The Backlog Analytics provide details about how much work remains for your organizations, and it allows you to measure if you are operating above or below the planned target. You can sort backlog information by organization level and use different project attributes, like project type and customer, to further filter your data. These details allow you to analyze the trends in your contracts and measure the overall health and status of your organizations. |
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Your system administrator specifies both the current fiscal period and the number of prior fiscal periods for which data is available. The future fiscal periods for which data is available are the periods for which budget data has been loaded into Costpoint Analytics.
For more information on specifying the analysis period, see Specify an Analysis Period.
During the security configuration process for Costpoint Analytics, your system administrator sets up the organization access for your Costpoint Analytics user role. This determines the organizations and reorganizations for which you can view analytic information. The Orgs list only includes organizations to which you have access.
You can change the organization type on the User Options tab. If you select the Reorg option, you can filter the analytics by reorganization:
The Reorgs list only includes reorganizations to which you have access.
You do not have access to a reorganization if you do not have access to any of the organizations mapped to that reorganization.
You have access to a reorganization if you have access to at least one organization mapped to that reorganization.
For more information on filtering the analytics by organization or reorganization, see Filter by Organization. For more information on selecting the option to filter by reorganization on the User Options tab, see Organization or Reorganization.
There are two types of backlog: Contract and Funded.
Contract — Contract backlog is the value of the funded and unfunded backlog that has not been spent. This typically displays as actuals for historical months, and the projected (actual backlog plus budgets) for future months.
A top-level project can only have a contract value that represents “new business” occurring in one fiscal period. All other changes in contract value represent contract expansion or contract adjustment.
Funded — Funded backlog is contract funding less the ITD revenue amount. For example, on the Backlog with Budget or Forecast chart, where Contract backlog is selected, funded backlog displays as a black square on each bar on the chart. The distance between the top of the bar (Contract Backlog) and the square indicates the amount of unfunded backlog.
A top-level project can have funded value that represents “new business” occurring in multiple fiscal periods.
For descriptions of the sources of the data used in backlog, see Data Sources.
You can use the Proposals option under the Additional Filters to further filter the data in the analytic. The proposal number and name are loaded as part of the budget or forecast process.
Use the Proposals attribute to select from the following for inclusion in the filter process:
Projects Only — Select this option to only include projects in the filter process.
Proposals Only — Select this option to only include proposals in the filter process.
All — This is the default. Select this option to include both projects and proposals in the filter process.
Revenue amounts are calculated using either 
actual or target rates. During the configuration process for Costpoint Analytics, your system administrator selects the option your firm will use. That selection applies to all analytics that either display revenue amounts or use them to derive other values.
Because revenue negatively impacts backlog, the cautionary and urgent alerts are engaged for a positive revenue variance. For the revenue analytic, a negative revenue variance engages alerts. See Alerts for more information.
Revenue is used in the following backlog calculations:
Contract Backlog = Contract Value – ITD Revenue
Funded Backlog = Funded Value – ITD Revenue
Contract Backlog Budget = Contract Value – ITD Budgeted Revenue
Funded Backlog Budget = Funded Value – ITD Budgeted Revenue
If your firm uses the Interim/Final Rates feature in Costpoint and includes prior year revenue adjustments in the Project Status Report (PSR) reporting tables, revenue amounts may include those prior year adjustments. A Costpoint Analytics configuration option controls whether the adjustments are included and, if they are, which fiscal periods are affected. For more information, see Adjustment Period.
If prior year revenue adjustments are included, all ITD revenue amounts are the net of normal revenue and applicable prior year adjustments.
Your system administrator determines the guidelines that control how, and when, you are alerted of variances in backlog. These alerts are either cautionary or urgent, depending on your configuration settings. Because revenue negatively impacts backlog, the cautionary and urgent alerts are engaged for a positive revenue variance. For all other analytics, a negative revenue variance engages the alerts.
Refer to the following scale to determine the type of alerts that display:
Cautionary alert — The variance percentage cell displays in yellow to indicate the alert is cautionary.
Urgent alert — The variance percentage cell displays in red to indicate the alert is urgent.
You can click the variance percentage column heading to sort a table by alert status. Urgent alerts will display first, then cautionary alerts, and then projects with an acceptable status.
Amounts — All backlog amounts are inception to date for the period, quarter, or year.
Calculations — All backlog calculations are at the project's revenue level, computed as actual or target, and only used for projects that are classified as Direct, Inter-Company, or Inter-Co Multi. Your system administrator determines this classification on the Project Classification field in either the Maintain Project Master (client server) or Manage Project User Flow (web) configuration screen.
The budget data that is necessary for backlog calculations is uploaded into Costpoint Analytics. This data includes future backlog components including new proposal wins, expansion of those proposals or existing contracts, new or additional funding, and the expected revenue on existing and proposed work.
If a backlog budget is not defined, but there is a revenue budget for an existing project, the budgeted revenue is used to reduce the budgeted backlog. To calculate the beginning backlog amount, the revenue budget file and backlog budget file for all existing projects are considered. The first period where there is a value is used for all projects to set the beginning backlog budget amount equal to the beginning backlog actual amount. This is done for all variations of the budget and backlog type separately.
The ability to trend backlog over time is crucial. Projected backlog is actual backlog through the current period, with budget or forecast backlog comprising the future backlog. The number of future periods is defined by the number of periods that are uploaded into the budget template. For the trending of backlog to be accurate, the beginning backlog for the prior period must equal the ending backlog for the next period.
You can filter and analyze information by either top-level project or revenue-level project. If you select a top-level project, all revenue-level projects under it are included in the analytics data.
If you select one or more projects and then go to another Costpoint Analytics tab for which the project filter option is available, Costpoint Analytics automatically filters those analytics for the same projects.
For general information about making selections in filter lists, see Filter the Analytics: Overview.
For more information on filtering the analytics by project, see Filter by Project.
Your selections on the User Options tab affect the Backlog Analytics in the following ways:
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User Option |
Effect on the Analytics |
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Budget Type |
If you select Baseline Budget, the baseline budget data is used to calculate backlog. If you select Forecast, the forecast data is used for backlog. For more information on this user option, see Budget Type. |
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Org or Reorg
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If you select Org, you can filter and backlog data by organization. If you select Reorg, you can filter and backlog data on the selected reorganization. The name and contents of the filter list and cycle options change to reflect your current selection. For more information on this user option, see Organization or Reorganization. |
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Org View |
This option does not apply to Backlog Analytics. Analysis is always by owning organization. For more information on this user option, see Organization View. |