Week #9 – Don’t limit your Analysis

Posted on September 2, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: “Revisit the Long-Forgotten“

Pilot demonstrations continued this week for 2 “long-forgotten” modules within PeopleSoft HCM 9.1- Succession Planning and Career Planning.  Like many customers, MITRE chose not to utilize the functionality delivered in previous versions for Succession and Career Planning due to the fact that there was no self service and it only provided a method to manually enter and track the information only while using Position Management.  The improvements made to Succession and Career Planning are numerous in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 and are well worth another, more recent, look.  Don’t place limits on analyzing ALL new functionality in the version you are upgrading to.  Remember to “revisit the long-forgotten” modules.

Our demonstration of PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Succession Planning module consisted of the following details:

1)      What is Succession Planning?

2)      What are the new features in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 for Succession Planning?

3)      Demonstration of:

a) Maintaining a Succession Plan example  (by person)

b) Creating a Talent Pool example

c) Succession 360° example

Our demonstration of PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Career Planning module consisted of the following details:

1)      What is Career Planning?

2)      What are the new features in HCM 9.1 for Career Planning?

3)      Demonstration of:

a) Employee Self Service– My Profile, Career Path and Career Development Plan

b) Creating an Internal Resume example

c) Viewing a Career Progression Chart example

d) Manager Self Service– Manage Career Plans example for direct reports

e) Manager Self Service– Search for Learning and Request Training for direct reports

PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Career Planning has been enhanced to provide many additional benefits.  These include:

  • Manager and employee self-service access to career planning
  • Ability to review career paths through a graphical user interface
  • Ability to generate customized or personalized resumes
  • Integration with ELM, Recruiting, Profile Manager and ePerformance

PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Succession Planning has been enhanced to provide many additional benefits.  These include:

  • Develop Succession Plans for employees, jobcodes and positions
  • Configurable X-Y grids
  • Ability to identify, track, and manage employees in talent pools
  • Hierarchical visualization of incumbents and successors
  • Intuitive, graphical user interface with drag-and-drop capabilities
  • Enhanced Integrations
  • Ability to search internal and external candidate pools

Note: If your company is interested in scheduling a webinar or demonstration of the PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Succession or Career Planning modules, please feel free to contact me directly or leave a message on this blog.  We will definitely get back to you ASAP.  I can be reached directly at jmartin@btrgroup.com.

Deliverables:  Succession and Career Planning demonstration, Upgrade Fit/Gap Assessment Results-Draft #3

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Week #8 – Seeing is Believing

Posted on August 20, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: “Show… don’t just Tell”

This week we started the pilot demonstrations.  First on the list was PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Benefits Administration.  Like many customers, MITRE chose to implement Base Benefits when they originally implemented PeopleSoft HCM.  During times of upgrade, it’s often an opportunity to review additional modules that could be included to handle many manual or customized business processes that exist in your system.  Benefits Administration is often one that we include in the analysis phase for consideration.  Note: No new enhancements were made to Benefits or Benefits Administration in the upgrade between 9.0 and 9.1.

The purpose of our demonstrations is to provide further evidence that the new features and functionality in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 will meet the requirements for MITRE’s HCM system.  Here at BTRG, we feel it is most important to Show the customer what the system is capable of instead of just Telling them.  Customers respond favorably to seeing their own data and information displayed within the new PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 system.  If they can see how it will work, they are much more likely to believe the new functionality will benefit them in the future.  Just telling the customer what the system is capable of is most often not enough.  So be sure to “Show… not just Tell”.

Our demonstration of PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Benefits Administration consisted of the following details:

1)      What is Automated Benefits?

2)      What triggers affect Benefits Data?

3)      Demonstration of:

  • New Hire / Administrator Enrollment example
  • Open Enrollment / Employee Self Service access example
  • Full Time to Part Time On-Call status change example
  • Termination example

We followed up the demonstration with a detailed list of implementation steps and an estimated level of effort to implement Benefits Administration during the upgrade.  With all of this information, MITRE is now able to make their decision on whether or not Benefits Administration will be part of the upgrade or if they will wait and implement the additional module after the upgrade is completed.

