificates up to date and plan relevant actions. Please note that diversity data points availability depend on your data provider. Contact your Sievo representative for additional information on enabling specific data points.
Analytics
Open dashboard charts in self-service
You can now open almost any of the dashboard charts in self-service to continue your deep dive analysis by adding data points. Opening a graph in self service will make it easier for anyone, unfamiliar with self service, to start using the powerful self service features. It will also speeds up experienced Sievo users work as they can pick any graph to use as a basis for deep dive analysis. The feature works by clicking the dropdown in top-right corner of any chart and click “Open in Self service”! You will be redirected to self service then with the selected graph. Please note that not all charts can be opened in self-service and some chart layouts or data points may be altered.
Unified number formats in Self-service charts
Measures in self-service bar and line charts will use the same measure formatting as in pivot and table charts from now on. This means that e.g. price measure is shown with 4 decimals. Kindly note that selecting two measures with different formats such as spend with 0 decimals and share of purchase order spend in % do not work together on the same chart as there’s only one axis in use. In these cases the first selected measure (the most left one) sets the number format for the axis.
Training video on the self-service page
Self-service starting page now contains a quick start guide video! This will help new Sievo users embrace the power of self-service analytics in no time.
Search box dimension always visible
Often the analytics filter search returns a long list of values per dimension. Now the dimension name e.g. supplier remains visible when scrolling down the search results. This minor improvement is very useful if you are uncertain which dimension the search results are related to.
Materials Forecasting
Restriction and usability improvements to mass round adjustment
Even though forecasting price mass adjustment is a great feature, its spot on the Adjust Rounds page used to be a bit too prominent for our (and yours) liking. Now you can hide or show the mass adjustment feature in one click, to give the data table more real estate when you need it. We have also added restriction to the use of Mass Adjust to make sure no one wreaks havoc to rounds by accidentally mass adjusting the whole forecast. You’ll first need to filter down on the data (e.g. a sub-category) in order to do mass adjustments.
Spend Analytics
Create savings project straight from your spend dashboard
Spend analytics is a natural place to find new saving ideas. You can now create a project directly from any spend dashboard, without having to navigate to savings projects. In one click, you get a pre-filled form using your selected filters. This form opens a new Savings Program Management tab, where you can fill in the rest of the details. Please note that the feature requires you have access to the new Spend analytics and Savings program management.
All the Spend administration tools in one place
We have simplified the main navigation by collecting all the Spend administration tools under one page. The Spend “Tools” page is organised in to groups so it’s easier to find the tool you are looking for, plus we have included a brief description of what you can do in each section. Existing user permissions will apply so there is no need for admins to make any changes. We’ll be removing the old links from your navigation during August. Under the Spend “Tools” you can now find all spend related tools like:
Improved metrics related to new suppliers
We have improved the way we calculate the ‘supplier since’ and ‘last month spend’ metrics, which tell the period where a supplier is active and has invoices linked to it. Previously, Analytics did not count new suppliers correctly if supplier had data older than 3 years, this has now been corrected. The changes affects the ‘Supplier Tail’ dashboard and the ‘New supplier count’ measure in Self service.
Analytics
Enhanced filter search functionalities
Search results outside selected data: Sometimes you can’t find what you are looking for using the main analytics search (🔎) because results are outside the currently selected filters. No worries, this will not happen again. Sievo search is now more comprehensive than ever and you will easily find e.g. suppliers outside of your current selections. If search results are outside your current selections, a ‘Clear & Search’ button will appear. Clicking on this button will clear your current filters and display the results. Please note that locked filters won’t be cleared.
Selecting multiple search results: Selecting multiple search results is now also possible which is handy if you wish to select multiple results that are not next to each other in the list. There are a few limitations e.g. if selecting a certain category, you can only select materials belonging to that category. For more details on the functionality, please reach out to your Sievo representative.
Improvement to numeric codes starting with a zero (coming soon)
In rare cases, Sievo has incorrectly shown numeric codes starting with a zero (e.g. supplier account number 0486000 might have been shown as 486000 or 00486000). We have now fixed this so that there won’t be additional zeros added or removed from the codes within the Spend solution area. Please note that this does not affect the analytics values in any way, only the way numeric codes are displayed.
Remove bookmarks quicker
When deleting the bookmark, you will no longer need to confirm the removal. Instead, you’ll be able to undo any mistake by clicking the ‘Undo’ button that shows for 3 seconds. This change follows our renewed UI style to improve overall UX with bookmarks.
Improvements to the calendar
Calendar (month picker) now has an updated design based on our enhanced UI style. You can now also select multiple years simply by separately clicking the start and end month (instead of needing to drag while clicking).
Materials Forecasting
Forecast price change history
Change history feature provides an atomistic logging on who made and what changes to forecast figures. It serves two main purposes:
Spend Analytics
Dashboard loading times slashed
We have done a bunch of improvements to make your analytics dashboards open much faster when you first open Sievo. The latest improvement, which also added a layer of security was limiting the shared analytics bookmarks to 14 days whereafter the share link is deleted.
