ESUP Student team meets in-person to collaborate, share progress

More than 120 people involved with the Student systems upgrade met in-person June 16-17 to work together face-to-face. The group met on the Twin Cities campus and included representatives from all campuses and all areas of the Student project: academic advisement, admissions, campus community, financial aid, SEVIS, student finance, and student records. 

The two-day meeting kicked off with a visit from President Kaler who discussed his vision of operational excellence as it relates to ESUP. Following his presentation, attendees learned more about work stream intersections from ESUP leaders before seeing some of the student experience in the upgraded system and having time to work as module teams.

From top and left to right: All Student group from all campuses,
President Kaler, and All Student breakout session

The second day of the meeting began with Vice Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Education Bob McMaster addressing the importance of supporting and improving the student experience. Before having more time to work together as module teams, the group participated in a workshop on how to address difficult changes with stakeholders. The team was encouraged to follow the L.E.A.D. approach:

• Listen using active listening skills
• Empathize
• Answer the person’s questions
• Direct to other sources of information

Associate Vice Provost and University Registrar Sue Van Voorhis said bringing the Student work stream together was a good way to reconnect and collaborate with colleagues. “It was great to have representatives from all campuses meet in-person after a long period of virtual meetings and conference calls.” 

On the Road Again...

Santiago Fernandez-Gimenez between
Nolte and Williamson Halls going to another
University unit to share ESUP information

In the past year ESUP staff, mostly Santiago Fernandez-Gimenez, Change Management director, has logged many miles visiting over 100 unit, governance, and professional network meetings including the:

• Senate Committee on Finance and Planning 
• College of Science and Engineering
• Carlson School of Management
• All five system campuses
• College of Biological Sciences

The visits offer the opportunity for face-to face communication between ESUP staff and stakeholder communities across the University’s five-campus system.

These crucial conversations have transformed over time, starting with executive and leadership meetings focusing on the why and how of ESUP. (Watch the first three “About ESUP” videos for this high-level context.) As the program moved past the analysis phase and into its current development phase, these conversations are starting to address specific changes coming with ESUP. 

Many blog posts in the Upgrade newsletter are based on questions faculty and staff asked during these face-to-face meetings. Listening and responding to stakeholder concerns is at the core of ESUP’s change management strategy. 

ESUP is interested in meeting with more faculty and staff prior to or during fall semester to hear concerns and share the latest information on faculty-facing changes. Please email the program at esup@umn.edu if your college or unit is interested in more information.

HRMS work stream focuses on stakeholder engagement

As the end of Phase 2: Analyze & Design draws near, the HRMS work stream has ramped up its outreach to the broader user community and to the University. A new Sneak Peeks video page has been added to the HRMS website to provide previews of system changes and early-education opportunities for system users. During the past three weeks, the HRMS team has also hosted three town halls on the East Bank, West Bank, and St. Paul campuses, which were streamed to employees statewide.

A total of 273 people attended these sessions (166 in person and 107 online). Attendees heard a brief overview of planned system and business process changes to date, then shared their feedback, questions, and concerns with HRMS project leaders including Director of OHR Operations Lori Lamb, HRMS business owner Kelly Krattiger, and HRMS project director Kris Hause.

“Our goal is to get more people involved, and more discussion happening, about the HRMS portion of the Enterprise Systems Upgrade Program,” said Lamb. “We want to know what concerns people have, what they are hearing about the project, and what additional information they need. We want feedback from people who might not otherwise have had the chance to share, and if people are out of the loop, we want to bring them in the loop.”

Attendees also provided written feedback, which is being compiled and reviewed to identify topics for future communications, training, and discussion. A video of the first town hall session has been posted on the HRMS upgrade website, z.umn.edu/hrms. You can also offer feedback or ask questions about the project online.

Additionally, on November 7, more than 60 project team members, governance committee members, and subject matter experts from the HRMS and Finance work streams attended an appreciation lunch hosted by Kathy Brown, vice president of the Office of Human Resources, for their hard work on shared processes like those in Payroll Accounting. Brown, Lamb, Associate Vice President and Controller Mike Volna, and Rob Super, chair of the Finance functional steering committee, each thanked those in attendance and spoke highly of the level of engagement to date and the tremendous potential of the upgrade to help transform the way the University operates.

ESUP creating a 'one-stop-shop' for reporting

University leaders and staff need reports to help them make good decisions. However, these reports are not always easy to find. This will change with the Enterprise Systems Upgrade Program (ESUP).

“In terms of reporting changes coming as a part of ESUP, the idea of a reporting center is the thing I’m most excited about,” says Lori Lamb, chair of ESUP’s HRMS functional steering committee. “Having ready access to reporting information in one place will be a big step forward.” Lamb is referring to the Reporting Center, a concept now taking shape as part of the program.

 

The idea is to centralize the reports University faculty and staff need to do their job through the Portal when the upgraded systems go live late in 2014. It won’t be the only place to find reports but it will be THE place to access reports from multiple reporting tools like UM Reports, PeopleSoft and UM Analytics.

 

The Reporting Center will:

• categorize reports based on their function (i.e. finance, human resources, student, etc.), 
• include robust search functionality, and
• allow users to customize their own view to include their favorites.

 To help identify features that work well for users and enhance functionality, Reporting and Data Management (RDM) staff conducted usability testing and feedback sessions by sharing an early version with University staff from the System campuses.

UM Morris feedback session - Clare Dingley, registrar and director of the Office of the Registrar pictured

“We’re encouraged by the positive response and we’ll use the feedback as we work towards a final product,” said Amy Winkel, reporting project director for ESUP. “We appreciate everyone’s input and the opportunity to create this tool that will make it easier to access reports in the future.”

Look for additional Reporting Center information and details in future issues of the Upgrade and at upgrade.umn.edu as development work continues.

New book highlights portal project's University engagement

Historically, implementing new products at the University has been a challenge. Students, staff, and faculty worry their needs won’t be met by the new product. To address this concern early in the process, staff on ESUP’s portal project looked to innovative participatory methods highlighted in a new eBook, Cultivating Change in the Academy: Practicing the Art of Hosting Conversations that Matter within the University of Minnesota.

According to their website, Art of Hosting Conversations that Matter (AoH) is “An approach to leadership that scales up from the personal to the systemic using personal practice, dialogue, facilitation and the co-creation of innovation to address complex challenges.” This means ensuring that when groups of people get together they have meaningful and productive conversations.

From the beginning, staff incorporated many AoH techniques as they engaged stakeholders and started their work developing the new Portal. Getting everyone together to discuss a future project using AoH helped “provide a vehicle to move from idea to action,” wrote Susan Geller, portal project director. These techniques, including World Café, guided Geller and the Portal Leadership Team from the initial steps in the process through the first phase of the project.

Landscape agenda for portal kick-off event

World Café, smaller circle discussions around a specific topic where people move around to different circles to hear others’ opinions, helped participants share ideas about success, challenges, assumptions, and identify themes used in the Portal’s project charter. At the kick-off event, over 430 people simultaneously participated from all five system campuses and it was well received. According to surveys completed after the event, 75 percent of respondents said ‘Yes’ when asked “Did you feel a part of the conversation about portal and that your input was valuable?”

Feedback harvested from the AoH activities has had a direct impact on the “Rough Draft” version of the Portal currently available through the project’s website. Join the conversation by looking at the “Rough Draft”, telling us what you think, and reading the new ebook. “If we all create the Portal together, we’ll have a better chance of meeting all of our needs,” said Geller.