Note: If your company is interested in scheduling a webinar or demonstration of the PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 net new functionality or any new module you are interested in learning more about, please feel free to contact me directly or leave a message on this blog.  We will definitely get back to you ASAP. I can be reached directly at jmartin@btrgroup.com

Deliverables: Benefits Administration demonstration, Upgrade Fit/Gap Assessment Results-Draft #2

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Week #7 – Documentation & Demonstration

Posted on August 13, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: “It’s all in the Detail”

At this point in the project we have 4 weeks remaining to complete the initial fit/gap assessment.  We will split this time between 2 major tasks.  The first is to complete the “Upgrade Fit/Gap Assessment Results” document.  This is the final deliverable owed to MITRE and consists of the following items:

  • Description of the methodology used to perform the fit/gap assessment
  • List of the fit/gap participants by name
  • Section header for each business area covered (Human Resources, Payroll, Benefits, etc)
    • Overview of the sessions held/material covered
    • Inclusion of the meeting minute notes as links to documents
    • Discussion of the business area
    • A list of the key changes between 8.9 and 9.1 for the functional area
    • A list of newly identified gaps
    • A description of each existing customization for the functional area
    • A table of each customization, a recommendation and details for accomplishing the recommendation
    • A list of recommendations for expanded utilization of delivered PeopleSoft capabilities
    • A list of security updates/considerations
    • A table of potential upgrade impacts
  • Appendix – include all Current State Assessment documents

This document will become the source for future scope and tasks to be performed.  It will provide the guidance for determining new configuration, upgrade decisions (upgrade as-is, retire customization, adjust customization as defined), future state business processes, change management, testing and training.  When writing this document, include as much detail as possible to help insure success in future tasks of the PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 upgrade.  The future success of the upgrade starts with the detail… It’s all in the Detail.

The second task is to prepare and deliver pilot demonstrations of the functionality agreed to between BTRG and MITRE.  These demonstrations will provide further evidence that the new features and functionality in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 will meet the requirements for MITRE’s HCM system.  Your list may be different, but our list of pilot demonstrations includes:

  • Payroll Related Items
    • Electronic W2
    • Paycheck Enhancements
    • Paysheet Load (PSHUP) Process
    • AutoTax
    • Garnishment Override on Paysheet
  • Template Based Hire
  • Retroactive Pay Enhancements
  • Automated Benefits
  • ePerformance
  • eCompensation
  • Succession and Career Planning
  • Profile Management (Competencies)

We finalized the list of demos this week and scheduled each with the appropriate attendees.  We started building the demonstration scripts and included as much MITRE detail as we could in the configuration of these demos.  It is a huge advantage to see relevant data when viewing the demonstrations.  Where possible, BTRG created data to match MITRE business processes.

Deliverables: Upgrade Fit/Gap Assessment Results-Draft #1, Demonstration schedule, Demonstration scripts

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Week #6 – Completing the Fit/Gap

Posted on August 4, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: “Keep your focus!”

This week we finished up the Fit/Gap sessions by reviewing the new Approval Workflow Engine (AWE), Delegation Framework and the Self Service functions for both ESS (employee) and MSS (manager).

As the fit/gap sessions continue for your PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 upgrade and new ‘players’ join the working sessions, it’s often good practice to review your fit/gap purpose and objectives again for the team.  Many times we find customers tend to lose focus on what the real objective of these meetings is supposed to be.  The facilitator should always keep in mind the goal of these meetings and be sure to drive the attendees in the right direction.  BTRG and MITRE were able to complete our fit/gap sessions in a 3 week time frame.  With many Dunkin Donuts, coffee and afternoon candy, we were able to keep enough sugar and caffeine in the team members to keep focus and excitement high for the features we were discussing.  If your project needs to extend the fit/gap sessions to a longer schedule, just be sure to revisit your purpose, goals and objectives and Keep Your Focus!!


We discussed the following list of new features for AWE/Delegation in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1.  AWE was originally introduced in PeopleSoft HCM version 9.0.  Additional functions were included in the AWE tool in PeopleSoft version 9.1.   The following lists our observations based on the feedback we received from user involvement:

