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.

Student Work Stream: Collaboration Key to Successful Decision Making

Members of the Student work stream Functional Steering Committees (FSC) faced a daunting task during the nine months they spent in Interactive Design and Prototyping: the first comprehensive examination and restructuring of PeopleSoft-related business processes since 1998. This included reviewing 93 business processes and nearly 900 modifications to the existing system. The goal of this effort was to increase efficiency and retire as many modifications as possible to allow for using delivered functionality. The challenge was accomplishing this while maintaining a high level of service. Questions such as, “Is there a better way?” and “What modifications can we do away with?” were routinely asked and the FSC members were charged with finding the answers and making decisions.

Because these decisions would affect the entire University system, it was critical that decisions resulted from open dialogue and discussion representing all five campuses. To accomplish this, a functional steering committee (with representation from each campus) was created for each Student work stream module and embedded in the team. In a methodology led by implementation partner, CedarCrestone, the FSC members worked alongside business analysts to review business processes and then make the decisions. “It takes all of the groups working together to best serve our students,” says Colleen Miller, finance director for the Morris campus and member of the Student Financials functional steering committee.

When a challenging situation arose, the functional steering committees often reached out to users. For example, both the Admissions and Student Records teams held Town Hall meetings to discuss the impacts of a particularly difficult decision with their stakeholders. 

Tina Falkner, director of Continuity and Compliance in Academic Support Resources and a member of the Student Records FSC, says taking the time to carefully consider each decision was a priority. “The Student Records functional steering committee took the time to discuss how we could change our business processes and how we would identify and fix errors that might arise from the new processes. We then allowed enough time for members of the FSC who would be the most impacted by the change to air their concerns.”

Transparency and a willingness to listen were critical. “All decisions were the result of open and thorough discussions,” says Brenda Herzig, director of financial aid and One Stop Student Services at Duluth and a member of the Financial Aid FSC. “Most decisions made were to improve issues we have had in the past but couldn’t resolve because of a lack of system resources. The upgrade is providing us the opportunity to make much needed changes that all campuses agree on.” For the Financial Aid module, these changes resulted in a 70% reduction in modifications to the system--a huge win for the University. 

To learn more about the outcome of work of the Student work stream FSCs, visit What’s Changing. 

Work Streams team up to improve the student refunds process

Collaboration between work streams has made certain that in the future, the University will spend less time and money maintaining PeopleSoft while still offering the same high level of service to students. The Student and Finance ESUP work streams have been cooperating to ensure that the University can retire several costly modifications to the Student Refunds process. Their work will allow the University to adopt Oracle’s off-the-shelf solution using the Accounts Payable module in Finance (EFS) for refunds rather than the current process of using the Payroll module in HRMS. Despite this change, students will continue receiving refunds quickly through direct deposit; checks will also be available on-demand when a student is granted an exception to the University’s direct deposit requirement. 

Lisa Luhmann Bass, Business Analyst for the Enterprise Financial System (EFS) Module Support area, has provided guidance as the Student Financials team learns more about the Accounts Payable processes. "The Student and Finance work streams work well together to ensure the University leverages delivered PeopleSoft functionality instead of relying on expensive customization,” says Luhmann Bass. “Our collaboration will also help ease the testing and implementation process." 

The groundwork for improving this process was started five years ago. From 2009 to 2011, Carolee Cohen from Academic Support Resources (ASR) chaired the Student Financials Product Advisory Group (PAG). These advisory groups work with other Universities and Oracle to resolve issues and determine improvements for PeopleSoft. Jack Kimmes, also from ASR, participated in a working group in 2010 that defined development requirements for the refund process. This included allowing students to use direct deposit to receive their refund and a method for University staff to create a refund check on-demand. 

“Participation in the PAG definitely helped ensure that necessary improvements were included in PeopleSoft 9.0. It’s nice to see our work pay off for the University,” said Cohen. Had those improvements not been made by Oracle, the University likely would have had to bring several modifications forward. 

