contents...if you do not know who your budget champion is, you can request access through the access...

`

Contents Section 1: BeanCounter Basics..................................................................................................... 3

BeanCounter - What is it? Why do I need to use this .............................................................. 3

How do I access BeanCounter .......................................................................................................... 3

The LifeCycle of a budget request .................................................................................................... 4

Understanding financial categories .................................................................................................. 4

Navigating BeanCounter ................................................................................................................... 5

Section 2: Budget Champions: Initial Setup and Administering BeanCounter ....... 8

Budget Champions: Managing your BeanCounter Teams, Projects and Sub projects ............. 8

Budget Champions: Managing User Roles and Access ............................................................... 11

Budget Champions & Organization admin: Target Management ............................................. 12

Scenario 1: Edit Target ..................................................................................................................... 13

Organization admin: re-org Management .................................................................................... 14

Section 3: Entering and Submitting requests ...................................................................... 15

Scenario 1: Reinvesting a prior FY line item (Copying existing BIDs to a new FY. ................... 16

Scenario 2: Entering a new line item .............................................................................................. 17

Scenario 3: Bulk requests ................................................................................................................. 24

Scenario 4: Partner Requests - Informing or charging other teams for your work ................. 25

Section 4: Reviews .......................................................................................................................... 26

Cleaning up line items prior to Reviews ........................................................................................ 26

Review Workflow, Reviewing Requests and Submitting Reviews .............................................. 26

Partial Review - Using the Review Page ........................................................................................ 29

Bulk Review - Using the Review Page ............................................................................................ 29

Recommending Budget Upgrades ................................................................................................. 31

Checking Budgeting Progress ......................................................................................................... 32

Section 5: Summary Page and Reporting .............................................................................. 32

Excel Reporting ................................................................................................................................. 33

Refreshing Your Report.................................................................................................................... 33

Section 6: Advanced Features .................................................................................................... 33

Exporting Requests to Excel ............................................................................................................ 33

Bulk Importing Requests ................................................................................................................. 34

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Section 7: Help and Feedback .................................................................................................... 35

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Section 1: BeanCounter Basics

BeanCounter - What is it? Why do I need to use this

Budgeting at Microsoft is hard. You probably know that already. BeanCounter was designed to

facilitate a partnership between Engineering and Finance so both groups better understand the needs,

process and impact of their asks and decisions. This tool allows our Engineering Teams to participate

in a 'Bottom Up' approach to Budgeting to help plan and organize asks, while at the same time helping

finance understand the ask details, relationships and impact. When used in conjunction with the

current 'Top Down' budgeting Finance runs we now have a common platform to meet, plan and

execute Reviews for an overall better experience on both sides. BeanCounter at it's core allows teams

to enter, iterate, validate and Review individual budget line items in MS Finance supported categories

with enough details to explain and articulate the impact of the request, while also providing the

necessary financial data along with these requests to be actionable by finance as an end result. Even if

you are a regular user, please browse the Budget Champion section of this document to better

understand the structure of BeanCounter.

What are changes in BeanCounter v4

- Multi-year support and ease of use improvements

o No more multiple websites for BeanCounter! Multi-year support for budget creation

let you use single BID for more than one year through reinvestment or create new BID

when planning,

o Submit more than one BIDs when planning a project:\

o Create multiple BIDs in the new request page and submit them all at once.

o Don’t have all the data you need but still want to make a request? You can do that

now! TBD data can now be entered for fields up through Director Review. (to get

funded details must be filled in)

- Home page and filtering improvements.

o New UI and filters! New quick filters and time slicer allows faster navigation through

data with the ability to quickly toggle through fiscal planning vs current fiscal year.

o Column sorting and pagination will be retained when taking actions or making

changes.

o Search for more than one BID at a time: Multiple BID search using page level search

option.

o Goodbye inconsistent BeanCounter Stage update: As we continue to move through budgeting, you should be focusing on getting your items to ‘Director Reviewed’ status by 5/1/20. A note on Targets: The targets on the Review page are Preliminary FY21 targets set by SLT guidance and are subject to change as we move through the close of

FY20. filter pages! All pages now share the same filter panel for easy of navigation.

- Administration Pages

o All hierarchy sections such as Teams, Projects, Groups, Sub-project etc. can be

created or edited based on current or planning year.

o New UI on user management pages

o New UI and grids on all hierarchy management pages

o New import/export functionality on all hierarchy pages

How do I access BeanCounter

`

BeanCounter is located at https://aka.ms/beancounter

Access to BeanCounter is controlled by your Budget Champion. If you know who your budget

champion is, please reach out to them directly for access. If you do not know who your budget

champion is, you can request access through the Access Denial page and we'll get you to the right

person.

The LifeCycle of a budget request

Budget Requests or Budget IDs (BIDs) in BeanCounter follow a specific flow on the road to final

Funding.

Proposal -> Review -> Director Review -> Funding

Budget Items have no real impact or Approval until they are in "Funded" status. Reviewed status,

even Director Reviewed status does not indicate that something has been ultimately approved for a

given year.

Review LifeCycle Statuses:

* Proposed - This is the default submission status. This indicates a line item is ready for Manager or

Director Review. These line items have no Financial Impact until they are Funded.