  • Approval Workflow Engine
    • We defined the approval workflow engine and the delivered processes already configured in the ‘vanilla’ system.  We highlighted the functions available to the administrators (reassignment of tasks and escalation) and the levels at which approvals can occur (supervisor, department manager, full or partial position management)
    • We defined the delegation framework and the delivered processes already configured to use these proxies.  We explained the levels at which you can delegate (upward, lateral or downward within the organization) and how this is all configurable.
    • We reviewed all the delivered generic email templates that can be used to send workflow messages based on approval or delegated actions.  These are configurable and setup using pages within the PeopleSoft online application, no longer within the Application Designer only.
    • We explained how ‘ad-hoc’ approvers or reviewers could be added at any time to an approval chain.
    • Some of the feedback we received included:
      • Delegation would be useful for upper level management where most of the transactions are delegated to an executive assistant.  Delegating all transactions for an open ended time frame would be useful in this situation.  Many times customers provide duplicate access via security to handle these situations.  Delegation removes this additional security setup and maintenance.
      • Being able to add ‘ad-hoc’ approvers or reviewers when necessary was a great improvement and would be implemented at MITRE.
      • Escalation procedures build in to the approval process as well as administrator access to escalate when needed was a great improvement.  Many manual hours are spent in reporting and reviewing when approvals are not done in time.  Automated escalation would save much of this time and effort from a support resource.
  • PeopleSoft Employee and Manager Self Service
    • We reviewed all current self service pages used in version 8.9 of PeopleSoft and the customizations MITRE made to these pages.  For each we discussed if the customization could be removed and if new functionality within these pages in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 could be utilized.  In many cases we found that moving custom fields to Profile Management within 9.1 would provide access to the employee for self service updates, as well as now include the changes in an approval process if needed.  This was a great increase in functionality for MITRE as it provided extra levels of review by a manager and/or an administrator and the approval/delegation process was already built right into the process.
    • Another feature that was discussed is the Text Catalog.  The Text Catalog feature stores standard text that appears on the self-service pages within HCM applications, including field labels, button names, links, page instructions, and warnings. It also includes the text and subject lines of automated email notifications. HCM provides predefined text entries, but you can modify them by using the Text Catalog feature.  Many customizations we found in the self service pages were due to text changes on the screens.  By using the Text Catalog, modifications to pages can be dramatically reduced and now maintained in a configuration page.

We completed the week with reviews of MITRE’s current state assessments for Absence Management and the Time Reporting System.  Visio diagrams and process narratives were reviewed, updated and approved by the business owner’s.

Deliverables: AWE, ESS and MSS Session Agendas; Meeting Minutes from the Fit/Gap sessions, Final Current State Assessment Visio and Word documentation

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We all need a vacation sometime… Right?

Posted on July 27, 2010 by Janet-Martin

It’s hard to plan time away from a project but we all definitely need to do it from time to time. Projects that span summer and year end (Thanksgiving, Xmas and New Years) will certainly have its share of vacations.

Last week I was able to attend the Quest Northeast Meeting at beautiful Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut. For those of you that attended my session and/or round-table discussion, I want to thank you and say it was a pleasure to meet you.

This week I am on vacation in sunny Florida. Please check back next week for continuing “Ramblings…”.

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Week #5 – Continuing the Fit/Gaps

Posted on July 13, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: “Less is… More!”

This week we tackled Fit/Gap for the Benefit sessions and the 2 remaining HR sessions.   It was a full week of meeting with the business owners to discuss new functionality for Benefits and verification of BTRG’s understanding of MITRE’S current business process for Core HR.

We discussed the following list of new features for Benefits in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1.  The changes discussed below were originally introduced in PeopleSoft HCM version 9.0.  There were no new enhancements for Benefits or Benefits Administration in the PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 release.  The following also lists our observations based on the feedback we received from user involvement:

  • New Rate Table Configuration
    • A single rate structure replaces the old flat, age-graded, salary percentage and service rate tables. This common architecture standardizes the definition of all rate tables.
    • MITRE will utilize this new functionality and will need to adjust reports, queries and any processing that utilizes the rate tables.  They also gain the ability to consolidate multiple rate table ids into one due to the increased configurability.  Less is more!
  • Life and Disability Plan Enhancements
    • All attributes calculating coverage for life insurance and disability plans are centralized in a common formula-based component. You can select from existing formulas to calculate life insurance coverage or create your own coverage calculation formula.
    • The new age reduction and coverage formula features were of great interest to MITRE.
    • Custom calculations and processing will be retired and manual updates will be eliminated when these features are upgraded.  Again, less customizations = More!!
  • Simple Rate Plans
    • Simple Rate Plans are established to help you easily set up long-term care insurance, employee assistance plans, legal plans and other types of insurances that only require an associated rate.
    • MITRE customized PeopleSoft version 8.9 to allow for simple plans to be created.  This customization will be replaced with the PeopleSoft 9.1 upgraded functionality.
  • Savings Plan Enhancements
    • Savings Plans were enhanced to provide limit processing and limit overrides. It now supports 402(g), 457 and 401(a) limit extensions, hardship withdrawals and contribution suspensions.
  • Medicare Entitlement Enhancements
    • Fields were added to track Medicare entitlements and enrollments. These fields were also added to the eligibility tables for Benefits Administration.
  • Dependent Coverage
    • Benefits Administration is configured to allow overage dependents to remain covered in plans until your policy says they are no longer eligible. Events can now be configured to maintain dependents and coverage when employees are migrated from one plan to another.
    • MITRE will utilize the new feature when they implement the Benefits Administration functionality.  Currently they only run Base Benefits.
  • Certifications and Validations
    • New ability to associate certification questionnaires with certain dependent relationships or with certain plan types (wellness plans, for example).