Additional bookmarks functionalities
You will be able to sort your bookmarks by solution area, creation date and alphabetical order, to make your bookmark management more powerful. You can even change the sorting criteria on-the-go based on you preference.
Savings program management
Saving program workflow notifications
You will start receiving Saving program workflow notifications soon. A notification (bell) icon will appear at the top of your navigation when you receive your first notification. This makes it a whole lot easier for you to get a glance on the approval requests and project updates right in the application. You will continue receiving the notifications also by email, to ensure you stay up to date even when you are not using Sievo.
You can send notifications from project item to
In case you need to adjust the steps where notifications are enabled or would like to modify the content of the notifications to better fit your company terminology, please reach out to our customer support.
Materials Forecasting
Support for fiscal years that are not aligned with the calendar year
Support for fiscal years that are not aligned with the calendar yearIf your company’s fiscal year is not the same as the calendar year, you definitely need all your forecasting and budgeting tools to support this set-up. We have now full support for this in our Materials Forecasting solution. Often a not-calendar based fiscal year can lead to cumbersome workaround needs in your software tools, but this is not the case here: we have been able to keep things usable and clear even in this often a bit confusing set-up.
Additional forecast adjustment fields
You sometimes need your budgeting and forecasting tools to support unique or uncommon data inputs. For this purpose we are delighted to introduce customer specific configurable forecasting adjustment fields. Just configure what additional input you want to include to the forecasting adjustment screen and you are good to go.
Solution Portfolio
Sievo’s New Solution Portfolio released!
Sievo’s Solution Portfolio communicates our whole solution landscape; its different solutions and all separate modules a customer can enjoy. It also communicates our focus areas and what we believe good Procurement Analytics is all about.
Now, Sievo Solution Portfolio has been re-arranged to better reflect our domain of Procurement Analytics and better emphasize our strengths and development focus. All familiar Sievo modules are there, and from now on our other communication will follow this structure as well.
Spend Analytics
New classification feedback workflow
Improving spend classification quality and ownership is easier than ever! Now any Sievo user can provide feedback or correct wrongly classified spend by: requesting a review of wrongly classified spend, suggesting the correct classification or even reclassifying to their own category. Previously, correcting mistakes required in most cases offline communication between user, super user and Sievo. With our new request and review workflow, users can directly suggest a better classification or correct classifications from the analytics user interface. New workflow in a nutshell:
All users can request a review of existing classifications and suggest corrections if they spot something has been misplaced.
Category owners are be able to review, approve, or forward those suggestions, getting full control of spend in their scope and leaving a trace of decisions easily available for future audit.
Super users can easily define roles (request a new classification, reclassify without approval, or approve requests) and classification scopes based on categories.
Analytics
Small improvements to bookmark feature
You might have noticed that occasionally loading your bookmarks take some time. We have now added a spinner to indicate that the loading is indeed happening. Also you will now get a notification if you have already reached the maximum limit of 100 bookmarks and you are trying to create a bookmark above that limit.
Bug fixes to Quick filter bar
A couple of small bugs have been fixed in Quick filter bar including the following:
Savings program management
Fine-tuned design for savings project list
We have aligned the savings project list look and feel with other solution areas to give you a user unified experience across Sievo.
Flexible configuration of organization, category and other hierarchical project fields
It’s now possible to configure hierarchical project fields independent from each other. These fields usually define if a project relates to a particular organisational unit, category or supplier. Please contact your Sievo representative to modify the following aspects of the fields:
Contract Management
In-document search page numbers and wildcard
When making a in document search, you’ll now see the document page number for the match. This will help you quickly find what you need if you have to open the attached document.
You can now also use a star sign i.e. wildcard (*) at beginning of your search phrase, if you only know the last part of the what you are looking for.
Materials Forecasting
Standard prices as forecast price source
Standard prices for materials can work as a good reference when doing price forecasting. Companies that use standard prices, can now easily integrated them into Sievo Materials Forecasting for users doing price adjustments. Standard prices can also be utilised by our Autopilot price forecasting feature.
Forecasting Purchase Price Variance
Purchase Price Variance (PPV) is often one of the key KPIs Finance wants to follow related to forecasting. When standard prices are integrated into our Materials Forecasting solution, we can automatically calculate forecast PPV for you. Of course we also have out-of-the-box PPV analytics available also. If you want to lear more about PPV check out this blog post on the topic: How to Calculate and Forecast Purchase Price Variance (PPV)
Forecast and budget volumes based on planning data sources
The easiest way to create volume forecasts is to extrapolate from historical spend data. The problem with this approach is that no matter how fancy your algorithms is, it will miss major shifts in the business environment. A better solution is to use planning data (such as MRP data) as a source. This data is based on the actual demand from production and customers, reflecting the real business outlook. Sievo now provides an easy integration of planing data from your ERP systems into our Materials Forecasting solution, to work as a volume source for your future budgets and forecasts.