* In Review - This line item has now been Reviewed by a budget champion or Manager. These items

are ready for Director Review. These line items have no Financial Impact until they are Funded.

* Director Reviewed - This line items have now been Reviewed by a Director level business owner

(typically reports to a VP). These line items have no Financial Impact until they are Funded.

* Funded - This line item has been VP Final Approved. This is ready for MS Finance to load as

requested budget.

Non-Review Statuses:

* Draft - Work In Progress. These items are not counted for anything and should be considered

temporary. They have no financial impact. Note: Draft items MUST BE SUBMITTED by clicking the

Submit button in the line item request before they can be approved. Managers and Directors will not

be able to take actions against Draft items on the Reviews Page.

* [Role] Review Pending - These line items have been sent back by the reviewer above them for

more information. These line items carry no Financial Impact until re-reviewed.

* Cut - These line items have been cut. They carry no Financial Impact and have been removed as a

request.

* Upgraded - These items have been marked for a special discussion during Final Approval. Typically,

these line items are known to be a large ask or carry someone over targets. These line items carry no

Financial Impact unless approved.

Understanding financial categories

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In BeanCounter there are a few different places where amounts are shown. These categories are

explained below.

In the top-level summary:

* Original Proposal - This is the CAPEX amount originally entered for the budget requests in the

current filter view.

* Current Proposal - This is the CAPEX amount currently entered for the budget requests in the

current filter view.

* Reduction - This is the percentage difference between the original proposal and current proposal

of the budget requests in the current filter view.

* Funded Amount - This is the total CAPEX amount of line items in FUNDED status for the current

filter view.

* FY Impact - This is actual IMPACT amount of the total amount of line items in FUNDED status for

the current filter view.

In the summary table:

* Ask Amount - This is the CAPEX amount of a given Budget Request. This amount will be

shown Struck Through if the line item is Cut.

* Funded Amount - This is the CAPEX amount of a given Budget Request which has been Funded.

This amount will be Struck Through until the line item is in Funded Status or it has been Cut.

* FY Impact - This is the IMPACT amount of a given Budget Request which has been Funded. This

amount will be Struck Through until the line item is in Funded Status or has been Cut as only

Funded items have actual impact.

Navigating BeanCounter BeanCounter consists of several pages which are accessible via the left pane menu. Below is a brief

description of the pages and their purpose.

1. The Planning Page - This page is only visible during the overlap period when one FY is

ongoing, and another is in Planning. All FY+ activities occur in this page.

2. The Summary Page - This is the current FY summary where you can find all of the entered

Line items for the current year.

A note on CAPEX vs Impact:

CAPEX: Capex or Capital Expense is the TOTAL amount required to cover an ask over its lifetime. This

is important because some items such as servers, networking gear, and high-priced software are

Depreciated over 3 or more years to spread out in the impact.

IMPACT: Impact is the cost of a given line item for the Fiscal Year in Planning. Again, with servers for

example being deprecated over 3 years. This is the portion we must pay in the upcoming FY.

`

3. New Request - This is a shortcut button to immediately begin entering a new request. This

function the same as clicking the +New Line Item button from the Summary Page.

4. Review Page - This is the page in which all line items run through various stages of Reviews

towards final Funding.

5. Cap Council Hub - This is the page in which all Cap Council requests are automatically pulled

from Funded Budget IDs for data management and submission to Cap Council.

6. Planning and Finance Reports - This page houses the various budget Reports available

7. Admin Portal - This page controls the administrative features of BeanCounter. Access to this

page is limited to Budget Champions and Tool Administrators.

8. Support - Links to useful resources for BeanCounter use and customer support

9. Feedback - Submit feedback about BeanCounter to the EBS team

Filtering and Searching for Line Items

There are multiple ways to filter and search line items (budget requests)

1. Page level Search, click on the top ribbon of the page you’re on

a. This search supports single BID or “,” separated multiple BID search.

2. Quick filter will allow users filter existing line items based on

a. Toggle (Current year or Planning year)

b. Time slicer filter is applicable to current and planning year.

c. Filter based on multiple attributes like Class, Investment Type etc.

3. A detailed filter combination is available to filter granular data. Select any combination of

filter criteria, then click

`

Viewing an existing request

Once a budget request is Submitted, to re-open the request for editing or review,

1. From the SUMMARY PAGE or PLANNING PAGE, click on the Budget Line to open the request.

Budget Request history can be reviewed at any time by looking at the RECENT HISTORY

AND COMMENTS section at the bottom of the BUDGET REQUEST INFO screen. This can be

useful for reviewing who originally submitted a request, who is asking for more information, why a

request was reduced or cut.

Who has created or edited the budget request?

To See who made the original request, either click on Quick or look under the

RECENT HISTORY AND COMMENTS section at the bottom of

a Budget Request Page.

