SAP Learning Journey

Configuring the Goal Plan Categories

Objectives
After completing this lesson, you will be able to:

After completing this lesson, you will be able to:

  • Describe the Balanced Scorecard, create and manage categories used in the goal plan

Category Elements and Definitions

Category Element

Categories are used to organize goals in a goal plan. When creating the goal, the user chooses which category the goals should be listed under. Once a goal is created, a user may change the category by editing the goal. The number of categories on a goal plan depends on the customer requirements and needs.

The <category> element is used to configure categories in the goal plan template XML.

Default Category Element

The <default-category> or catch-all category is the one that defaults for the user when a new goal is created. If another category is not specified during the goal creation process, it is placed in this category.

Categories can be organized in the order that the customer decides, but the <default-category>, if defined, will always be the latest category displayed in the goal plan.

Note
Some considerations about the <default-category> element:
  • It is not mandatory to specify a <default-category> in your goal plan template.
  • The <default-category> assignment can only be changed from XML.
  • The <default-category> cannot be reordered. It is locked in Manage Templates and attempting the change in XML would trigger an error, due to the order of elements.

Configuration of Categories

Configuration in Manage Templates

In Manage Templates, you can add, delete, rename, and change the order categories (except for the default-category, if defined, it will always be placed at the end of the categories).

By default, the extended goal plan templates use the Balanced Scorecard, but customers can customize the categories to their liking.

Note

When categories are created from Manage Templates, we cannot determine the category ID. System will assign IDs as New Category, New Category (2), New Category (3) and so on. Recommendation would be to change category IDs, and the step can only be done in XML.

Watch this video to learn about configuring the Goal Plan categories in Manage Templates.

Configuration in XML

Categories are set up using the category element. Within the category element, there must be a category ID and a category name.

The category ID appears in reports and can only be configured in the XML. The category name is what appears in the instance.

It is best practice to have the category ID and category name be as similar as possible. In addition, exotic characters should not be used in the category IDs .

Caution
Do not set the category ID to a number. Numbers are not intuitive when the customer is running reports. The category ID is case and space sensitive; using spaces is not recommended.

The <default-category> element

The <default-category> has the following considerations:

  • There is only one <default-category> that can be configured as such in the XML template
  • The <default-category> always comes after the last </category> defined in the XML template. Not following the right order of elements will mean that the XML template will not validate against the DTD.

The figure, Default Category Element, shows the XML set up a default category.

Category Minimums and Maximums

As learned in the previous unit, you can set the minimum and maximum number of goals and weights at the category level, in addition to the goal plan level. Each category can have its own minimum and maximum values set.

If the plan does not meet the conditions set, a soft warning appears on the goal plan. A soft warning is not strictly enforced; there is nothing stopping the user from exceeding the configured limits.

Here is an example of how to configure category weights and counts in XML.

Minimums and Maximums:

Weights: The total weight for Financial goals should be between 25% and 50%.

Counts: Financial goals should be between a minimum of 2 and maximum of 4 in total.

Code snippet
<category id="Financial" min-weight="25" max-weight="50" min-goals="2" max-goals="4"> <category-name>Financial</category-name> </category>Expand

Watch the video below to learn how to configure Goal Plan categories in XML.

Configure Categories

Business Example

You are required to add and modify categories in the instance and the goal plan XML template.

Learn how to configure categories in the Goal Plan from Manage Templates and XML.

ExerciseStart Exercise

Steps

  1. Create and rename a category in the instance.

    1. Navigate to Manage Templates using Action Search.

    2. Choose the Goal Plan tab.

    3. Select the template you have been working with and expand Edit Categories.

    4. Choose the first category and change the label to any label you choose.

    5. Select Add a New Category.

    6. In the Label field, enter the label of your choice.

    7. To change the order of the categories, hover over the left-hand side of the category name until six small dots appear, and then select the dots to drag and drop the categories into a different order.

    8. As an optional step, you can select and delete a category of your choice (but do not delete the default-category Other).

    9. Choose Save.

  2. Create and rename a category in the XML template.

    1. Log into Provisioning and navigate to Import/Export/Update Objective Plan Templates.

    2. Find the goal template that you have been working with and click the Export icon.

    3. In the XML editor, locate the <category> tags.

    4. Between the <category-name> tags, change the name that will display to end users for any category of your choice.

    5. Copy the code of a category and paste it into the XML. Change the ID and name of the copied category. Move the category into the order you would like the end user to see.

  3. Modify the default category in the XML template.

    1. In the XML editor, locate the <default-category> and change the label.

      If you are unsure of where the default category should be located in the XML tree structure, check the DTD.

  4. Define minimum and maximum weights and numbers of goals per category in the XML template.

    1. In the XML editor, choose a category and modify the minimum and maximum goals per that category. For example, you could set the following values:

      • max-goals="3"

      • min-goals="1"

      If you are unsure of where to place the max and min attributes within the category element in the XML tree structure, see the DTD.

    2. Choose a different category and modify the minimum and maximum weight per that category. For example, you could set the following values:

      • max-weight="25.0"

      • min-weight="10.0"

  5. Validate, save-as a new version, and import the file into Provisioning.

  6. Log into the instance, and navigate to Home → Goals. To verify that the end user will see the correct configuration, try creating goals to exceed / not meet the minimums and maximums you created in the XML.

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