Spend Analytics
Download 1 million transaction rows!
Now you can download up to one million rows of transactions directly from Sievo analytics. This improvement helps reviewing data in familiar tools like Excel, or sharing data with people outside Sievo i.e. to negotiate with a supplier about the prices for a certain material. To download, just hit the export button on the top right corner of the Transaction data dashboard and you will receive a link to the file in your email. Some key details about the feature:
Break by filters alphabetically ordered!
Finding the correct break by to apply filters in the exclusion and heuristic classification tool, has become easier than ever! Now you will find the correct break faster, as they are arranged alphabetically instead of the order they where added in.
Analytics
New functionality in Self-service Pivot chart!
Together with the improved Self-service, we have now added added a bunch of handy tools to the Self-service Pivot charts. Next to the Export button in top right corner, you can now find:
Pin open the analytics Quick Filter bar
To help you quickly add filters while working with dashboards, the quick filter bar can be now pinned open. Just click the pin arrow icon in the top right corner of quick filters and it won’t hide any more (as in the main navigation bar). This feature works across all Sievo dashboards.
Appropriate amount of decimals in Self-service for better legibility
We will be changing the amount of decimals shown for each measure in the self-service table and pivot charts. This will help you go through the numbers faster, when you see them in a familiar formatting. Here is a few examples of how the measures will be formatted:
Added security and speed to sharing bookmarks
Links to your shared bookmarks will now expire in 14 day to add security and speed up opening the shared dashboards. To ensure continued access to the shared view (received link), the recipient will need to save it as their own bookmark. If you need access to a view which link has expired, please ask the sender of the link to send a new link to the same view again. This update will not affect your own saved bookmarks in any way.
Dashboard permissions to restrict visibility and improve usability
We’ve received a lot of requests to restrict the view of certain dashboards to a particular group of users. Well, now you can! With help of dashboard permissions, user access to Analytics dashboards can be easily controlled and restricted when needed. The permissions enable creation of multiple permission groups with varying access rights. This also enables restricting access to certain dashboard within one Sievo solution area e.g. Spend instead of only restricting access to full solution area.
Your Sievo contact person will help set up the access groups, whereafter Sievo Super users can freely manage the access rights of individual users.
Savings program management
Title and organization added to notification recipient list
Finding the correct approver for your project is sometimes tricky in large organizations. We have now made it easier, by adding job title and the organization of your colleagues, to the notifications recipient view. You can also search for the title and organisation, if you are unsure of the recipients name.
All project stages in one glance
We have added a visual workflow to the project list, helping you to get an overview of your projects’ stage. The visual workflow helps you see each project stage, in one glance. Use the top right list settings, to manage what columns you see in the list, and toggle the visuals on and off.
In-document search for attached contract documents
You can now search for text within the attached contract documents, using the new free-text search functionality. You’ll find the search in the top right corner of a individual contract. This will make it a whole lot easier for you to manage your contract documents and find details of the contract without opening each attached document separately. Search works with the most common document types, including scanned PDFs and even images, as we utilize optical character recognition when indexing the documents.
Supporting multiple data sources for your contracts
We now support multiple data sources in our contract analytics. No matter what system you are using to manage your contracts, we want to provide a unified contract analytics experience and help you to combine your contract data with spend. With the contract dashboards, you’ll get a view on your contract coverage and expiring contracts. With self-service you can take a closer look at the contract details.
General features
Notifications in Sievo
You will soon start receiving notifications in Sievo, to help you keep track of things like savings projects, expiring contracts and reclassification requests. The notification bell icon will appear on top of your main navigation when you receive your first notification. We will be adding many more notifications, so please let us know what you would like to be notified of using this form.
Sievo Academy
New learning videos added!
We have added new content to the training section, including the often desired ‘What is spend in Sievo?’ – video, which explains you what data is used in Sievo Spend Analysis and why it might be different than in your ERP systems. We’ve also added a training video on the Supplier Risk dashboard. Check it out to fine tune your skills on using the dashboard, see the high-level picture of the risk distribution, as well as taking actions to find alternative suppliers with favourable risk scores for your current high risk suppliers.
Analytics
Improved Self-Service usability
Self-Service analytics has been redesigned to highlight its multiple features and provide a better experience for new users. The new style also aligns with our new user interface style we are rolling out across all our solution areas. The design will help users find all the self service features including:
Control amount of price decimals you see in Self-Servic
Self-Service table and pivot charts now have an option to change the number of decimals shown in price measures. When you select the price measure, a button will appear in top right corner that increase [+] and or decrease [-] the amount of decimals you see.
Decimal amount in Self-Service table and pivot charts
All measures in the Self-Service table and pivot charts are shown with two decimals by default. The measure formats can be now configured by a Sievo consultants to show a different amount of decimals (the change will apply to all Sievo users in your organisation). For instance, the price format can be changed to be shown with four decimals, to increase the level of detail.