`

Section 2: Budget Champions: Initial Setup and Administering

BeanCounter

So, you're a Budget Champion in BeanCounter....what does that mean? Being a budget champion in

BeanCounter means you are the primary point of contact for Budgeting within your group,

are responsible for ensuring your group is supported, has their asks in on time, Reviewed correctly

and in accordance with guidelines from Budgeting Owners throughout the planning process. Being a

Champion also means you are responsible for managing your Group's structure, user access and

permissions in BeanCounter across the following areas:

1. Managing Teams

2. Managing Projects

3. Managing Sub Projects

Most importantly, the links you have for the old budget tool aren’t valid for FY19. BeanCounter can

be found here: https://wdgbeancounter.azurewebsites.net/. If you have an access issue, please

contact WDGCSFS for support.

Budget Champions: Managing your BeanCounter Teams, Projects

and Sub projects

Budget Champions are responsible for managing their Group structure in BeanCounter. Budget

planning is comprised of a series of budget requests (BIDs) which reside within a grouping

Parent/Child relationship encompassing difference bodies of work within your organization. The

parent structure of BeanCounter is broken out as follows:

• Group: This is your top-level organization bucket and is common referred to as a Group or

'Feature Team'. Example: Engineering Systems

• Team: This is an organization grouping under the Group which comprises a collective body of

work. Example: Engineering Systems - 'Build Services'

• Project: This is an individual body of work within a Team, something they are delivering. Example:

Engineering Systems - Build Services - Build Performance

• Sub Project: This is an optional further breakdown of work within a given project. Example:

Engineering Systems - Build Services - Build Performance - Performance Metrics

To manage your organizational groups, refer to the directions below:

Step 1: Adding to or editing your FY20 or FY21 team structure

1. Navigate to the admin portal by clicking the icon on the left panel.

2. Under "Catalog Management," you'll see links to Team Management.

3.

4. By default, the FY20 will be the selected Financial year, If planning is enabled you can

selected FY21.

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5. You can either edit an existing item or click

on that’s left justified above the table to add a new Team.

6. Click on the “Select Group” dropdown in the first row of the Group column; select the group

that the team is in.

7. Click on the text box in the first row of the “Team” column and type the name of the team

that you’d like to add.

8. Click in the rightmost column of the line where you just entered the hierarchy addition.

Step 2: Adding to or editing your FY20 or FY21 Project Structure

1. Navigate to the admin portal by clicking on the icon on the left panel.

2. Under "Catalog Management," you'll see links to Project Management.

3.

4. Edit an existing project or click on that’s left justified above the table to

add a new Project.

5. With Beancounter V4, we can create a project in current or planning year by selecting a

Financial year from the dropdown.

6. The following box will then be displayed if the Project is not related to Service Tree

7. If the New Project is related to Service tree it will display

`

8. Choose the group and team that the new project will be in and then type the project name in

the “Project” text box, a concise project description in the “Project Description” text box, and

a very brief explanation to upper management of how the company will benefit from this

project (the goal of business win is to sell the project to upper management). IMPORTANT:

As noted above, you’ll need to map all applicable projects to Service Tree. Because of

this, you indicate whether the project is service tree related or not; if it is not, click on

the dropdown and change “Not Yet” to “Unrelated;” if it is, choose “Yes.” The

following textbox will then appear in the rightmost section of this box:

9. Click on to submit the project to database.

Step 3: Adding to or editing your Sub Project structure


2. Under "Catalog Management," you'll see links to Sub-Project Management

3.

4. Create a new subproject entry by following the steps below.

1. Click on that's left justified above the table.

2. With Beancounter V4, we can create a sub project in current or planning year by

selecting a Financial year from the dropdown. A sub Project can be created only in a

Project or Group which is designated for Planning or Current year.

3. Click on the dropdown in the first row of the "Group" column and choose the group

that the subproject will be in.

4. Click on the dropdown in the first row of the "Team" column and choose the team


5. Click on the dropdown in the first row of the "Project" column and choose the project


Click on each dropdown to choose the group, team

and service that the project is related to.

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6. Then, in the first row of the "Sub Project" column, click on the textbox and type the

name of the subproject you'd like to enter.

7. Click in the rightmost column of the line where you just entered the

hierarchy addition. Note: At least one sub project is mandatory for each project in

the tool. If you have a project which you don't need a sub project for, you must still

create a sub project called "none" and select this value when making budget

requests under that project. Items with a Sub Project "Unassigned" cannot be

submitted.

Budget Champions: Managing User Roles and Access

Budget Champions are responsible for ensuring the proper people have the correct access and

Review rights within their Group in Beancounter. BeanCounter is a Role Based budgeting tool.

To Manager users:


2. Under "Security Management," you'll see links to Sub-Project Management

3. Type and validate the name of the user

4. Select the Group from the drop down

5. Select the desired Role

6. Click Save

FOR MANAGER ROLE - you must select what team they manage, this can be a one to many

relationship or one to one.

FOR DIRECTOR ROLE - you must select what discipline (aka Trio) they Direct.

TO EDIT AN EXISTING USER: change to Modify mode, validate their name, then change their role.

Click Save.

The roles supported in the tool and who can set them are listed below.

1. CC visitor: These users have READ ONLY access to Lab items only in the group they belong

to. This role is for people who need to view and edit Cap Council hardware requests within

the tool.

2. Budget Visitor: These users have READ ONLY access to the group they belong to.

3. Budget Submitter: These users have READ/WRITE access to the group they belong to, but

cannot Review any line items.

