L: Dick Fosbury doing the “Fosbury Flop” to win the high jump gold medal at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics (Source: International Olympic Committee)
R: Illustration showing path of center of gravity in the Fosbury Flop (Source: Wikimedia Commons, Author: AlanSiegrist)

Look up an implementation plan for enterprise software, and “Custom Reports” will show up as a task with significant effort. However, talk to anybody who has gone through these implementations and they will tell you that almost 80% of the custom reports created are hardly used. In fact, most users will not even be aware of the existence of many of these reports.

Recently I overheard a conversation between two of my colleagues. One was requesting inputs for a task assigned, while the other was protesting that he didn’t have the time to prepare detailed documentation. The term “detailed documentation” appeared to send a shudder down the requestor’s spine. He promptly replied, “Please don’t give me anything lengthy… A half page document with ALL the details is what I need.”