Month selector bug fixed
The analytics month selector now guides you to first select the start month of the range you want to view, before selecting the end month (e.g. selecting 1/2020 before 12/2020). This fixes a bug that sometimes appeared when you first selected the end month.
Materials Forecasting
Forecast mode based on material segments
Last month we introduced Price Forecast Autopilot feature which allows you to set our Forecasting Engine to automatically determine new prices for selected forecast rows. Now we have taken things one step further and enabled Forecasting Engine to automatically decide which forecast mode to use – whether a forecast row can be handled by Autopilot or if Manual user input is expected.
This is achieved by utilizing material segmentation, which divides materials into high impact materials requiring extra scrutiny from procurement and to those that have less impact and do not need to be manually inspected at least every forecast round. Segmentation is based on historical spend and price volatility data. Materials are divided into 4 different segments, which can then be assigned to use Autopilot or Manual forecast mode as desired.
Spend Analytics
Target search i break-by filters
You can now use quotation marks (“) to searching for a specific item in the break-by filters of the classification heuristic tool. Adding quotation marks will significantly speed up the search by only looking for exact matches and not searching for all potential matches (wild card search).
Sievo Academy
Training videos added
Sievo Academy team has been busy creating new instructional videos. You can now find several training videos on Spend Analysis, Payment Term Tracking, Savings Program Management, Market Benchmarking and User Management on Sievo’s Training Page. Also if you are a new user, it is worth to check the videos under general section to make sure you get the smoothest start with your Sievo tool.
You’ll find the Training page under your name, at the bottom of the side navigation. We would love to hear your feedback and ideas on future videos.
Analytics
Global filters now keep your selections across all of Sievo
Now it’s quick and easy to look at the same selections across Sievo. With global filters your selections follow you between dashboards and solution areas. This means you won’t lose the filters you’ve selected when navigating between e.g. Supplier 360 to Payment Term Opportunities in Spend or from Spend Analysis to Savings Program Management. Have a try by selecting a category and part of your organisation in one dashboard view, then jumping into another dashboard or solution area. Your filter selections will persists between different login sessions in the same browser tab, but will be reset if you open a new browser tab. Please note that filters like project owner that only apply to a certain solution area will be dropped when moving between solution areas.
Faster filter search
We have improved the speed and stability of the filter search. Now your search hits will appear quickly and be applied immediately without slowness or freezing.
New design for Analytics header
The Analytics header bar has been updated to better fit browser windows on all devices: computer, tablet and mobile. The new style aligns with the sleek user interface update we are introducing in all our solution areas.
Savings Program Management
Tooltips on the input form are now easier to find
We have improved visibility of the Savings project input form tooltips. All fields that have a tooltip now show a small info icon next to the title. By mousing over, you will be given more instructions on how to fill in a specific field. This removes mistakes and speeds up creating new savings projects.
Improved stability of the input form
We have fixed a bug that caused the input form to occasionally crash when the page was refreshed and project had been closed on another tab.
Materials Forecasting
Price forecast Autopilot
Our new price forecast Autopilot makes materials price forecasting much more effective. High-impact materials still warrant close scrutiny from Procurement professionals, but a large number of less important materials can be automatically handled by our new price forecast Autopilot. Autopilot automatically fills new forecast and budget rounds based on best available price data. Don’t worry if you don’t yet trust the machine fully, you still have full control over where Autopilot is applied and when you want to handle things the good old manual way.
Enhanced price forecast adjustment experience
While creating the Autopilot, we also made big improvements on the ways you can manually adjust forecast prices. You will now see several reference price points when adjusting forecasts manually. You can also copy these reference prices and keep adjusting them to your liking. Editing a single monthly price and multiple months is now simple and intuitive to do in one go. Don’t worry if you are forecasting more than 12 months, the user interface also adapts well to longer forecast horizons.
User experience
Collapsible Navigation
We updated the look and structure of the side navigation. All links will now be organised in their parent category, which can be collapsed to offer you a compact and focused view. The style of the navigation has also been reviewed, to support more intuitive exploration.
Savings program management
Personalise the project list and jump seamlessly to analytics
We have revamped the user experience of the Savings Program Management – Project List. You will now be able to manage the project list columns in order to see the project details most relevant to you. You can also jump straight to the project list from analytics without losing your filters to see the underlying projects behind the savings figures. We will be rolling out the improvements to all new analytics customers within the next months, please contact your customer representative if you want to know more.
Use project list to
Spend Analysis
Get more out of Payment Term Tracking
Our most recent developments on Payment Terms Tracking module will serve you to identify better opportunities and get more accurate KPIs. We have enhanced our Outlier detection mechanism, and added Payment status and Due-to-pay measurements.
Spend Forecasting
Currency impact
Comparing how prices change between budgets, forecasts and actuals is one of the key analysis in Direct Materials Forecasting. In addition to changes in the real purchase price, these variances can also be caused by changes in currency rates. This currency impact can now be isolated from the “real” price changes to give a better understanding on price changes and their drivers.