`

4. Budget Manager: These users have READ/WRITE access to the GROUP they belong to, and

can set line items to IN REVIEW status for TEAM they are assigned to. (1:many relationship

supported)

5. Budget Director: These users have READ/WRITE access to the GROUP they belong to, and

can set line items to DIRECTOR REVIEWED status for any item in the GROUP they are

assigned to.

6. Budget Champion: Set by Finance admin/Budget Champion, these users control the contents

of TEAM, PROJECT, and SUB PROJECT lists for their group. They also control USER ACCESS

and ROLES up to champion for their group. Additionally, Budget Champions have the power

to Set Line item status to any state on behalf of others in their GROUP.

7. Final Reviewer: Set by Finance Admin. Senior Leadership CVP budget owners. These users

have READ/WRITE access to ALL GROUPS and are responsible for FINAL FUNDING of line

items and set the budgets for their Division.

8. Finance Admin: Set by Tool Admins. These users are members of finance and special users

with READ/WRITE to ALL GROUPS and access to ALL Review levels.

9. Tool Admin: Set by dev team. Back end tool administrators which control features and

functional content.

Budget Champions & Organization admin: Target Management

Budget Champions and organization admins are responsible for ensuring the target budget is

provided for different categories of budget, target are measured against the actual spending at

group level and can be created for either current or planning FY. In beancounter v4, we have

provided functionality to transfer the available target within different groups.

To Manage targets:


2. Under "Financial Management," you'll see links to Targets Management

3. Click on to open panel to provide details

4. 5. Select Fiscal Year, Group, Class and Trio Paying, if there is existing target available it will show

“Target already exists”

6. Provide budget targets for specific budget categories

`

7. Click “Save” to submit the target.

Scenario 1: Edit Target

To Edit existing target, you can update the existing line items or amounts in the existing line items.

1. You can filter specific target using

2. Click on icon to edit a specific target request. 3. Update any of the listed category list with new budget amount, comments for specific line item.

4.

5. Click to submit the updated target.

Scenario 2: Transfer Target

Beancounter V4 provides ability to transfer available budget from one group to another. Transfer

functionality will work for groups within same Division. It will subtract available budget from source

group and transfer it to destination group.

`

1. Select source Group, Class, Trio and Category from the source group to show exactly how much

current target is available and how much you can transfer.

2. Select Destination group, Class , Trio and Category where amount will be transferred.

3. 4. You can input the amount which should be lessor than current available budget.

5. Click on to initiate and complete the transfer of amount.

6. Once the transfer is complete, the destination amount will show additional funds and it will

subtract the amount from source group.

Organization admin: re-org Management

Beancounter v4 allows users to perform re-org at any given hierarchy level. Re-org will happen at all

the subsequent levels of a hierarchy. E.g. A re-org performed at group level will have cascading

impact on Teams, Project and Sub-projects under that group.

To Manage re-org:


2. Under "Hierarchy Management," you'll see links to Re-Org Management

3. You can select a level to perform re-org

4. After selecting the level, you can filter all the entities in hierarchy using filter

`

5. It will render a list of BIDs which will transferred as part of re-org. You can pick and choose

specific BIDs to transfer by selecting the check box against each listed BIDs.

6. You need to select where you want to move selected BIDs to, use Division, Organization, Group,

Teams and Project.

7. You can also create a new project by clicking , and use to

create new project and transfer the BIDs to newly created project.

Section 3: Entering and Submitting requests

Accessing BeanCounter: To bring up the tool, enter the Beancounter URL in your

browser http://aka.ms/beancounter. This will log you in, take you to the Budget line request

Summary Page and display all the budget requests for your group. Use the at the

top right of the page to display a specific type of request based on criteria. Total budget amounts for

requests shown appear in the cards at the top of the SUMMARY PAGE.

Budget request creation changes in BeanCounter v4.

- User with right access can reinvest a line item into planning year or create budget request in

planning year.

- Capturing seasonal cost for all the budget categories, this will help capture more granular

budget and provide detailed insights to approving managers.

- Creating budget request with minimum validation except user with Organization admin

needs to provide all the mandatory fields to create budget request. A budget champion can

create a budget request by selecting only “group”.

- Budget creation also provide an ability to create more than on budgets with single click.

http://aka.ms/beancounter

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For easier budget request creation users can create a budget request with minimum inputs like

group

Scenario 1: Reinvesting a prior FY line item (Copying existing BIDs

to a new FY.

During planning, you may wish to reinvest an existing budget request for the current FY into the

next. The Reinvestment feature allows the user to quickly accomplish this as well as the chance to

alter it's Hierarchy to support any org changes which may have occurred since the line item was

entered. Follow the steps below to use the Reinvestment feature.

Reinvesting in single or multiple budget items

The Reinvestment Feature is only available from the summary page.

1.

1. Select the BID using checkbox and click on the button.

2. It will open a popup with options to select existing hierarchy or create new hierarchy for budget

request.

3. Option 1: Maintain the existing hierarchy by checking the 'Keep my existing hierarchy'

option and click REINVEST

4. Option 2: Select new hierarchy by changing field value and click REINVEST

NOTE: Reinvested line items will be automatically set to Sustaining Investment. If you have additional growth on top of this amount for the new year, enter a new Line item as a New Investment type and specify the non-sustaining amount. TIP: You can do this more quickly by using the 'Submit and Copy' button at the bottom of a reinvested line item.

