News from SRUG: Compelling Reasons to Upgrade
What are your compelling reasons to upgrade to Oracle PeopleSoft 9.1? This is the question that was put to a group of PeopleSoft customers at the Southeast Regional Users Group (SRUG.)
There had been a number of presentations at the SRUG about what was coming in the new release. Valuable new features and functions were demonstrated. Ample advice was offered on best practices for successful upgrades. Oracle presenters produced a variety of impressive slides describing the new and improved technology that could be gained through an upgrade. The what, who, where, and how were described, often in painstaking detail. However, the WHY had been only lightly touched upon.
Here is what the group had to say:
- Avoid extended support fees- According to Oracle’s Technology Price List extended support adds 10 to 20 percent to your annual software license and support charges. On the flip side, Oracle has waived PeopleSoft 8.9 extended support fees until June 2011.
- Assure timely and accurate regulatory updates- Usually this means tax changes. Get them wrong or get them in late and real problems can ensue. In early 2009 Oracle announced an additional year of extended support for PeopleSoft Enterprise 8.8. The date was moved out from December 2010 to December 2011. Let’s say for arguments sake that it takes 4 to 6 months to do a major upgrade. December is always a bad time to cutover a new release. The October timeframe is doable. Work back from there and you may quickly come to understand that if your 8.8-to-9.1 upgrade does not get off the ground sometime before the onset of Winter 2011 you may end up in something called indefinite Sustaining Support. I am not quite sure what that entails but it does not sound pleasant.
- Modernize the technology platform- Many customers seem to be stuck on old operating systems, old database releases, and old hardware. They can’t upgrade the foundation without upgrading the dependent applications.
- Consolidate your applications portfolio- Are you paying twice; Oracle license fees for functionality you are not using while cutting monthly checks to a third party vendor for almost the same thing? Recruitment was one example where significant money could be saved by bringing an outside system back home to PeopleSoft.
- Electronic Approvals- Need to gain more control of your operations but don’t want to add to your bureaucratic paper trail? Several users spoke highly of the new Approval Workflow Engine (AWE) that has been efficiently integrated into the 9.1 release. As one participant put it, “It is finally good enough to implement.”
PeopleSoft 9.1 Upgrade Insights: Set high standards – Part 2
In Part 1 of setting high standards for your PeopleSoft 9.1 upgrade I listed a few reasons why Upgrade guidlelines and standards are important.
First, it is just plain bad project management to allow every developer to do their own thing? 
.
Second, all changes made to the new release must be tracked relentlessly from inception through the final cutover to production. Not knowing where your changes are and why you made them can put your schedule in jeopardy.
Finally, having different developers handling the same item in different ways can lead to different results. And to a severe drop in end-user confidence if not remedied.
In my prior posting I covered Data Standards & Guidelines. In this posting I will be offering forth some suggested Object/process Standards & Guidelines.:
- Modification Logs- If you have not yet instituted a modification log now would be a great time. A modification log is a dated sequence of developer activity. The standard convention is to put the most recent change at the top of the list. Typical fields include:
- Date
- Developer
- Project
- Description of change
- Related Projects, Fit/Gap issues, other items
- Project Naming standards – – Multiple developers may be working on your upgrade. It is crucial that they all use the same naming conventions so that a simple PeopleTools query can easily find and report all upgrade related work. Here is a proven naming scheme:
|Organization| _ |Master Project| _ |Project| _ |Version|- Organization – Usually 2 characters. Must be different than Oracle/PS delivered update projects.
- Master Project- U91 would indicate work being done for the PeopleSoft 9.1 upgrade
- Project- Assignable individual project such as VacAwd (Vacation Awards)
- Version- A number indicating subsequent changes. For instance, Version 1 would contain all changes up to and including the first test move. Version 2 may only contain fixes to problems discovered after the first move.
- Properties of PeopleSoft objects- Take advantage of the comments field within the properties section of each object. The format of this documentation is:
|Project name| , |Change date| , |Developer| , |Description|An example of this format would be:
MY_U91_VacAwd_1, 11/01/2010, RJ, Initial Vacation Awards redevelopment ISSUE# 12.0.1
- Batch Processes- All new or modified batch processes (e.g. SQR) must have a modification log. All upgrade changes must be tied to a specific upgrade project (U91)
- Online Processes- Document changes of PeopleSoft PeopleCode or other online processes at the beginning of the program. The documentation must include the developer making the change, the date of the change, and the reason for the change. The format would look like this:
‘/* |Project Name|, |date| , |developer| |description| */
An example of coding is listed below:
/*MY_U91_VacAwd_1, 10/9/2010, RJ, Added logic to set the default for field EMPLOYMENT_PF.EMPPF_STATUS_DT */
The actual changes will probably be imbedded in the delivered code. The start and end of changes must be indicated:
‘/*Begin mod MY_U91… */’
…..
……. Modified code ……..
……
‘/*End Mod MY_U91… */’Comment out PeopleSoft vanilla coding instead of deleting the coding. This will make the PeopleCode easier to maintain during future upgrades.