Use latest purchase currency instead of default currency
Procurement people inputting and checking forecast prices usually want to work with the purchase currency used for the specific material and purchase location. So instead of using system currency, we can now use the last used purchase currency from Spend data to determine the forecast currency.
Users can change currencies
Even when using the latest purchase currency to populate forecasts, users still sometime want to work with some other currency. Now it is possible to change currencies when adjusting forecast prices and the currency values are automatically converted with appropriate currency rates.
General
Introducing Sievo Academy training videos
We’ve added new exciting content to Sievo’s Training Page. Sievo’s newly established Academy team has produced the first set of general training videos for all Sievo users and the Savings Program Management Playbook has also been recently released. At the same time we have removed some general content from the page.
The first set of videos will include both general tips for using the product as well as practical training material about some of the Sievo’s different solution areas. You’ll find the training page below your name, at the bottom of the side navigation. We will continue producing more materials for our users and would love to hear your feedback.
Recommended browsers are Chrome and new Microsoft Edge
From March 2021 onwards Sievo recommended browsers are Chrome and new version of Microsoft Edge. Microsoft stops supporting old Edge browser to make way to new Edge and consequently, we strongly recommend that all old Edge users start using Sievo in the new version for the best user experience.
More information about sunsetting the old Edge version is available on Microsoft’s own website. The most visible change to users is the web browser logo.
Supplier Risk Analytics NEW!
Sievo is proud to rollout our new Supplier Risk module. Supply continuity, costs, and reputation can be impacted by suppliers in many ways. External data providers can monitor news and other sources for signals of increased risks in terms of e.g. financial risks, natural disasters and reputation related risks. Systematic risk management starts with risk visibility, which many risk data providers offer. Linking supplier risk scores with spend data in Sievo gives procurement stakeholders a view across the whole supplier base and contextualizes risk, in the tools they already use.
The new supplier risk analytics:
We’ve also updated the Sievo Spend Analysis Playbook to include the new analytics.
Spend Forecasting
Forecast adjustments with seamless analytics integration
We have completely re-designed how users adjust forecast prices. Instead of managing everything in a one huge Excel-like grid, we have created separate controls to suit the different kinds of adjustment needs. Currently we support percentage adjustment of multiple forecast rows in one go, as well as detailed adjustment of single forecast rows. The Forecast Adjustment functionality has also been integrated seamlessly with Analytics, which enables near real time updates of adjustments to all Forecasting Analytics so that users can see the effect of their input immediately. Another benefit is that all our great Analytics functionalities (such as search, filters, drill-down, and configurable reports and views) are available to users when doing forecast adjustment.
Benchmarking
Mintec API integration
Mintec is a leading provider of global food pricing and index data. Using the Mintec API integration, Sievo customers can automatically integrate Mintec data to be used for different Analytics solutions.
Analytics
Market Benchmarking in New analytics
New and improved visualizations for comparing market development to purchase price development. The new charts include automatically calculated market opportunities and exposure to raw materials / commodities, as well as freely usable comparison tools of own purchases against the market.
Spend
Reclassification in analytics to correct mistakes and teach AI
No matter how well classification work is done, there are always mistakes. Previously, correcting these mistakes required in most cases offline communication between user, super user and Sievo. With our new reclassification in analytics functionality, users can directly correct classifications from the analytics user interface. So, in short, when a user encounters a mistake, she can just click and reclassify the spend to the right category. This action will not only correct the select spend’s classification, but also work as further input for the machine learning process. Users can be given rights to reclassify any spend, or to only reclassify within a given category level (level 1 / level 2 / level 3).
Analytics
Accessible analytics colors
You have given us a lot of valuable feedback on the accessibility of the analytics graphs. We want to make sure Sievo works for every single user, which is why we will be updating the analytics colour pallet to strike a beautiful balance between accessibility and harmony (colors are both distinguishable and fit together). The change will make it easier to read graphs containing several data points (colors) as they can be distinguished, even with that old projector or monitor. We apologize for the inconvenience this might cause, as some graphs will look different from last month. Please bear with us, as this will hugely improve the legibility of all graphs, especially line charts.
Savings program management
Realized Savings Measurement available in New Analytics
Realized Savings Measurement helps procurement and finance align their view on procurement contribution by isolating the external impacts that drive spend change. Realized Savings Measurement is now available in the New Analytics, with fresh look, enhanced user experience and all the familiar features of the New Analytics platform such as bookmarks and self service. With the standard set of dashboards, you’ll get a view on your realized price savings, main drivers for spend change and material level details.
Spend
Classification explanation dashboard
Users can now explore an explanation for classification decisions in a dedicated dashboard. This includes an explanation for how, why and when the classification was performed and who is responsible. Previously explanations had to be requested from super users and Sievo support, and we hope this new dashboard will help clarify most classification decisions without the need to ask others.
Analytics
Bookmarks search and mobile
We have added a search functionality to bookmarks. This will help you quickly locate the bookmark you are looking for. You will also be able to access your bookmarks on a mobile device.
