The fifth menu option within the Settings area (Figure 1) is called Custom Data. The Custom Data section (Figure 2) of the Settings area provides Workspace Admins the ability to manage various metadata throughout Ruddr. Note that all custom data that you create/manage can be exported. See the Export Custom Data section of this article for more information.
Figure 1 - Custom Data in the Settings Area
Figure 2 - Snapshot of Custom Data Area
There are four types of custom data types that can be managed here:
Lookup Data
Lookup data refers to data that is used to assign a "Type" or "Assignment" to an entity in Ruddr. For instance, a time entry may be assigned a "Time Entry Type". Ruddr allows you to configure the values you would like to associate with a time entry. Before we get into how to manage this lookup data, here are the Custom Lookup Data fields that you can manage:
- Disciplines - Disciplines in Ruddr are used to group employees and project roles. For example, the employees in various project management roles can be assigned to a single Project Management discipline. Disciplines can be used to filter reports and analyze business performance
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Expense Categories - Expense categories are used for the individual line items on expense reports. Each expense line item must be assigned a category. For more information of managing expense categories, see the separate expense category article.
- Industries - Industries are applied to clients as a way to associate clients with a specific vertical. Reports can be filtered by industry.
- Invoice Items - Every line item on a Ruddr invoice must have an invoice item. The invoice item is the category of the charge to the customer, such as Service or Expense.
- Job Titles - Each workspace member can be assigned a job title. You can also filter reports by job title.
- Locations - Location can be assigned to clients and members in the workspace. The client filters and the member filters in reports include Location.
- Member Skills - Member skills can be assigned to each member in Ruddr. You can then filter reports by Member Skills.
- Payment Methods - Every payment in Ruddr can be assigned a Payment Method.
- Practices - Larger professional services companies often organize services offering and personnel into practices. You can assign a Practice to each member, client, and project in Ruddr. Reports can then be filtered by Practice.
- Project Types - Every project in Ruddr can optionally be assigned a project type. Assigning a project type helps you analyze the performance of specific segments of your project portfolio.
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Time Off Types - When a workspace member creates a time off entry, the member must select a Time Off Type. A standard set of time off types are created when the workspace is provisioned but you can tailor these to your organization's preferences.
- NOTE: There is one system-used Time Off Type of "Holiday". You can edit this Time Off Type. It can also be Deactivated. However, Ruddr will use this Time Off Type when automatically creating holiday time off entries when the workspace setting Automatically create holiday time off entries is enabled.
- NOTE: There is one system-used Time Off Type of "Holiday". You can edit this Time Off Type. It can also be Deactivated. However, Ruddr will use this Time Off Type when automatically creating holiday time off entries when the workspace setting Automatically create holiday time off entries is enabled.
When a new workspace is created, the creator must select a Professional Services Type (Figure 3). The lookup tables for Project Type and Discipline will have initial values that are based on the chosen professional services type.
Figure 3 - The Professional Service Type Dictates Default Lookup Data upon Creation of a new Workspace
Edit Lookup Values
To edit a lookup value, simply click the edit (pencil) icon on the row (Figure 4) that you wish to edit. This will open the edit drawer (Figure 5) for that custom data entity.
Figure 4 - Click on the Edit Icon to Edit a Custom Data Value
Figure 5 - Editing Lookup Data
Add Lookup Values
Above each lookup table is an New... button (Figure 6) that allows you to add a new item to the table. For example, to add a new Discipline to the Discipline lookup, simply click the button shown below.
Figure 6 - Add Button for Lookup Data
Delete or Deactivate Lookup Values
You can delete a lookup item if it is not currently in use within Ruddr. If the item is in use, then the Delete option will be disabled and you can only Deactivate the item (Figure 7). When a lookup item is deactivated, it can no longer be selected for new data entries in Ruddr but past entries will remain unchanged.
Figure 7 - Managing a Lookup Data Item
Organizational Data
Organizational Data refers to data that is unique to your organization, but does not necessarily factor in to the data or structure of Ruddr's primary entities (projects, clients, members). The various types of Organizational Data that can be managed in the Custom Data section are:
Workspace Roles and Rates
Leveraging Workspace Roles and Rates in Ruddr allows you to define, at a workspace level, a standard rate card for your organization. You can link clients within your workspace to these roles and rates, and then add those roles and rates to projects where clients leverage them. The workspace administrator can establish this rate card in the Custom Data section (Figure 8) of Workspace Settings.
Note that any changes to existing Workspace Roles and Rates in Custom Data will be reflected in all clients that link to these roles / rates.
Figure 8 - Set up a Standard "Rate Card" for your Workspace
Multicurrency
Workspaces that leverage Ruddr's multicurrency feature will have the ability to specify workspace roles and rates for each currency being used by the workspace.