We completed the week with reviews of MITRE’s current state assessments for Add and Maintain Personal Data, Add and Maintain Job Data, Merit Increase process and the Bonus Award process.  Visio diagrams and process narratives were reviewed, updated and approved by the business owner’s.

One of our overriding themes is always “Less is More”.  We try to focus our recommendations around making the system as close to ‘vanilla’ as possible while taking FULL advantage of all it has to offer.  With our years of experience we have seen numerous ways our customers have been able to be creative in utilizing delivered functionality to meet all of their business requirements while reducing customizations.

Deliverables: Benefit Session Agendas; Meeting Minutes from the Fit/Gap sessions, Final Current State Assessment Visio and Word documentation

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Week #4 – The Excitement Begins…

Posted on June 28, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: ‘Sharing is Caring’

This week we completed the Current State Assessment interviews and started the highly anticipated Fit/Gap sessions.  It is a great feeling to be at a company where everyone is so excited to start seeing and learning about the new features of the PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 product.  The first meeting was a PeopleSoft Fit/Gap Kick off session where we explained the process and what was expected of each participant.  Be sure to include as many business owners, functional and technical team members as you can afford.  The more each individual learns during the fit/gap process the more involved and engaged they will be during the upgrade.  Share the information with as many users as possible.   Sharing is caring… those invited will feel included and that their opinion and feedback is important.

The Kick-Off Meeting Agenda includes the following:

  • Fit/Gap Purpose
  • Fit/Gap Step by Step Process
  • Fit/Gap Deliverables
  • Fit/Gap Schedule
  • Detailed Fit/Gap Session Agendas
    • Each working session includes the following:
      • Review of existing MITRE 8.9 functionality compared to the new HCM 9.1 functionality
      • Review of new major enhancements in HCM 9.1
      • Review of existing MITRE customizations and the potential for retirement/changes
      • Identification of any new GAPS uncovered
      • Review of the MITRE ‘Current State’ business process documented in prior week(s)

We started with the Payroll sessions this week because it was the ‘off week’ for payroll processing.  The team members we needed are responsible for running the bi-weekly payroll process, so we had to start with the payroll processes first.  Typically we would start with Recruiting, then the Hire process, Benefits, Payroll and so on.  Sometimes however you need to rearrange to meet the schedules of those most important to the process. 

We discussed the following list of new features for North American Payroll in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1.  The following also lists our observations based on the feedback we received from user involvement:

  • Garnishment Processing Enhancements
    • MITRE will utilize the new features; no additional gaps were found
  • PSHUP Process Enhancements
    • MITRE was very excited about the changes to this process;  there are a number of SQR interfaces to Paysheets that will be retired because of these new enhancements
  • Retroactive Pay Enhancements
    • Both Retroactive Pay and Retroactive Benefits are getting another look because of the new features coming in PeopleSoft 9.1; configuration of Retro Pay will increase productivity of the Payroll department and will reduce many manual processing steps currently in place to handle retroactive changes
  • Check and Advice Reports in HTML and PDF
    • Customizations to the paycheck and advice SQRs will be retired; utilization of the new HTML features and PDF formats will be a welcomed improvement
  • Year End Electronic forms enhancements and new Administrator functionality
    • Currently a 3rd party provider is used to handle Year End forms and processes; our recommendation will be to discontinue the 3rd party provider and utilize the new features in PeopleSoft HCM 9.1; this will be a good part of the ROI for this upgrade

Deliverables:  Kick-Off Meeting Agenda; Payroll Session Agendas; Meeting Minutes from the Fit/Gap sessions

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Week #3 – Ask ‘Why?’

Posted on June 21, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: Always ask the tough question…. ‘Why?’