`

5. Option 3: Create and assign new hierarchy by selecting the 'ADD NEW' value in the Team,

Project, or Sub project fields. Specify your new value and click REINVEST

Scenario 2: Entering a new line item

A new budget request can be created using button on the summary page.

1. Click on “New Line Item” to create a new request. It will create a budget request based on

the selected Financial year using

Tip: Don't see the Team, Project, or Sub project you're looking for? You can either add one during

Line Item entry by selecting NEW from the drop-down list or Contact your Budget Champion as they

can help manage these fields. If you're not sure who your Budget Champion is, please contact:

EBServ.

Tip: Want to enter multiple new items for the same hierarchy? Use the Copy and Submit button

when you have completed your line item to open a new request with the same hierarchy auto filled

in.

`

2. Select your group

3. Select your team

4. Select your Trio Paying. Note: All hardware requests should be set to DI as trio paying. If this

is entered incorrectly, we will fix it prior to reviews.

5. Select your Project and applicable sub project for the request Common Question: Why can't I

edit the Project Description and Business Win?! - These fields are common to all asks under a

single project. If you feel you need to have this changed, please contact your budget

champion ASAP.

6. Select your priority. Note: Priority can mean something different to every team, but for

general guidance we suggest:

1. Pri 1 = I can't ship without this ask.

2. Pri 2 = Cutting this would have a demonstrable business impact.

3. Pri 3 = Low business impact if cut, but we should do this.

4. Pri 4 = This is a nice to have request. Not technically needed.

5. Pri 99 = Internal Use for budgeting, will be cut if set to P99.

7. Enter the point of contact. Note: You must remember to select the person's name from the

pop-up list to validate their account in Active Directory. Else you won't be able to submit the

request.

8. Enter the Line Item Description: This should be a one sentence non-technical description of

what you're asking for.

9. Enter the Line item business impact: This should be one two sentences about what the

impact would be if this item is not funded.

How to guide: Proposing a Non-People Lab/Equipment request

1. Choose "Non-People Expenses - Lab/Equipment" as the Category.

2. If the request is external spend, click on the “Is External Spend?” dropdown and choose yes

and then choose the external funding group that the request will made on behalf of.

Otherwise, choose “No” in the “Is External Spend?” dropdown.

3. Fill in the rest of the fields as needed. Here is a quick cheat sheet (Rule 1: Don’t use

unassigned as a value in any field unless you’re just saving the request as draft to finish

later).

`

1. Class: COGS or R&D; if the work being done is for an in-market product, you need to

select COGS else it is R&D. Please double check this with the requestor.

2. Investment Type: Either select New or Sustaining Investment. Sustaining investments

are the amount you invested in this same ask the previous Fiscal year. New

Investments line items are either brand new investments or to account for Growth

over a Sustaining Investment from the previous year.

3. Company Code: What country will this gear be deployed in? This should stay as 1010.

4. Release: Select the appropriate release(s) related to this request.

5. Lab Device Type: What kind of lab device is being budgeted for?

6. Quantity: How many items are you requesting?

7. Seasonality Type: When are you going to need this money?

1. Monthly: the total of the request is divided into 12 parts hitting each month.

2. One Time: This will all be purchased in a lump one-time order.

3. Quarterly: the total of the request is divided into 4 even parts, hitting once

per quarter.

8. Purchase Fiscal Month: What month will you make the purchase/initial purchase in.

9. Ask Amount (CapEx): What is the TOTAL dollar amount request for the entire year for

this request.

10. Comments from the Requestor: This is where you put the business justification as to

why they can’t use Azure for this work. These budget requests will generate a Cap

Council request. Without this justification, the line item will not be Reviewed.

4. Once the above fields have been filled out, click the button to submit the

request.

How to guide: Proposing an External Resources - Managed Service request



2. Fill out the Basic Request Info as appropriate for the budget request.

3. Choose "External Resources – Managed Service" as the Category.





unassigned as a value in any field unless you’re just saving the request as draft to finish later).



`

2. Investment Type: Sustaining investments are the amount you invested in this same

ask the previous Fiscal year. New Investments line items are either brand new

investments or to account for Growth over a Sustaining Investment from the

previous year.



5. Cost by Month: How much do you expect to spend each month?


request.

How to guide: Proposing an External Resources - Contractor budget request



2. Fill out the Basic Request Info as appropriate for the budget request.

3. Choose "External Resources - Contractor" as the Category.





unassigned as a value in any field unless you’re just saving the request as draft to finish later).



2. Investment Type: Either select New or Sustaining Investment. Sustaining investments

are the amount you invested in this same ask the previous Fiscal year. New

Contractors are for short term need. They are different than a Managed Service. A Contract is a 'Time

and Materials' or 'T&M' resource which can only be in position for up to One Year before they must

take a mandatory 6 month break.

`

Investments line items are either brand new investments or to account for Growth

over a Sustaining Investment from the previous year.



5. Resource Type: What kind of resource is being budgeted for. Choose T&M /

Contractor.

