Time for Training
A faculty training session in Wyatt 226: (l-r) Emily Precht, Rob Hutchinson, Nancy Bristow, Sarah Moore, David Hanson, Landon Wade, Pat Krueger, Terry Beck, Joel Arakaki, and Priti Joshi.
Several faculty training sessions took place this week on how to manage classes and advisees in PeopleSoft. The associate deans have scheduled ongoing sessions in multiple buildings across campus to assist faculty and support staff in learning the new system. Visit the Campus Solutions training site to register for a session or to find online instructions and self-help videos if you prefer to learn on your own.
Congratulations to the Campus Solutions team for reaching a major milestone with the completion of financial aid awards and letters for admitted students!
This week the Financials team sent an update to budget managers and support staff detailing the seamless nature of the partnership with Wells Fargo to issue accounts payable payments.
As always, for assistance with PeopleSoft, please contact the Technology Service Desk at 253.879.8585 or servicedesk@pugetsound.edu.
CS Training Begins Monday
Beginning Monday, March 4, through Friday, March 15, the associate academic deans, director of academic advising, and other Optimize team members will conduct training sessions for faculty and administrative support staff on the changes that will occur when the PeopleSoft Campus Solutions module goes live March 25. Those planning to attend a session are encouraged to register, although drop-ins are welcome as space allows. For those who prefer to learn at their own pace, handouts and short video clips will be available by Wednesday, March 6.
In other news this week, the Human Resources team had an exciting configuration checkpoint on recruiting in PeopleSoft to review the job opening and approval process, while the Financials team continued with nVision report training.
Please send any questions or comments to optimize@pugetsound.edu. Have a great weekend!
Lots to Celebrate!
The HR module team: (l-r) Cindy Matern, Katie Holmes, Shannon Briggs, Andrea Shea, Jeff Strong, Mona Lawrence, Ana Burns-Johnson, Scott Dunham, Jessie Carter, and Nancy Nieraeth.
In case you missed it, there was a rockin’ party in the lower level of Howarth Hall this past Monday afternoon to celebrate the accomplishments of the HR module team! Colleagues, dignitaries, and just general fans came by to congratulate team members on going live and making payroll in the new system (twice now!).
There was greeting, eating, and, of course, music to enjoy. All team members autographed the individual HR logo sign, and team leads Jessie Carter (general HR), Katie Holmes (payroll), Mona Lawrence (Career and Employment Services), and Shannon Briggs and Ana Burns-Johnson (benefits) added their signatures to the Optimize wall in the project lab.
Kudos, too, to the Financials team, which went live this week with the Wells Fargo Payment Manager! The team is now focused on refining various aspects of this most helpful tool which provides one source for the processing of internal and external payments of all forms.
The Campus Solutions team is making significant progress as they prepare to roll out components of their module over the next few weeks. The Office of the Registrar is verifying enrollment data, building reports, and tracking graduation, among other things. Student Financial Services has been working on such items as the student checklist for financial aid, federal application processing, financial aid packaging terms, and the interface with the general ledger and third-party payment system, Nelnet.
Academic Vice President and Dean of the University Kris Bartanen sent a message to faculty this week detailing expected changes with the go-live of Campus Solutions on March 25. Training is planned for faculty and administrative staff during the weeks of March 4 and March 11 in various academic buildings on campus. Topics will include tasks related to course schedule, class lists and management of courses, and advising. More information will be sent to faculty as it becomes available.
Super Focused, Moving Forward
Everyone associated with Optimize Puget Sound is super busy and super focused as we move through an intense phase of the project these days. HR and Financials participated in parallel payroll testing this week and also engaged in PeopleSoft Time and Labor meetings. The Campus Solutions team completed and signed off on the validation of external organizations, meaning the possible high schools and colleges students transfer to and from.
It’s still being developed, but we’ve opened a new SoundNet site to house Optimize training information and resources. See https://soundnet.pugetsound.edu/optimizetraining. Registration is available for training sessions on budget administration, purchasing, and payroll and timekeeping. Please send any questions related to training to optimizetraining@pugetsound.edu.
Fits, Gaps, and Conversions
The Human Resources team has been working on solutions for filling gaps and tightening fits in preparation for migrating from our current systems to PeopleSoft. They are collaborating with the Financials team on plans for parallel payroll testing.
Congratulations to Katie Holmes, who has accepted the regular staff position of Assistant Director of Financial Systems and Disbursements in Accounting & Budget Services. In this position, Katie will be responsible for processing Puget Sound’s payroll and related tax reporting. Katie also assumes the role of PeopleSoft payroll functional lead. Look for email messages from Katie in the coming weeks about the changes and training opportunities related to payroll and timekeeping.
The Campus Solutions team includes a wide range of members working on many different tracks. Some 21 people are involved in validating bio/demo data. The Registrar’s Office has been setting up external credit, test score, and advising conversion tables. Student Financial Services has been working on the setup and conversion for packaging financial aid awards. The technical team created an interface between Enrollment Manager and PeopleSoft for the Office of Admission. And Academic Recorder Leah Coakley completed the manual clean-up of the course catalog in PeopleSoft!
And The Beat Goes On!
