Upcoming Release: Workday 2020R1

Twice a year, in September and March, Workday – UW’s integrated, cloud-based human resource and payroll operations system – releases major feature upgrades designed to increase functionality and enhance the user experience. On this page, learn about what changes you can expect; what steps, if any, you might need to take to prepare for the new upgrade; and what dates Workday will be unavailable during this routine maintenance.

Workday releases are named for the calendar year in which they became effective + their release number (ie, R1 for Release 1 in March or R2 for Release 2 in September). For example: the upcoming spring release is called “Workday Release 2020R1.”

New Features and Enhancements in Workday 2020 Release 1 (2020R1)

Workday’s spring release will come out the weekend of March 7, 2020. Unlike some previous Workday releases, most updates for Workday 2020R1 will center around back-end improvements (which end users won’t notice), with many new features planned in the payroll sphere, as well as several upgrades focused on improving Workday search functionality.

Some of the updates you may see when you log into Workday on the morning of March 9 include:

• Enhanced Worker Search Functionality: When typing in a search term in the Workday search field, the returned options will now include the employee’s Sup Org and Business Title so users can better distinguish one employee from another; results will also now be sorted by relevance, with exact matches sorted first.
• New Look for Absence Calendar Date Selections: Workday is changing the look of a selected date/dates in the Absence Calendar as part of an overall focus on improving the experience for all employees, including those employees using adaptive or assistive technologies.
  • Instead of the entire cell for the date selected appearing as a solid color, a colored circle will now more clearly highlight just the date number(s) of the date(s) selected, providing users with improved visual contrast.
  • The word “Today” will appear in the lower corner of the cell for quicker identification of the current date.

Select the “Before and After” graphic below for a comparison.

Workday Unavailable During Release Update

Just like any major software upgrade, there is necessary downtime while the changes are implemented. Workday will be unavailable for use the weekend of the release from 11:00 pm on March 6 through 5:00 pm on March 8. Employees and administrators should make plans to anticipate this downtime.