6. Position Title: Choose the position you will be budgeting for.

7. Start Fiscal Month: What month will you make the purchase/initial purchase in.

8. # Month Required for: How many months will you need the contractor(s) for?


request.

For budget requests, the following steps detail how to submit a budget request.

1. Under the BUDGET REQUEST section, the details required will depend on

the Category selected. Select the Category of the request (i.e. Lab, External Resources, etc.)

and fill out the BUDGET REQUEST details.

2. Definitions for all budget types and input boxes can be found in the Glossary section of this

document. If you need additional help, please email WDGCSFS.

3. Once all the data has been entered, click on

4. Once a budget request has been submitted it will be ready for Manager Review. If you don't

have all the final request information, you can . Draft requests are not part of

the budget and CANNOT be Reviewed, so be sure to come back and Submit them later or

they won't be Reviewed.

How to guide: Proposing an Azure Budget Request.

Azure category budget requests provide internal budget calculations for azure resources. Users can

select existing subscriptions while creating budget requests.

1. On the summary page click on to create new budget request.

2. Select Budget request category as

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3. Click on the service Name to open pop up to select

relevant details.

4.

5. Choose options to select component or Microservice check

box to select either component or Microservice, it will populate corresponding subscription in

the dropdown

6. You can use existing Azure calculator file (in the form of sharable JSON link), application will

automatically calculate internal rates for resources based on the provided calculator file.

7. Select appropriate option for Nebula investment .

8. Once you select the ramp up plan using , it

will populate the monthly budget.

9. Once all the details are provided, click on to create budget request.

How to Guide : Create Azure calculator file.

Azure calculator provides an easier way to create anticipated amount required in azure category budget

requests. Azure calculator JSON file is used to calculate internal / discounted rates for monthly ramp up

plans.

1. Click on the link to open the azure calculator

OR

Browse https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/calculator/

2. Sign in with domain account

NOTE : This is required if there is no project to service mapping OR there is a need to map the BID to different service than existing one.

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/calculator/

`

3. In the azure calculator portal, select all the required resources. Before creating a sharable link

4. At the bottom of your estimate just under the Share icon you will need to toggle the “Display

Resource IDs” to the on position. You may need to toggle this and the “Display Skus” icon a

couple times. The goal is to get the Resourced to show up under the cost amount of each line

item.

5. Click on the share to get an JSON link

6. 7. Use this JSON link and provide it as input to calculate internal rates for azure resources.

`

Scenario 3: Bulk requests There are situations where you need to create multiple budget requests using different categories with

Beancounter v4, you can submit more than one budget requests using single window.

1. On the New budget request page, select all the required attributes to create a budget, then click

on the “+” to create additional budget request.

2. It will populate Category dropdown, budget planning fiscal will be inherited from main request,

comment and option to attach files.

NOTE : Beancounter is continuously working on expanding its support for internal calculations for additional Azure resources, following are resources we are supporting currently.

Azure Synapse Analytics

Data Factory

Virtual Machines

Azure Analysis Services

Power BI Embedded

Azure Cosmos DB

HDInsight

Azure Firewall

Azure SQL Database

Azure Functions

Azure Kubernetes Service

App Service

Cognitive Services

Service Fabric

Virtual Network

Load Balancer

IP Addresses

Basic formula for Internal Calculations:

FORMULA:

INTERNAL_TOTAL = (EXTERNAL_TOTAL/EXTERNAL_RATE)

* INTERNAL_RATE

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Scenario 4: Partner Requests - Informing or charging other teams

for your work There are several situations in budgeting where you may wish to indicate they're spending money on

behalf of another Group, or even ask the other group to pick up the bill for work you're doing. This

workflow is handled through Partner Group Request

You will find the Partner Group workflow in a budget requests after you select a Category.

Partner Group: This dropdown indicates which group you would like to inform about the budget

request.

Is Partner Funded?: This checkbox indicates that in additional to informing, you also wish for the

Partner Group to cover the expense from their cost center

Partner Group Workflow:

If the Partner group is selected, but the funded checkbox is NOT selected, both you and the

Partner Group will both see this BID in your FY Summary, but your Group will be responsible for

Reviewing and Funding the request.

If the Partner group is selected, and the funded checkbox IS selected, both you and the Partner

Group will be able to see this BID in your FY Summary, but the Partner Group will be responsible

for Reviewing and Funding the request.

Icons indicating Partner Group Requests:

There are two icons which indicate a partner request:

Information Partner Request:

This icon indicates a partner request that has been made, where the proposing group is

responsible for review and funding. Treat this as an FYI Partner Request.

Funding Request:

This icon indicates a partner request that has been made where the Partner Group is responsible

for review and funding. Treat this as a request to have the Partner Group fund this request.

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Section 4: Reviews

Cleaning up line items prior to Reviews

Line item clean-up is an inevitable phase which we must go through before starting Reviews. You will

need to add comments and re-submit line items where there was a request for more information.

Prior to Reviews Champions may also need to consolidate lines or remove duplicates. There are a few

ways to approach this:

1. Cutting duplicates

1. Click anywhere on the line of the budget request line that you’d like to cut.

2. From the BUDGET REQUEST, scroll down to the APPROVAL WORKFLOW

section at the bottom.

