Staff, faculty, and students evaluate ESUP’s web presence

Reaching new audiences

If you’re reading the ESUP blog, then you probably have some idea about the impact the upgrade will have on your work. But there are thousands in the University community who have a lot of catching up to do. As we approach April 2015* (when the upgraded systems plan to “Go Live”), ESUP’s Communication Team reached out to “unaware audiences” to figure out the best way to get them up-to-speed.

Usability Services

The Team leveraged the expertise of user experience analyst Nick Rosencrans to evaluate ESUP's online presence. As a member of IT Training and Usability Services, Nick discussed the basics of content strategy and facilitated an evaluation of the website and blog in the University's usability lab. By conducting usability tests with faculty, staff, and students who were mostly unaware of ESUP activities, we gained insight into how these members of the University community find information, how existing content resonates with them, and how they view the potential impact of the systems upgrade.

Santiago Fernández-Giménez(bottom) and Nick Rosencrans(top)
observe participants from behind double-sided glass

Findings

Overall, evaluators were able to find information explaining how and why the University is updating its systems. Most users seemed to agree the content explains why the upgrade is a positive and necessary step, but the Team also heard feedback on areas needing attention:

• Most users wanted to know what is changing, when, and how it will affect them. An abundance of information and insider jargon seemed to obscure the most important points that answered their queries.  

• Evaluators did not anticipate much, if any, interruption to their daily work, despite language indicating systems will be down for several days during Go Live.  

• Our audiences self identified with their role(s) as faculty, staff, or student (example: a staff member who is also taking classes) and sought information according to these roles, rather than how ESUP is organized as work streams or differentiated by the systems (Student, HRMS, Finance, etc.).  

• Participants wanted to know the people behind ESUP. They wanted to understand where to direct their inquiries and have confidence that their concerns would be routed to the correct person.

Tricia Conway(left) and Carrie Meyer(right)

record observations in the Usability Lab

Looking forward

Time with Usability Services provided valuable direction for how to provide detailed information to the community. In the coming months, the Communications Team will adjust strategies and messages to address areas of confusion. To learn more about the upgrade, please contact esup@umn.edu.

*This article was updated on 02/04/2015 to reflect the most recent timing information.

HR Stars to Meet July 31; Focus Will Be Electronic Time and Absence Reporting

Planning is well under way for the next meeting of the University’s HR Stars on July 31. The Stars are a key advance team of more than 100 HR professionals throughout the five system campuses that has been organized by the Office of Human Resources to provide valuable leadership, insight and advice regarding the upgrade of the Human Resources Management System, as well as the larger Enterprise Systems Upgrade Program. The Stars convene monthly and serve as important resources within their units.

One of the key areas of focus at the Stars’ July meeting will be the new electronic time and absence reporting capability, which will replace paper timesheets and absence forms when the HRMS upgrade plans to go live in April 2015*. Heather Kidd from the Office of Human Resources will be leading a presentation and live demonstration of electronic time reporting.

Current paper absence reporting card

The meeting also will provide an opportunity to test and gather feedback on key messages being developed about the change from paper to electronic reporting. The messages and other communications tools being developed will ultimately be provided to the Stars to help disseminate within their units, as well shared with other employees to raise awareness of training and other how-to resources that will be provided.

For more information about the HR Stars, or the group’s upcoming meetings, please contact Nicole Salm in the Office of Human Resources at (612) 626-2286 or salm0078@umn.edu.

*This article was updated on 02/04/2015 to reflect the most recent timing information.

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.

ESUP is Listening...Survey Results from the University

Through the Enterprise Systems Upgrade Program (ESUP), the University is improving its technology and streamlining procedures related to its three largest PeopleSoft applications: Finance, HRMS, and Student while building a new portal and enhancing reporting capabilities. The Program is a major endeavor with significant changes, and one bound to elicit different interests and opinions. To understand its stakeholders better, ESUP surveyed the University community for the second time in fall 2013, and plans two more surveys during the course of the program.