If undocumented changes are discovered they must be labeled as Pre-PS9.1 customization at the beginning of the PeopleCode and imbedded code.
Stay tuned for more postings in the series, PeopleSoft Upgrade Insights
PeopleSoft 9.1: More news from the Southeast RUG
Recently, I made the trek to Atlanta to attend the Southeast Regional Users Group (SRUG.) The venue was small and the rooms were packed but my sense is that almost all attendees considered the time well spent. 
I was pleased to discover that there were some high-quality sessions given by people who are actually working in the PeopleSoft 9.1 environment. Getting real life experiences is the lifeblood of these types of gatherings.
My prior SRUG posting listed some of the HRMS 9.1 “gotchas” discovered by early upgraders. Please feel free to check it out.
It is a little unusual for me to post commentary about a session I didn’t actually attend. But Janet Martin of BTRG, Inc. was nice enough to provide me with a copy of Features of PeopleSoft HCM 9.1: Core HCM & Benefits. I must say that upon review I find her PeopleSoft 9.1 presentation one of the best I’ve seen on the topic. The key 9.1 changes are highlighted in red and the operational impacts of those changes well illustrated. For instance, the slides covering eCompensation explain step-by-step the new streamlined procedures for managing an organization’s specific compensation cycle.
The general areas covered in the presentation are:
- Profile Management
- Career Planning
- Succession Planning
- eCompensation enhancements
- ePerformance enhancements
- Other core HR enhancements
Janet has started a blog and I have happily added it to my favorites list. Her blog title speaks for itself: Ramblings of a PeopleSoft Upgrade Project Manager. If you leave a comment or note that you are interested in her presentation she may be as kind to you as she has been to me.
Stay tuned for more postings on discoveries and insights gained at the Southeast RUG meeting.
PeopleSoft Projects 2.0: Will the talent be there when you need it?
Are you sure that when you are ready to start your next PeopleSoft project you will have or be able to find the talent you need?
Perhaps, six months ago the answer would have been obvious. Now the answer is not so clear. It could be that in the absence of a creative staffing strategy the talent train may have already left the station just about the time you get to the platform.
Many organizations are starting to think that they may soon need a lot more skilled workers. The New York Times recently detected significant Rays of Hope for Job Hunters. Indeed.com, an internet consolidator of online job postings, currently shows a 17% increase in information technology job postings over this time last year.
“The opportunities are growing fast,” said Paul Forster, chief executive of Indeed.com, which culls its information from sources like corporate Web sites, newspaper classified ads and job boards.
There is a long term labor trend occurring that is not getting sufficient attention and this article draws attention to it. A large number of experienced and skilled people will soon be leaving the permanent worker force. A combination of more demand for skilled workers and less supply may very well lead to shortages; fewer skilled people available to staff your upcoming PeopleSoft 9.1 upgrade project.
Tamara Erickson, an author and work-force consultant said the recession masked a long-term trend that will intensify: a worker shortage caused by the continuing retirement of baby boomers.
Suddenly, she said, employers are starting to realize that they don’t have, or won’t have, people with the skills they need. Some are starting to worry, she said, while others “have no idea what’s going to hit them.”
Reacting after the fact is not innovation. Innovation is detecting the trend, recognizing the implications, and acting before the crisis hits. The key is developing a manpower strategy that retains your most knowledgeable workers regardless of seniority and seeks experienced contingent staff in a variety of inventive ways.
The train has not already left the station. Stay tuned for future postings on novel, innovative options on staffing your upcoming PeopleSoft projects.
PeopleSoft 9.1: You can go home again
Who says “You can’t go home again.”? (Actually, it was Thomas Wolfe who says so in his novel of the same title.) Never the matter, current PeopleSoft customers contemplating an upgrade to PeopleSoft 9.1 should be asking a similar question: Should I consider bringing my 3rd party applications back home to PeopleSoft?
What inspired this question? I attended a session at the CIRCUIT conference Washington DC, given by a gentleman (..unfortunately I was unable to ascertain his name) from the Office of the CIO at the Federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
He raised some very interesting questions regarding HHS’s roadmap for the upcoming PeopleSoft 9.1/8.50 upgrade project. Their main question will NOT be: Why are we using what we are currently using in our PeopleSoft system? Their main question will be: What are we NOT using in our PeopleSoft system and Why are we NOT using it?
He went on to describe the 3rd party systems that HHS is spending millions to maintain and integrate with PeopleSoft. HHS will be seeking significant savings by reassessing their needs and determining how to bring these external functions back inside PeopleSoft 9.1.
Are you now paying licensing and maintenance fees on external functions that can be done practically for free in PeopleSoft 9.1? If you suspect the answer is Yes then it could be well worth your while to consider eliminating some of these peripheral systems in your next upgrade project.
Please check out the other postings in this series – PeopleSoft 9.1: Practical Improvements.