3. User Status, select ‘Cut’ . E Enter a note

like ‘Duplicate in the review w c comment

section to document why the line was

cut. Then click

2. Cut multiple, resubmit a single

1. Use the find feature on the SUMMARY PAGE to look for multiple requests for the

same item. If you find duplicate requests, submit a new combined request, and cut

the individual duplicate lines.

3. Collecting data outside of the tool first

1. If you wish, you can use a spreadsheet like last year to collect line items from people,

then the Budget Champion or Budget Admin can enter the requests into the tool

manually after cleaning up the data. This is more work, but it gives complete control

to the Budget Champion in determining what gets submitted.

Review Workflow, Reviewing Requests and Submitting Reviews

Tip: Budget Champions: You have the power to also set the status of any line item to Any status. This is useful if you're doing work on behalf of your mangers or directors in case they cannot access the tool or are asking you do take care of something for them.

NOTE: A refresher on LifeCycle

When a manager or director submits a line item, it is automatically afforded the appropriate level of review.

A Summary of Line Item Status:

• Draft - Work In Progress. These items are not counted for anything and should be considered

temporary. They have no financial impact. Note: Draft items MUST BE SUBMITTED by clicking the

Submit button in the line item request before they can be approved. Managers and Directors will not

be able to take actions against Draft items on the Reviews Page.

• Proposed - This is the default submission status. This indicates a line item is ready for Manager or

Director Review. These line items have no Financial Impact.

• In Review - This line item has now been Reviewed by a budget champion or Manager. This is the first

status which carries potential Financial Impact. These items are ready for Director Review.

• Director Reviewed - This line items has now been Reviewed by a Director level business owner

(typically reports to a VP). These line items carry potential Financial Impact if funded and are ready for

`

Once all requests have been entered, they must go through a formal Review process which consists

of Proposed-> In Review -> Director Reviewed -> Funded. Only In Reviewed and above line items

have actual financial impact. Draft and Proposed are Pre Review states with no impacting cost. The

budget Champion is responsible for managing the which people have the Review Roles required to

get through Reviews, if you feel you need permissions to Review line items, please contact your

Budget Champion. Line items which are in Draft must be Proposed before they can be Reviewed.

Managers are responsible for reviewing and approving all requests which have a Proposed Status,

and Directors are required to Review requests which have a In Review Status. Final Reviewers are

required to Review requests which have a Director Reviewed Status.

Reviewing and approving a single request

1. Open the budget request.

2. Carefully review all the request details on the Budget Request screen.

3. Scroll down to the APPROVAL WORKFLOW section at the bottom

4. Enter changes or reductions, slect 'submit Review' in the Action drop down, and click

`

Reviewers: Send Back

If an Reviewer has questions they can change the request Status to Send Back and enter a comment

or question under Reviewer's comments. These requests will show in RED with a Pending status on

the SUMMARY PAGE.

To see a Reviewers questions,

1. From the SUMMARY PAGE, click on the Budget Request Line to open the request.

Tip: Budget Champions: You have the power to also set the status of any line item to Any status. This

is useful if you're doing work on behalf of your mangers or directors in case they cannot access the

tool or are asking you do take care of something for them.

Tip: Are these options not showing for you? You may not have the correct permissions, please

contact your Budget Champion as they can assist you with access and permissions. If you're not sure

who your Budget Champion is, please contact: WDGCSFS.

There is no email notification built into the tool, so Budget Champions and Admins should periodically check for RED PENDING requests, answer questions, and re-submit to keep them moving through the approval process.

`

2. Once the Budget Request is open, scroll down and click on the RECENT HISTORY

AND COMMENTS header.

3. Hover over the Comment field to see the question.

4. Enter a reply in the Comments from Requestor field and click on to submit the

request. This will cause it to re-start the Review process.

Partial Review - Using the Review Page

1. In v4 we are supporting partial funding or partial status update of the budget request. Once you open the budget request page using summary page.

2. Scroll down on the request details page to “REVIEW WORKFLOW”

3. Review workflow provides flexibility to approve budgets for specific months.

4. You can update the amount, or uncheck the check boxes and update the Action as ‘Partial

Approval’

5. This will update the status of the budget request to ‘Partially Funded’

Bulk Review - Using the Review Page This year the bulk Review feature has been completely updated to make the process faster and more

interactive.

The Goal of reviews:

The goal for reviews is split by Role:

Use the Request History section to review who entered a request and the chain of actions taken

through a line's life.

`

• Managers: Mark items which are 'Proposed' as 'In Review'. Worrying about funds and targets at

this level is not needed as much ensuring you have an accurate representation of what each

manager feels they need in order to do their work effectively next year.

• Directors: Mark items which are 'In Review' as 'Director Reviewed' or 'Upgrade'. Directors will

be working towards a Target in each category which they will not want to exceed. Remaining

items which are over Target should either be Cut or marked as Upgrade.

• Funding (Final): Mark items which are 'Director Reviewed' and/or 'Upgrade' as 'Funded'

Workflow:

The new Review Page is geared towards role-based Review, so the options displayed will change

slightly based on your role. In general concept is that Managers Review each budget request for their

team. A manager can see all the request lines in their Group but can only Review lines for their own

team. Directors Review, reduce or cut whole Project or Team budgets. They can drill down to the

Budget Request level if they want, or they can just Review the requests as recommended by the team

managers.