Resource Placeholders
Resource placeholders (Figure 9) should be used when you are not certain which team member should be assigned to a project but want to assign the hours of the project to a "placeholder" role. Creating a resource placeholder (Figure 10) allows for the assignment of a practice and a discipline to the record. Assigning these values to a placeholder provides you with the ability to track resource needs at a more granular level across your organization and workspace.
Figure 9 - Create Resource Placeholders to track Tentative Project Assignments
When editing a Resource Placeholder (Figure 10), you can also set the average bill rate and average cost per hour for the placeholder. The average cost per hour is used when calculating the future projected cost, gross profit, and gross margin for a project. The average bill rate is used for calculating the future projected revenue on projects that do not have the Use Roles option turned on. For projects that use roles, the bill rate used to calculate projected revenue is the rate of the role assigned to the resource allocation.
Multicurrency
Note that when Ruddr's multicurrency feature is enabled in the workspace, admins may configure the currency for either or both of the average bill rate and average cost per hour values. In regards to the Rate Currency, the placeholder can only be allocated to projects that use that same currency.
Figure 10 - Provide Average Cost per Hour and Average Bill Rate for a Resource Placeholder
Holidays
Ruddr has several built-in, standard holidays, all of which can be managed within the Custom Data section (Figure 11). If your company observes a holiday that is not built-in, you can create a custom holiday (Figure 12). All holidays can be added to your holiday schedules. In the holidays list (Figure 11), you can filter the list of holidays by Holiday Schedule to see which holidays are associated with a particular schedule. Also, you can see the associated holiday schedule(s) for each holiday in the Holiday Schedule column of the list.
Figure 11 - Manage Holidays for Your Workspace
Figure 12 - Create a Custom Holiday to Accommodate a Data not Built into Rudd
Auto-creation of Holiday Time Entries
Note that you can configure Ruddr to automatically create holiday time off entries for your members. For more on that setting, please refer to this Time and Expense Settings section of the General Workspace Settings article in the Ruddr Help Center. For those workspaces that leverage Ruddr's BambooHR Integration, you may want to ensure that this setting is turned off if you handle holidays as PTO requests in BambooHR, as those would be synched via that integration and having this setting checked may result in duplicate holiday time entries.
Holiday Schedules
You can create multiple holiday schedules (Figure 13) for your workspace to accommodate personnel across multiple countries. A holiday schedule can be assigned to each member. Manage your holidays in the Holidays custom data, then assign multiple holidays to a holiday schedule (Figure 14).
Figure 13 - Manage Your Workspace's Holiday Schedules
Figure 14 - Assign Holidays to a Holiday Schedule
Tax Rates
Tax Rates are used to associate a invoice item with a specific tax rate percentage. These tax rates can then be used to apply tax to line items on Ruddr invoices. Edit / add Custom Tax Rates inline on the Tax Rates screen (Figure 15).
Figure 15 - Manage Custom Tax Rates for Your Workspace
Tags
Tags consists of metadata that allow you to define custom entity attributes that can be used to search for corresponding entities and to filter reports.
There are three types of Tags supported in Ruddr:
- Client Tags- Client Tags can be assigned to each client in Ruddr.
- Member Tags- Member Tags can be assigned to each member in Ruddr.
- Project Tags- Project Tags can be assigned to each project in Ruddr.
- Task Tags- Task Tags can be applied to project tasks in Ruddr.
Managing Tags
Tags can be edited / added / deleted via the corresponding Tag screen (Figure 16).
Figure 16 - All Three Types of Tags are Managed on their Respective Screen
Exporting Custom Data
All Custom Data can be exported to multiple formats: Microsoft Excel or Comma-Separated Values (CSV). To export any custom data values, navigate to the data screen by clicking on any of the boxes on the Custom Data Section (Figure 2). Then, click on the download icon (Figure 17) at the top-right of the screen. This will drop down a list of formats (Figure 18). Select the desired format for the data and then click the Download button (Figure 19) to download
Figure 17 - Download Your Custom Data
Figure 18 - Choose the Desired File Format
Figure 19 - Download the File Once it is Ready
Templates
Templates in Ruddr allow you to quickly create entities in Ruddr. You can create these templates with core data that defines the entity and apply the templates where appropriate.
Task Templates
Templates for project tasks (Figure 20) can be created and managed in the Custom Data section of Ruddr. Once created, these task templates can be added as tasks to projects in the workspace.
Figure 20 - Manage Task Templates for Project Tasks
When creating task templates (Figure 21), baseline information for tasks can be provided. For more on tasks and the various settings and properties that can be defined when added to projects, please refer to the Project Tasks article in the Ruddr Help Center.
Figure 21 - Provide Fundamental Task Information as Part of the Task Template