Spend
Supplier segmentation
Users can now update supplier segmentation values directly in the analytics interface. The capability to segment suppliers is a cornerstone for effective procurement strategy. Previously this was possible in Sievo, but had to be done in the background by super users. Now we have launched a new functionality that enables end users to manage supplier segmentation information directly in the Supplier 360 page. Enabling the feature is easy! Contact your Customer Development Manager to have more information on how to take it in use.
In details
Analytics
Quick options in Self-service
Quick options have been added to Spend Analysis Self-service, meaning that we have defined some basic charts that will show up as quick options when no chart has yet been created. This will make it even faster to get started with the self-service! Note that the feature will only be enabled if your organization has the standard measures and dimensions in use.
Analytics last refresh time displayed
The last time analytics data has been published can now be seen from an info tooltip on each chart by hovering over it.
Bugs fixed
Thank you for reporting these bugs!
Analytics
Improved calendar
We have improved the Analytics calendar to simplify it and boost performance of the Analytics Dashboards. The calendar now acts as a simple one-way range selector – select the time range you wish to analyze, and you are good to go! Previously, the calendar reflected the time range where your current selection had data. In essence, the time range shown in the calendar would change to reflect for example a supplier selection. Now, the time range that is displayed in the calendar object is more consistent – and charts work the exact same way as before.
Bookmark updates
We have improved the Analytics bookmarks, both in stability and performance. There have been issues with bookmarks disappearing, and now that hole has been patched. As for performance, we have fine-tuned their logic in the background to make them open faster. While your old bookmarks will still work, we recommend you to open old bookmarks and save them again to get the best performance!
Spend Analysis
Supplier responsibility analytics
Sievo has partnered with leading global sustainability ratings provider Ecovadis to create a Supplier responsibility dashboard for Spend Analysis. Ecovadis scores suppliers in 21 criteria in 4 areas of corporate social responsibility (CSR): environment, labor & human rights, ethics and sustainable procurement.
This data is then matched to your spend & supplier data in Sievo to give you an overview of your supplier base’s responsibility performance in our new Supplier responsibility dashboard:
The new integration means you can:
Sievo Responsibility dashboard requires a contract with Ecovadis.
Supplier diversity analytics
Sievo is proud to rollout our new Supplier diversity dashboard. Supplier diversity is a way to create a more inclusive supply chain for small business and e.g. women or minority owned businesses that have historically been underrepresented.
The new dashboard:
We’ve also updated the Sievo Spend Analysis Playbook to include these 2 new dashboards.
Spend forecasting
Spend Forecasting available with New Analytics
With Spend Forecasting Procurement, Finance and Business people can establish a solid, fact-based view on how direct material costs affect future gross margins. Spend Forecasting is now available with the improved look and feel, and enhanced usability that Sievo’s New Analytics platform provides.
Analytics
Selecting multiple levels of a dimension in Self-service
It is now possible to select multiple levels of a dimension in self-service. By default, the top level is selected, but if a certain level is selected manually, then selecting other levels adds/removes them from the visualisation. How sweet is that!
Select all levels brought back to tables and pivot tables in Self-service!
We heard you, so we brought back the popular “select all levels” option to tables and pivot tables. In the same go, we renamed the “default” option to “dynamic” as that makes more sense in the tool. Additionally, this fixes a bug with old bookmarks not opening if they had all levels selected.
Load spinner improvements
Load spinners in charts have been adjusted to be greyscale and a tad smaller, to be easier on your eyes.
CSV chart export
It is now possible to export all charts in CSV format in addition to XLSX and image. Cool!
Selection area of year in calendar expanded
We have improved the analytics calendar usability so that selecting multiple years is now easier. The whole “box” of the year can now be used to select a year, whereas previously users had to land on a smaller circular area to make a successful selection.
Bug fixes
Tables and pivot table columns can once again be resized. Opening the dimension level menu highlights selected levels properly, and does not freeze the page if an old bookmark is opened. Thank you for reporting these bugs!
Sievo Friends Online
June 3-4
Exciting announcements at Sievo Friends
Our biggest event of the year, Sievo Friends is here soon. The development teams can barely hold their excitement from all the announcements we have upcoming. Don’t tell anyone you heard it here, but we might even be releasing a new solution area 
Want to be the first one to know about all the new & cool stuff, you can tell your boss about?
Check out the topics and reserve your seat at
sievo.com/sievofriends
Performance
New storage brings speed
Improving speed is one of our key focus areas, which is why we revamped our whole storage system during the last maintenance break. We’re now running high bandwidth, ultra-low latency all NVMe flash storage… well you get the point, we did a lot 
. This vastly improves speed and enables more frequent software updates across Sievo.
Authentication
New authentication service
We have worked on Sievo’s User Management to make it more intuitive and easy to use, and to facilitate communication of new access requests. Users can now reset forgotten passwords themselves and super users can create and invite multiple users at one go. We also support Single-Sign On with SAML 2.0.
