Crystal Reports and SQL Reports

Typical Client Requirements
Reports are the windows on the world. Once a firm bears the burden of getting the data into the database, it becomes possible to dice and slice it to put a laser beam on whatever might need attention. Managers tend to need summary reports. It is surprising to me how often a vertical solution lacks an adequate set of built-in reports. Like with help pages, I've always suspected that reports tend to be the lowest priority in a development project, so that its team always seem to be racing the next self-imposed deadline and are always running late.

Solution Scenarios

I like to categorize reports into five types:
• Management Summary Reports,
• Management and Staff Exception Reports,
• Staff Query Reports to look up histories of a single customer or vendor,
• Utility Reports that fire automated data processing steps, and
• my least favorite, Detail Reports, which dump the most data and help the user the least.

I have been on several development teams that tended to relegate the writing of reports to the newest and youngest team member. But over the years I increasingly think this is a bad idea. It always seems to me that software vendors build their detail reports first and may not get much farther. Generally, the more useful the report, the more work involved in building it. In particular, summary and exception reports can be quite complex and can require highly advanced skills to build. I now see reports (and automation) as being the real opportunities to harvest the greatest return on investment for all the hard work already done. I like to say that any report longer than 10 pages is probably not very helpful. I like to ask users where their time really gets spent, and then I look for opportunities to "spoil" them. This is part of the quid pro quo I discuss elsewhere. To bring a long-run improvement to certain staff within an organization, I usually need to be able to pester them upfront to clarify requirements. This is a catch 22 since I am probably trying to help them precisely because they are already so busy. So, if I can knock off a couple reports along the way that helps them immediately, it typically goes a long way to earning trust during a larger effort.