All teams continue to work very hard in preparation for the January 1 go-live of the human resources module and the March 2013 implementation of the campus solutions module. Project Manager Travis Nation says he appreciates how everyone is pulling together and maintaining a sense of collegiality even as the work intensifies. With that in mind, he has restocked the chocolate supply in meeting rooms and has arranged for an extra hour of sleep for everyone this weekend!
For questions related to using PeopleSoft, please contact the Technology Service Desk at servicedesk@pugetsound.edu or 253.879.8585. We also welcome feedback on the project itself at optimize@pugetsound.edu.
Optimize Teams Collaborate Across the Board
With the PeopleSoft Financials module in place, the Human Resources module set to go live January 1, and implementation of the Campus Solutions module planned for next March, cross-team collaboration was happening across the board this week for Optimize Puget Sound.
On Monday, Optimize representatives participated in a panel at the President’s LEAD meeting to discuss policy and operational changes prompted by the transition to PeopleSoft. Participants included William Morse, chief technology officer and associate VP for technology services; Travis Nation, Optimize project manager; Cindy Matern, associate VP for human resources and career and employment services; Janet Hallman, associate VP for accounting and budget services; and John Hickey, associate VP for business services and community engagement. For details covered in their presentation, see the handout distributed at the meeting.
On Tuesday, Sherry Mondou, vice president for finance and administration, and Kristine Bartanen, academic vice president and dean of the university, sent an overview of project developments to faculty and staff. This was followed on Wednesday by a message from HR describing leave policy changes coming with the HR module in 2013. Members of multiple teams are engaged in the development of more communications to come related to faculty and staff ID cards, payroll, and timekeeping.
As project work continues, we are seeing growing integration between the systems supporting Financials, HR, and Campus Solutions. This week, the HR and Financials teams worked together on budgeting and payroll processes in the HR module. And both technical and functional team members have been involved in the conversion of data for Campus Solutions. As they say, it takes a village to implement an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system like PeopleSoft!
The HR Module is Coming!
Preparations are occurring on many fronts as we approach go-live of the Human Resources module on January 1, 2013. The HR team continues configuration meetings, and the Project Management Office is working with team members and the Office of Communications to plan and develop communications to campus. Informational handouts and posters for offices and break rooms will be distributed at Monday’s LEAD meeting, and a variety of email messages will be sent over the coming weeks. Also look for more information in the next issue of TechNews, scheduled for November.
Implementation of the HR module means timekeeping will move to PeopleSoft from the Kronos system currently used by staff and Student Employment Time Entry (SETE) used by work-study students and their supervisors. Training sessions on the new timekeeping system will be held from early December through the end of January. Details on dates and times will be added to the Optimize Training page as they become available.
Not to be forgotten, the Campus Solutions team carries on with their important work as they move toward go-live in March 2013. This week they signed off on course catalog information, built pre-requisites in the system, entered and mapped data, created item types, and all sorts of other fun stuff.
Deployment, Demonstrations, and Decisions
Hurrah! Anticipated budget updates were deployed Sunday, October 7, providing three new tools in the Puget Sound Financials menu: Operating Budget Admin, Vendor Invoice Inquiry, and Chartfield Value Lookup.
The Human Resources team continued with configuration meetings and attended demonstrations by three possible vendors for new time clocks in Dining and Conference Services to facilitate full integration with PeopleSoft.
The Campus Solutions team, working with Payroll and HR, documented many decisions on handling student work and scholarship awards as well as the student time entry process. Development Lead Carol Odland worked with the Registrar’s Office to validate course catalog information between Cascade and PeopleSoft, while Academic Recorder Leah Coakley converted all academic calendar data into PeopleSoft this week.
Scheduling Software Demo and Other Highlights
This week the meeting of the Scheduling System Advisory Group included a demonstration of 25Live, the new room and event scheduling software planned for the university. Sarah Comstock, assistant director of student activities for the Wheelock Student Center, was impressed with what she saw.
“25Live will make scheduling events so much easier for the campus community,” Sarah noted. “No more running around trying to figure out who schedules what – instead we’ll have a centralized process that works for everyone!”
The Human Resources team continued with design and configuration activities, focusing specifically on benefits, student employment, and payroll integration. The Project Management Office is collaborating with functional leads and the Office of Communications on the plan for informing campus members of the various changes we’ll see with the implementation of the HR module.
The Campus Solutions team reached an important milestone this week when Mattie Watts, student financial services systems manager, loaded the first College Scholarship Service (CSS) Profile and Institutional Student Information Record (ISIR) into the test database.
The Financials team tested the integration of PeopleSoft Financials with Payment Manager, an accounts payable automation system from Wells Fargo. The switch to this new product to manage all forms of payment from the university will be made once Wells Fargo validates the test file.
There was a delay in the rollout of the new budget tools planned for October 1. That update is now expected to be available for budget managers Monday, October 8. In preparation, PeopleSoft Financials will be unavailable Saturday, October 6, from 3:00 a.m. to noon.
Special thanks to the Data Standards Committee for supporting the various Optimize teams in determining appropriate standards for conversion. Great work, everyone, and enjoy the beautiful weekend!