PeopleSoft 9.1: Install PT8.50 get Web 2.0 for free
The new PeopleSoft Enterprise 9.1 and PeopleTools 8.50 releases have officially blasted off. Perhaps, you have seen a demo presentation or even installed and examined PT8.50 at your site. If so, I hope you are as impressed as I am in the amount of work Oracle has invested in the new releases. The sortable, searchable cascading menus are quite nice but actually I find the Web 2.0collaborative workspaces and related content services the most compelling new features. If you would like to see these new Web 2.0 features in action Oracle provides an excellent online demo: PeopleSoft Workspace and PT8.50.
How can you bring these new Web 2.0 features to your organization? What are the licensing requirements? Oracle addresses these questions and little bit more in it’s “New Web 2.0” data sheet .
“Customers licensing the PeopleTools 8.50 release will also be granted a limited use license to the PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal 9.1 in order to take advantage of PeopleSoft’s Web 2.0/Collaborative functionality.”
Perchance, the first thing you may notice is that these new capabilities are not imbedded in the PeopleTools portion of your application. PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal 9.1 must be implemented in order to support wikis, blogs, related discussions, tags, related links, and other Web 2.0 functionality.
“You must install and configure a PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal database to host the data for these services. However a separate PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal license is not required…”
A key question is: What does it take to implement the PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal and connect it to your HCM, ELM, CRM or other PeopleSoft application? At a past client I had the opportunity to implement a portal database and create an HCM connection. In an upcoming post I will describe my experiences and attempt to relate those experiences to the new Enterprise Portal release.
Please stay tuned for the next posting in my series – PeopleSoft 9.1: Practical Improvements.
Make your next PeopleSoft ERP project 1000% easier
CIO online recently published an article asking the question: Why is ERP still hard?. There is a lot in this article that is on target. However, there is one premise expounded early in the article that deserves closer scrutiny: ERP projects are difficult, lengthy, and expensive because users want too many customizations.
Taser decided to customize its chosen ERP package to meet the business processes that it already followed. “So rather than take an ERP system-which supposedly out-of-the-box has, say, an accounts receivable [process], with best practices that are inherent to the system, we decided…to modify AX to work like this other application because users were comfortable with it,” he says, “and they didn’t want to change.”
I view ill advised customizations as a symptom not a cause. In many cases the root cause is the absence of people with sufficient ERP project experience to properly and efficiently tailor the package. In my experience most PeopleSoft ERP projects become “hard” as a result of having the wrong people doing the right things, having the right people doing the wrong things, and, of course, not having the right people at all.
Want to make your next PeopleSoft ERP project 1000% easier (and less expensive in the long run, too)? Seek PeopleSoft veterans who know the application best. They are the ones who will find innovative ways to meet your organization’s needs. What should you expect from a well seasoned resource?
These are the delivered features and functions that most closely match your requirements. Here is a re-engineering option successfully and inexpensively implemented by another customer. If you make this small, peripheral change almost all your needs will be met.
Of course, there will always be internal needs that cannot be met by an external package. The million dollar question is what to do. Does it make sense to re-write the core delivered components? Or, can a more elegant way be found to meet the need without creating an upgrade nightmare. An experienced person can help your organization make the smart choice. Save time. Save money. Reduce stress. Make your next PeopleSoft ERP project 1000% easier.
My Oracle Support: The New Collector
The most interesting new feature in the new My Oracle Support may be the Configuration Manager. This enhanced monitoring capability requires the download of a data collection component. The data collector lives in your Oracle home and communicates daily with Oracle central. You can find this valuable tutorial at Why use The Configuration Manager at My Oracle Support.
My Oracle Support: Now Active
Earlier this Summer I wrote about the coming replacement of Metalink 3. That time has arrived. Check out the new My Oracle Support.
PeopleSoft 9.1: Practical Improvements #1 – Profile your Workforce
The PeopleSoft 9.1 release value propositions (RVP) , previously known as pre-release notes, are now readily available for your review. We all know that the RVP’s contain a wealth of information on new features and functions. What is not readily known, however, is how these new features and functions can be translated into practical improvements to your operations.
The Profile Manager (PM) first introduced in PeopleSoft 9.0 received significant development attention. The concept behind the PM is that people in your workforce have attributes: qualifications, responsibilities, competencies, mobilities, and more. And these attributes are important for workforce management. In my experience the most difficult task is collecting the data. Do you really want to develop and distribute a new form? Forms are costly and once in place often difficult to eliminate.
The profile manager self service component is much more usable in 9.1 than it was in 9.0. The page has been drastically re-designed making it more realistic for your workers to enter this data themselves. Also, a historical view has been added. Prior values are not necessarily lost as workers change their data.
The bottom line result is that it is now easier than ever to collect important workforce data. No paper forms. No centralized data entry. No error scrubbing. Just incent, possibly through ties to career management, your workers to do it themselves. If you have already deployed employee self service (ESS) all you have to do is add another component. If you have not deployed ESS perhaps this is a good reason to do so.
Please stay tuned for the next posting in my series – PeopleSoft 9.1: Practical Improvements.