Grab n Go Briefs
Often you need to put together an ad-hoc collection of presentation quality reports for your clients or others with specific information. MasterFile's Grab n Go Briefs were designed for these situations and are the simplest and fastest way to make polished Word or PDF reports for your clients, or other use.
Grab n Go Briefs are not reports in the traditional sense. There's no need to properly configure, dozens of nitty-gritty details in advance, either. Instead, Grab n Go Briefs are simply customizable Microsoft Word templates (with your own logos and graphics, etc. too) into which MasterFile report tables are automatically formatted and inserted. You simply grab (select) the information needed and add it to the brief as you go. Once complete, you can save brief as either a Word document and/or a PDF.
When saving as a PDF, navigate and save to the MasterFile watch folder. When the Watch Folder Alert appears, click "Add to existing doc profile" and select the original Word document's profile so both Word and PDF versions are stored together and easy to locate.
3 step process
There are 3 easy steps.
- First, you create a blank Grab n Go Brief in Word.
- Second, rather than defining a selection filter, sort order, etc., for a report, simply select the rows in the appropriately categorized view or custom report folder with the sort and categorization of the documents, extracts, facts, players, etc. you want, and
- Third, click a button to automatically append your selection as a new tabular table to the Grab n Go Brief already open in Word.
Repeat the process for each report table you wish to add to the brief and within a few minutes you have a completed brief ready to go.
- For each report you want to add to a brief, simply select the rows required from the view with the appropriate sorting and categorization, as shown below
- Click on [R+ Intake : Reporting : Send > Grab n Go Briefs] and you'll see the following window.
- Click "Create new Grab n Go Brief". A new brief will be created from a Word template provided with MasterFile. You can copy and customize this template, add corporate or other information, logos, and so on. Alternatively, switch to Word and open an existing Grab n Go Brief in which to add the report.
- Enter a title for the new report in the "New report title" field.
- Click "Paste copied selection as new report in current brief". The rows are pasted as a table into Word and the table reformatted for clarity.
To add additional tables, leave the Grab n Go Brief open in Word and simply repeat the above to select, copy and paste the rows from any views you want as a new report.
- Save the brief as a regular Word document when you're done, or if you need to interrupt your work. Simply reopen the breif and carry on as above when you're ready.
Shown below are the contents and two report pages from a Grab n Go Brief as they appear in Word. Since reports are simply tables in the Word document, they can be re-formatted, cut and pasted into other documents, or even deleted and added again if corrections are required by you or your colleagues.