Procurement data hub
Mintec and Basware cooperation
We are happy to announce two new data providers to the Sievo platform. You can now compare your spend with Mintec price indexes and enrich your spend with Basware purchase-to-pay data.
Analytics
Improved Error messages
We have improved our error messages – this eases fixing any encountered errors and ensures that if you need to contact Sievo support, all the needed information is already in the error message displayed on the screen. This way, we will be able to fix any issues even faster than before!
Corona Response Dashboards
free to use for all Sievo customers
We have launched a new Corona Response Analytics Dashboard, ready for implementation for all Sievo Spend Analysis customers. Use the dashboard to track the epidemic impact on your suppliers and take actions to mitigate risks. The dashboard combines daily epidemiology status from Johns Hopkins Hospital with supply chain data from Riskmethods, and of course your existing Sievo spend and supplier data. We can also bring in other 3rd party data sources from your contracted data providers (e.g. Dun & Bradstreet or Bureau van Dijk). The dashboard is free to use during H1 (an implementation fee applies) and can be implemented within 48 hours.
Use the dashboard to
— Download the Corona dashboards explained presentation —
Please Contact your Sievo representatives for additional information on enabling the dashboard.
Analytics
Stacked bar chart has been changed to default in Self-service!
Due to a large number of customer requests, this has now been set as the default when creating bar charts in self-service, saving some unnecessary clicks!
Self-service charts now follow the customer locale settings!
Now all charts created in self-service use the correct thousand separator and decimal separator.
New Analytics
Copying cell values from tables and pivot tables
It is now possible to copy a cell value directly from a table or pivot table in Analytics dashboards, including Self-service! In tables, highlight the cell value by click and drag, and the use CTRL+C to copy the value. In Pivot table, simply right-click and copy the value.
Fiscal time support
It is now possible to configure the New Analytics calendar to reflect your organization’s fiscal calendar. Once the fiscal calendar has been set up all your Sievo users will be able to see the analytics in fiscal time. Please be in contact with your customer development manager to set up your calendar.
Savings program management
Project analytics updated in minutes (new analytics)
We have drastically reduced the time it takes for changes in savings programs to be visible in analytics. No more waiting until the next day before to see how changes in individual programs affect your overall savings, just grab a coffee and the analytics will be updated in minutes. The functionality is not yet available to everyone as we are still working to fine tune the data handling. Please contact your Sievo representative if you want to be included in piloting the feature.
Contract management
New Analytics available for Contract Management
New analytics is now available for Contract Management! Take a glance at your contract coverage figures and contract portfolio with new intuitive dashboards, and build your own reports with self-service. Please contact your Sievo representative for additional information.
To celebrate the new decade, we took a look back to see how much Sievo usability has improved. Sievo usability is crucial to ensure all our users are able to easily find all the insights relevant to them. Here are some highlights of the great features we’ve released during the past year.
New Analytics
With New Analytics we took huge leaps in visualizing data in a user-friendly way. The intuitive and simple to use features like filtering give different types of users full control to see how their procurement is developing.
Self-Service Analytics
One of the most commended features of New Analytics is the ability to create any chart on the fly. This gives users the ability to build any type of chart so that they can focus on exactly the information they need.
Simplified navigation
The simplified left-hand navigation made it very easy to jump between dashboards. This allows users to quickly look at the data from all the various aspects to make sure nothing is overlooked.
Intuitive user interface
Last year we made huge improvements in simplifying and harmonising the user interface. This makes it easier for users to find and focus on relevant information without distractions.
Mobile optimized
New Analytics including self-service is fully responsive which means that you can use it on any device from desktop to mobile. This helps users on the fly check data quickly e.g. in a supplier negotiation.
Speed
A main focus area of last year’s development was improving speed. This is a tricky task with the vast amount of data Sievo crunches, but we made significant progress and will be continuing the work in to 2020.
New Analytics to all customers
Currently we are working hard to make sure users see the benefit of all these improvements by rolling out New Analytics to all customers at full speed.
Analytics
Selecting multiple years from calendar
It is now possible to select multiple years from the calendar by clicking on the first year, and then dragging the mouse over the following years. Neat!
Performance improvement
We have improved our software performance in Analytics, so now you should enjoy good performance throughout usage, even in longer sessions!
Savings program management
Stay on top of project step
We have enhanced the notification messages to help users track when projects move from from one step to another. You can now edit the pre-filled email notification subject and select who you want to send the notification to (cc field).
Contract management
Export recent contracts
It is now possible to export the ‘Recent contracts’ directly from the Contract Management front page. The export functionality works the same way as in the other contract lists.
Define require attention timespan
Companies can define the timespan for the ‘Contracts requiring attention’ list. The default is 6 month but it can be defined freely to whatever fits your organisational needs e.g. one, three or twelve months. Please contact Sievo if you want to change this configuration.
Savings program management
New Analytics available for SPM
New analytics dashboards are now available for Savings Program Management! New SPM analytics brings a totally new user experience for viewing, saving and building self-service charts. Please contact your Sievo representative for additional information.