Using the off-the-shelf Oracle process will involve some changes for both staff and students, but ESUP staff is hard at work creating training materials that will guide staff and students through those changes. Those interested in some of the specific changes that will be happening around refunding can check out “What’s Changing - Refunding.”

ESUP Update 10-21-13 to 11-04-13

Human Resources Management System (HRMS) upcoming town halls

As part of the Enterprise Systems Upgrade Program (ESUP), the HRMS upgrade will simplify and streamline the University's human resources management system and processes, add essential new self-service functionality, and improve data quality and the user experience. Interested faculty and staff are invited to attend one of three upcoming HRMS Upgrade Town Hall sessions scheduled for late October and November. Read more...

Portal releases Rough Draft: Take a look!
The Portal Team is releasing an early version of the portal for your review! It will be the place to access tools and resources you need at the University, from searching for classes to viewing your pay statement. Read more...

Consensus by collaboration: HRMS partners with Finance, others to redefine processes
In any highly decentralized organization, fostering cross-functional collaboration is a challenge -- and a necessity. The HRMS upgrade project is a prime example of an initiative that cannot succeed without cooperation from across the spectrum of University units and functions. Read more...

ESUP establishes IT Steering Committee
The ESUP Information Technology Steering Committee (ITSC) was formed over the summer to help the Program establish technology governance, processes, and policies that align the work being done on ESUP with the University’s long-term IT strategy. Read more...

Subscribe to the ESUP Blog!
Get each new blog post delivered to your inbox by entering your email address in the Subscribe by Email window at upgrade.umn.edu and following the instructions. Once your subscription is activated, you will receive an email alerting you to new ESUP posts late in the afternoon the day they are published. If there is no post, you receive no email -- simple as that!

Consensus by collaboration: HRMS partners with Finance, others to redefine processes

In any highly decentralized organization, fostering cross-functional collaboration is a challenge -- and a necessity. The HRMS upgrade project is a prime example of an initiative that cannot succeed without cooperation from across the spectrum of University units and functions.

A fresh perspective on core HR data
Restructuring appointment data and reducing multiple appointments required significant cross-functional consultation by the entire appointment data team just to develop a recommendation that would have traction in the broader U community. Gretchen Wolfangel (UMN) and James Ellis (CCI), in particular, conducted at least a dozen consultation sessions with academic and administrative units throughout the University. They also contacted peer institutions facing similar challenges to see how they approach appointment data. The conclusion? Everyone does it differently, and no one would recommend their approach.

Then in mid-July, the team invited the HRMS, Finance, and Reporting and Data Management work streams together for a collaboration session in which they walked through the major challenges posed by appointment data and solicited input.

“The big takeaway from that session was that everyone understood the challenges and said, ‘We’re ready for a consistent approach; come back to us and tell us how we can do this in a better way going forward,’” says Lori Lamb, director of OHR Operations.

The team invited the same people back together in early September to share the final recommendations for restructuring. More than 50 people attended the second session in person and online and gave their consensus endorsement to the new approach. That recommendation was ratified by the Integration Steering Committee at its Sept. 10 meeting and by the Executive Oversight Committee on Sept. 17.

Teamwork key to simplifying payroll accounting 
To redesign the University’s payroll accounting processes and take advantage of delivered functionality, the HRMS and Finance work streams held 26 working sessions this past summer, totaling more than 80 hours on the topic of payroll accounting. The Finance and HRMS Functional Steering Committees also met jointly on this topic, and the Integration Steering Committee reviewed and endorsed the resulting Distribution Entry business process last month. By many accounts, the level of collaboration has been unprecedented; past partnerships have been strengthened and new connections fostered around a process that has previously been challenging at best.

“The changes currently being recommended for the Payroll Accounting process are the result of significant collaboration between HR and Finance professionals,” says Dan Hemauer, project manager for the Finance system upgrade. “The representation for the first two phases of the project has been very broad. … As a result, a number of recommendations have been made that will significantly improve the current business process from a functional as well as technical perspective.”