In your planning process, there might be instances where you’d like to compare different planning scenarios, whether company-wide, department-wide, or even just one individual process or Application. You might want to try out “What-if” planning and be able to compare results. This article introduces Scenarios and shows how they can help with your planning process.
What are Scenarios for?
Scenarios let you see how different data inputs or formulas create different plans and compare them. The model’s structure remains consistent across Scenarios, allowing you to easily identify the changes made in data and formulas. You can visualize multiple scenarios side-by-side in Charts and Tables, to easily compare them.
Some things to keep in mind with Scenarios:
you can't perform calculations across Scenarios. For example, in Scenario A you can't sum the values of Scenario B, the same applies to referencing another Scenario’s data through formulas.
Lists, Transaction Lists, and Dimension Lists, must be consistent across Scenarios, meaning you can’t have one list in Scenario A and another in Scenario B.
What are the types of Scenarios?
When creating a new Scenario, it is very important to select the right type of Scenario. As once you have started to work on a particular Scenario you can’t change its type.
There are two types of Scenarios:
Shared Scenarios: can be used across different Applications. If you have the relevant permissions, new Scenarios are created as Shared Scenarios by default. If you prefer to create a Local Scenario, you just have to disable the “Shared Scenario” option in the Scenario creation form. Keep in mind, if your Application is using or will be using Shared Blocks from other Applications and you plan to change assumptions on these Blocks, you need a Shared Scenario.
Local Scenarios: the Scenario is created only in your Application and won’t be visible elsewhere. Data in Local Scenarios is never shared with other Applications via Shared Blocks. Shared Blocks used in the Local Scenario are those of the closest Shared Scenario.
ℹ️ Note
Scenarios can’t be converted from Local to Shared and vice versa. You must also be a Workspace Administrator in order to create a Shared Scenario.
How do Scenarios work with each other?
Once activated, a Default Scenario is created. This Scenario inherits all the existing data inputs and formulas. When creating any new Scenario, you get to define a Scenario to be the initial source of data. The new Scenario takes all of the existing data and formulas from the source Scenario.
How do Scenarios work with Access Rights and Permissions?
By default, those with Admin Permissions are able to create and delete Scenarios. Depending on your security configurations, you need to adjust permissions for users to work with Scenarios.
There are two permissions related to Scenarios:
Create Scenario: this allows the user to activate and deactivate the Scenario feature from the Scenario Tab, to create new Scenarios and set them as Read Only by selecting the “Prevent inputs” icon in the Scenario Selector dropdown.Delete Scenario: allows the user to delete existing Scenarios.
The access right per scenario depends on the configuration of the Role for the Member within the Application.
🎓 Resources
The following articles describe how a Security Admin can set up access rights for Scenarios in the workspace:
How to activate the Scenarios feature?
Scenarios are activated at the application level. You can access the Scenario management page by clicking on the Scenarios tab located at the bottom of the Sidebar. Only Workspace Admins have visibility on the Scenario tab and are allowed to activate it on a specific Application.
Once activated, the following new elements appear on the Application.
A centralized Scenario management page to view, add, edit and delete scenarios
A Scenario selector on Boards, Formulas, Tables and Metrics to switch between Scenarios.
A Compare Scenarios functionality within Boards and Views that allows for quick selection and comparisons.
A Default Scenario that will inherit all current data and formulas