Here’s something that would add to the functionality of Report Manager and would make it even more flexible and usable: a report format for “Every contact in the database” and the ability to include use Edit Columns to include any column that is available in all/most of the other formats that report on contacts, contributions, online forms, etc. Plus, activist codes and all emails attached to the contact record. Contribution summaries, advocacy/online form summaries, and so on too.
The scenario I’m describing is when we need to see a list of everyone in the database along with their emails and specific activist codes they have (yes/no). It’s somewhat similar to the Export Format called Standard Text, since that allows you to include Activist Codes one by one and to include Personal Email, Work Email, Preferred Email, Other Email. I could see including Other Email 2, Other Email 3, and so on if a contact has many, many emails.
I know Export Formats exist, but they don’t allow every single field I would want in the same way reports do. Plus, the user interface to add activist codes and contribution summaries is so, so tedious that I avoid using it as much as possible. It’s a real barrier to adoption. And you can’t schedule exports the same way you can schedule reports.
We’ve heard from many of our clients that they can’t get what they need in one report or export and find themselves in the position of needing to do 2 (or more!) reports and then join the data in Excel with a pivot table. Creating this dream, ultimately customizable report format would solve that and remove hours of manual work.
I’m interested to hear whether other people have run into this too and what your workflow is.