Results from the second survey:

• More than 2,000 people responded for a response rate over 30 percent
• Awareness and support for the program and readiness for change are strong - around 80 percent
• Knowledge of what the program entails and the business reasons for ESUP are not as high - around 60 percent
• Respondents who know ESUP team members personally have greater confidence in its success
• Many stakeholders think the program will succeed but it may take some time to work out the kinks or details
• History of past enterprise projects still on the minds of stakeholders with low confidence

ESUP’s response:
As part of an educational institution, ESUP is trying to demonstrate what it has learned by taking several steps based on knowledge gained from previous enterprise system implementations and survey results, including: 

• Establishing its current governance model and functional structure
• Incorporating reporting and data management as an integrated project within the overall program
• Committing to an enterprise communications, change management, and training strategy
• Launching The Upgrade newsletter to improve reach of communications and provide more depth of information

Thank you to those of you who completed the survey. Please watch for future opportunities to provide feedback as we move closer to implementation. If you have questions or would like more information about the survey, please email the program at esup@umn.edu.

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.

Portal releases rough draft: Take a look!

The Portal Team is releasing an early version of the portal for your review! The portal will be the place to access tools and resources you need at the University, from searching for classes to viewing your pay statement.

Screenshot of Portal rough draft

The Rough Draft was created from many of the ideas and suggestions gathered from the Kickoff Meeting in January 2013, the Design Thinking Workshops, meetings and presentations, and through feedback collected on our website. 

This is a “Rough Draft” because development has just started and your input is integral to the process. Like a house under construction, we want you to “walk through” the site and tell us what you think. Visit the Portal Project website to log in, explore, and give your feedback. Your suggestions will help the team build a portal that will work well for the University.

HRMS project to preview changes, solicit input at 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.

The purpose of these town halls is to share the latest information on HRMS project progress and decisions and to gather input from interested stakeholders to ensure that the new system, processes, and training meets your needs and those of the University. We will take a closer look at the major system changes identified to date, discuss challenges and opportunities posed by new functionality and processes, and more.

You can attend these town halls in person or online via UMConnect. The sessions are scheduled as follows:

• Thursday, October 31, 3 to 4 p.m., Physics 166 (East Bank)
• Thursday, November 7, 3 to 4 p.m., Carlson 2-206 (West Bank)
• Thursday, November 14, 3 to 4 p.m., Alderman Hall 415 (St. Paul)

Please RSVP via ULearn and take this opportunity to learn more about the HRMS upgrade and to engage in the change process. Our goal is a more streamlined and effective HRMS system that better supports our human resource  enterprise and the University’s academic mission.

For more information on the HRMS upgrade project or ESUP overall, visit z.umn.edu/hrms or upgrade.umn.edu.

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.”

New approach to Appointment Data will transform HRMS

It’s mid-afternoon, and HRMS business owner Kelly Krattiger is presenting a proposal to restructure the U’s appointment data to a full conference room. The discussion could be dry and technical -- a bad combination after lunch -- but Krattiger begins by clicking through a simple model of the current system, built in PowerPoint. In this simulation, Krattiger is an HR professional looking up an employee’s salary. In this case, the employee in question has six appointments in HRMS, and it’s not clear which will include the employee’s actual salary.

The maroon boxes represent six active appointments, some paid, some unpaid, and
none identifiable until you click into them; the gold bubbles represent multiple pages,
windows, and clicks required to reveal this faculty member's job and pay.

Click. Click. Click. Heads nod, and several people in the audience chuckle knowingly. One by one, Krattiger deciphers each appointment. Once he has the full picture, he’ll need a calculator or scratch paper to add up the pay associated with each appointment. The process can take many minutes.

Nancy Casey is an HR specialist in the School of Public Health’s dean’s office and one of the subject matter experts consulting on the HRMS upgrade. She can vouch for the challenges posed by the current system and structure.