Project management (under development)
We are in the process of re-designing the savings project list page. Currently we are conducting user interviews to make sure we meet all the requirements. Next year we’ll be introducing this cool new page that allows you to see what’s going on with all your projects in one glance.
Analytics
Responsive charts
Self-service charts have been optimized to better use the space available on all screen sizes! Also, the chart options now have a little more space and do not overlap with content in small screens.
Deleting bookmarks
Deleting a bookmark is now a whole lot safer: the icon has been moved farther from the copy icon to reduce misclicks, and a confirmation to delete a bookmark has been added so users don’t accidentally delete important bookmarks!
Training material
General training material
You will now find general training material at the bottom of the new left hand navigation. Here you’ll see introductions to all the Sievo services and tips on how to fully utilise Sievo. We will keep updating the material so have a look every now and then.
Add and manage training material (Super users)
Super users can now add and manage company specific training material. Just click the edit icon (pen) on the training page to add and manage training material. You can add quick links to videos or documentation on e.g. your company intranet.
Permissions to manage training, news and logo
Any user can be granted the permission to manage training material, the news feed and company logo. Please contact Sievo support to request management permissions.
Contract management
Open-ended validity for documents
It is now possible to assign open-ended validity period to documents even when contract validity period is different, or the start date of document validity period is different from contract’s start date.
Analytics
Bookmarking and sharing charts
Sievo bookmarks feature is released! This allows users to save and share dashboard with filters, time range and all the self-service options. You’ll find the feature in the top right corner of analytics. Note that you have to be logged in to Sievo for the bookmark to open the correct page.
Mobile friendly analytics
Analytics and the side navigation are now mobile optimized. You can access it on any mobile device browser using the same URL as you do on your computer. Some companies have restricted access to Sievo only from the office network. We are still working to improve the mobile experience, send any suggestions to our support team.
Filter search dimension
Usability of filter has been improved by moving the filter search button next to current selections
Export chart as image
Charts can be downloaded as an image using the menu on the top right corner of each chart.
Export self-service pivot
Exporting data from pivot table in self-service contains information of all levels, no matter opened or closed.
Self-service chart types
Self-service chart options (e.g. chart orientation) have been made clearer and moved to the top right corner of the chart area where it’s easier to find.
Improved accessibility
Analytics charts color palette has been optimized for users with vision impairments like colour blindness and support browser extensions like high contrast and inverted colours. The main navigation and analytics function buttons support screen reader and keyboard navigation.
New chart types supported
We now support several new chart types like sankey, container and trellis.
Home page
News publishing (super users)
News management users can publish and manage the front-page news articles. Manage news by clicking the pen icon next to the news on the front page. Currently news articles are static text but we will shortly be adding the option to add a link.
Company logo (super users)
Users can update the home page company logo. The feature is located on theAdministrationpage underManage logo.Please always use a logo with a transparent, not white background (e.g. png file format).
Market Data
Manage your own indexes
You can now easily import your own indexes in excel format and edit values in the Sievo user interface
New index provider added
Enjoy the commodity market data provided by The World Bank. New data added every month.
Bug fixes
– Reporting issue fixed where the left navigation caused the vertical scrollbar to be hidden
– Analytics Internet Explorer 11 Self-service usability issues fixed
Known issues
– Analytics Self-service stacked bar chart with 2 dimensions and 1 measure does not render
– Analytics image export does not currently work with Sankey chart and scatter plot
Upcoming maintenance breaks
Next maintenance break on Saturday 28 – Sunday 29 September
Sievo has launched a new feature to our fresh analytics solution: bookmarks! You can now save shortcuts to your recurring reports and share findings and new reports with your colleagues.
Usage is very simple:
See the bookmarks in action:
The bookmark will not only save your selections, but it will remember the dashboard you were working on, so you will always get back to the view you saved. Go back to your other saved bookmarks by just clicking on its name or have a look at a previously done chart in the Self Service.
Bookmarks are a great way to share relevant insights with your colleagues, use the copy function to share them around with other logged-in Sievo users in your organization*.
*If your colleague has different access rights than you do, the bookmark will not show the same data.
Together with this new feature, other graphic improvements are available in Sievo:
*If your colleague has different access rights than you do, the bookmark will not show the same data.
Sievo has launched a new way to enrich your internal data with external data sets such as market indexes within your procurement analytics dashboards.
We have added automated, monthly index updates by leading indexes such as The World Bank and the London Metal Exchange to support your price vs. index development comparison and market impact calculations. Easy access to follow relevant indexes and see in your analytics how you perform against market trends.
How to utilize Market Indexes in Sievo?
In this video we introduce the market data management tool in action and give multiple examples how one can utilize market data in Sievo reporting.
You will learn how to:
– Combine your spend data with the market data
– Find out how you are doing against the market in specific categories
– Do ad hoc analysis of price development over the years
– Benefit from the automatic price opportunity calculations by material, unit or supplier
– Calculate the procurements performance against the market over the year