Starting in Week #2 and continuing this week, we are completing the Current State Assessment interviews.  These are informal sessions with the business owners and IT supporters where BTRG walks through MITRE’s current processes.  We find it very helpful to review as much as possible about the process before conducting the interviews.  If available, provide access to your current system (MITRE is on PeopleSoft HCM 8.9) and any documentation you have to your consulting partner.  Gather this information even before the consulting partner starts the project.  It will make the interview process much quicker and less painful.  BTRG also uses the current business process flows from Oracle for the version you are starting with (8.9) and going to (9.1).  By having these as the starting points for each business process, we find it’s easier to look for the customized or unique steps that pertain to our client, instead of “reinventing the wheel” each time.  

The documentation for this part of the assessment includes both a Current State Business Process Overview word document that details the flow of each process as well as a Visio representation of the process.  The purpose of these interviews is to help BTRG get familiar with the current state of MITRE’s business processes.  We find it also provides details for the entire project team (customer and consultant) for those individuals who aren’t always involved in certain aspects of a system.  A great “cross-training” opportunity for MITRE is being realized during this part of the project.  Current State also highlights areas where legacy decisions are not so apparent anymore.  The tough question is “Why?” -  Many times for a mature customer (MITRE has been on PeopleSoft HCM for 15 years), the answer to “Why?” is often unknown.  Reevaluation of the business requirement is key to determining the correct future for your business process.  Take this time to understand and fully document the requirements for any and all customizations being considered for migration during your upgrade.

Deliverables:  Current State Assessment Detailed Business Process Overview and Visio Diagrams

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Week #2 – Starting the Current State Assessment

Posted on June 11, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Tip for the Week: Plan for Time Away from the Project

I attended a conference this week and presented 2 sessions on the new enhancements for PeopleSoft HCM 9.1.  While it was a great experience and I was able to meet many people also in the planning stages for a PeopleSoft 9.1 HCM upgrade, the work back home on the project did not stop.  Often as a Project Manager, you focus on the “work” to be performed during a project and you forget to schedule for absences during the project time frame.  Be sure to gather actual time planned away from work and anticipate some absences during the project.  Look for vacations, holidays, and part time schedules.  If you don’t plan for these, you are sure to overrun your schedule and budget.

Our first big task on the PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Upgrade project is to perform a Current State Assessment.  The first challenge is to schedule all the interviews we need to accomplish with the business owners.  This is another area where knowing the schedules for all relevant parties (both Customer team members and Consulting team members) is important.  Many times a customer will rely on a small team to accomplish day to day tasks.  One person may wear many hats in your organization.  Trying to include that one person in 8 to 10 different interview sessions can turn out to be impossible and will certainly increase the length of time you need to complete a task.  In the planning phase of your project, be sure to:

1)      gather a list of all team members to be included

2)      proactively ask for all anticipated time away from work that they are aware of

3)      factor in the amount of time needed from each resource and what is available based on current work responsibilities 

Our original estimate included 2 weeks to conduct and document the Current State Assessment.  With resource limitations from both BTRG and MITRE, we have determined we will need 3 weeks to accomplish this task based on everyone’s schedules.

Deliverables:  PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Upgrade Current State Assessment Interview Schedule and Participant List

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Week #1 – Kicking the Project off the RIGHT way

Posted on June 4, 2010 by Janet-Martin

Week #1
Tip for the Week: Nail down your SCOPE

The first week is dedicated to planning and logistics. I met with the Project Management team and reviewed the Project Planning and Scope document. Consulting PMs… do your homework. Come prepared with a template and a first draft of what you believe to be the PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Upgrade planning and scope items. Be sure to focus on perceived risks to the project, from both your point of view and the customer’s. Customers… Think about the culture of your company and how that might impact the HCM 9.1 PeopleSoft Upgrade project. Be sure to define your 1) project objectives, 2) items in (and out) of scope, 3) critical success factors, 4) a list of upgrade best practices and 5) project risks and the appropriate response. You know best the risks associated with your company. Whether it is the tendency to resist change, the inability to make decisions in a timely manner or the lack of resource availability at key points in the project timeline, you will be the one to highlight these issues and help insure they are addressed in a proactive manner during the upgrade. BTRG always comes prepared with these items and we work with you to define those specific to your organization.
A draft project plan based on the initial project proposal will go a long way to kicking the project off right! We all love those Microsoft project plans. Take the time to create a template that is easy to use and update based on project specific items.

Deliverables: Project Planning and Scope Document
The planning document must be completed by the end of this first week. Don’t let the scope information slide. It will become VERY important when the customer wants to “add” items that were not originally agreed to. If you don’t have a completed, sign-off copy of the planning and scope document, you have very little ground to stand on when deliverables are not met and things fall behind schedule.

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