“On the AHC side, there are always multiple records and multiple appointments -- UMP, AHC, school or division, et cetera,” Casey says. “Verifying an actual base salary for grant purposes is an adventure. Condensing and simplifying the appointment process would help us verify accurate base salaries.”

Simplified structure and processes
In the current system, users click through multiple appointment records on multiple screens to access even basic appointment information. In the new system, most U employees will have a single appointment record, with all of their key data and information only a click or two away using delivered PeopleSoft functionality.

Krattiger shares examples of the new structure for various types of employees. The visual is still complex, because the relevant information is still detailed -- but it’s clear the process of accessing that information is significantly simpler and quicker. PeopleSoft’s Components of Pay functionality makes it possible to enter multiple types of pay for a single appointment, eliminating the need for multiple appointments to record base salary, administrative augments, and awards, for example.

Single appointment record using Components of Pay functionality --
relevant information is only a click or two away

Fewer multiple appointments
This new approach to appointment data enables the University to significantly reduce the number of multiple appointments in the HRMS system.  The University will still use multiple appointments for U doctors who are also part of University of Minnesota Physicians (UMP), retirees who return to work, individuals who have separate 9- and 12-month appointments, and employees who work two distinct part-time jobs.

The U will also take a consistent approach to its 300-plus academic administrators, such as deans, department chairs, and directors with faculty rank.

• Chancellors and deans, as well as vice chancellors and associates and assistants in both categories, will be considered primarily administrators and will have an administrative appointment, with their salary broken out using Components of Pay functionality.  
• Department chairs, department heads, and directors with faculty rank will have a faculty appointment, with their salary broken out in the same way.

“This is a big deal,” says HRMS project manager Kris Hause. “This new approach to appointment data lays the foundation for a number of other important changes to our system and business processes, which will simplify and streamline the way we work and improve data quality and consistency.”

Krattiger acknowledges the work to get to this point has been highly collaborative but also challenging.

“Some appointment data issues, such as recording tenure, were simple, because the functionality is delivered in PeopleSoft version 9.2,” he says. “Others, such as how to handle without-salary appointments, were more complex, but doable. But handling multiple appointments was the big one. I believe we’ve come up with a consistent approach that people can understand and live with.”

Restructuring appointment data enables and supports significant changes to payroll accounting and other key business processes. Check back for more information on these changes and the strong collaboration between work streams in the near future.

Survey is now closed - thanks for your feedback!

Survey Said!!! - We sent the second stakeholder assessment survey to nearly 5,000 people across the System campuses on September 12 and we want to thank those who have responded.

The purpose of the survey is to gather new information, compare the results to the first survey sent in December 2012, and gain a better understanding of stakeholder awareness, engagement, and areas of concern to move forward most effectively.

As a reminder, the survey is anonymous and we encourage ESUP consultants to complete it as well. So, if you received an email inviting you to take the survey, please fill it out as soon as possible.

The survey is now closed. Thanks again for your feedback!

ESUP surveys to gather stakeholder feedback

ESUP staff are constantly evaluating and adjusting their work based on feedback and data. Consistent with this practice, the Program is sending its second stakeholder assessment survey to nearly 5,000 people across the system campuses this week. The purpose of the survey is to gather new information, compare the results to the first survey sent in December 2012, and gain a better understanding of stakeholder awareness, engagement, and areas of concern to move the Program forward most effectively.

The first stakeholder assessment survey established a baseline of information for the Program to help guide strategy and direct specific actions. For example, the first survey revealed 74 percent of stakeholders are involved in multiple work streams, and while 81 percent believe they will receive appropriate training, nearly 20 percent have concerns. To respond to this information, Program staff are ensuring stakeholders receive targeted communications across the work streams and timely, comprehensive information about training.

When the survey closes, ESUP team members look forward to using the data to evaluate and modify their plans where necessary. However, they can only analyze results if recipients take a moment to provide feedback. So please, take a few moments and complete the survey when it arrives in your email inbox!