1. To access the Review page, click on the from the left panel

2. Click on the icon at the top of the page, enter search criteria if needed

(Example: Finding item from a specific Trio, or team, etc), OR you can use quick filter or page

level filter.

Bulk review page provides users quick and page level filters.

Tip: Budget Champions: You have the power to also set the status of any line item to Any status.

This is useful if you're doing work on behalf of your mangers or directors in case they cannot

access the tool or are asking you do take care of something for them.

Tip: Are these options not showing for you? You may not have the correct permissions, please

contact your Budget Champion as they can assist you with access and permissions. If you're not sure

who your Budget Champion is, please contact: WDGCSFS.

NOTE: In Beancounter v4, you can create budget request with minimum data e.g. you can submit a

budget request by using ‘Group’ and “Team’, In the bulk review page, it will show the line item, but it

will not allow you to approve the request to upgrade it to ‘Funded’ state, It will list the line items

which require missing mandatory fields to upgrade its status to ‘Funded’.

`

Budget request at group level.

Budget request at sub-project level

Recommending Budget Upgrades Sometimes requests deemed strategic by a manager can’t be Reviewed without exceeding targets set by

Senior Leadership. Essentially an Upgrade request is a line that was cut to meet goal, but where the

manager thinks it would be of particular strategic value to Review the request anyways. In cases like

this, a manager can recommend a budget request for Cut, Upgrade, or Split it to Review a portion of the

request and recommend the other portion for upgrade.

`

Once a manager has recommended a request for upgrade, it will appear in the Recommended

Upgrades section at the top Group header. The Director can Review, reduce, cut or send back the

request with questions. All upgraded lines must be Reviewed by the Final Reviewer to be added to

the budget.

Budget requests can be approved in bulk, however BIDs marked for CUT will not be considered for

approval unless users filters out all the BIDs marked for CUT and perform an operation on only those

requests.

Checking Budgeting Progress

To see the progress of the overall budget process, on the SUMMARY PAGE, you can toggle between

seeing total Reviewed dollars and request counts at each stage by clicking on the View Totals icon.

Section 5: Summary Page and Reporting

To review the overall status of the budget, go to SUMMARY PAGE screen and click on the

to review categories of requests, or generate a summary report.

1. Click on the reports option on the left panel of the SUMMARY PAGE.

`

2. The report supports multiple ways to slice the data for reporting. A lab only, R&D

only, ProdDev and Lab but not external resources, etc. Use the tree control to select

what you would like to include in the report and then click on Generate Report.

Excel Reporting

If you'd like to run Excel reports on BeanCounter contents that can be refreshed, reach out

to WDG Finance & Budgeting Support ([email protected]). We can create a report

which will provide you with relevant Budget Request information.

Refreshing Your Report

First Refresh

The first time you refresh your report, you'll need to perform additional steps to pull your data in.

Start by following the instructions of the "General Refresh" section to perform a refresh. This will

bring up the following prompt: File:Credentials Prompt.jpg Click on the "Database" tab that's on the

left; you will get a prompt that looks like: File:Database.jpg Fill in "User name" and "Password" with

your credentials; make sure that the appropriate server is chosen at the bottom of the prompt. Once

credentials have been filled and the server is chosen, click "Connect" in the bottom right corner.

General Refresh

To perform a refresh, click the File:Refresh All.jpg if you'd like to refresh both the data and your

pivots. If you'd only like to refresh the base data, click on the File:Budget Requests Tab.jpg tab, click

anywhere within the table pulling the data, click on the File:Data Tab.jpg at the top of the page and

then click File:Refresh.jpg.

Section 6: Advanced Features

Exporting Requests to Excel

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There are three reasons to export requests: 1) To quickly generate Pivot Table reports; 2) To make

bulk modifications and existing requests; 3) To reinvest in existing project in a new budget year. To

export budget requests,

1. Use the at the top right of the page to select the budget requests to export.

2. Click on

Bulk Importing Requests

To bulk upload requests you can either download an import template or export existing budget

request to Excel. If you are starting from Exported budget requests there are a few rules to keep in

mind:

• Existing requests can be modified by entering Budget ID in the BID field.

• Only fields where you can enter data on the Budget Request can be modified.

• Review Status is ignored.

• If the BID field is left blank it will create a new request.

1. From the SUMMARY PAGE click on

2. If you need a template for entering new requests, click on Consolidate Template to

select a template.

3. To download the select template, click on Click Here.

4. Enter the budget requests in Excel, then save to a local drive and close the file.

5. Make sure the template type matches the template you are importing.

You must delete the BID for each record for the Import to create a new record. Imported records are treated like NEW requests, so the Status, Year Impact, Approved Amount and Approver Comments are ignored. In addition, for some Categories like Lab where amounts are entered by month instead of in total on the new request form, the Ask Amount will be calculated by adding up the month columns in the import file. For required fields, if the value is not recognized it will be set to Unassigned and the request will be imported as Draft.

`

Section 7: Help and Feedback

Questions or feedback? Click on the feedback icon or email WDG Core Services Financial

Support team.

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