BYU-Hawaii recently completed a multi-year, multi-million-dollar upgrade of its information technology (IT) capabilities with the campus-wide implementation of major Oracle PeopleSoft™ enterprise resource planning (ERP) software modules for Financial Services, Campus Solutions and Human Resources/Payroll.
BYU-Hawaii Chief Information Officer, Jim Nilson [upper left] explained the university began an extensive search in 2004 "to find a replacement for our aging Datatel™ system, and decided upon PeopleSoft," which includes the same accounting system used at BYU Provo and Latter-day Saint Church headquarters in Utah.
"We started the 24-month project in calendar year 2005," Nilson said, noting contracts were let by late spring of that year to IBM™ for hardware and CIBER, a large international IT company, for implementation.
On the hardware side, Nilson pointed out BYU-Hawaii was the "first 'blade' technology user for a PeopleSoft implementation. A computer blade is a chassis that contains 14 units, each one with two processors, 70 gigabytes of hard drive and a fiber optic channel interface. We put 14 of those in, and then virtualized them with a software product that allows us to put up to 10 virtual servers on each of the blades, so we essentially have 140 servers in this little box. We use blade technology on Intel™ architecture and Linux as the enterprise operating system, which also hadn't been done before."
"Financial Services and Campus Solutions started in parallel, with a 'go-live' target date of January 1, 2006, for Financial Services," Nilson continued. "We met that deadline, and we were able to do Fall Semester '06 admissions by late '05, because that's when they start admitting students for the following year."
"Financial Services did go live on January 1, while Campus Solutions — student records, the academic catalog and everything that has to do with that aspect of campus — continued implementation in phases, with a target date of Fall Semester '06. We also made that deadline."
Nilson said HR/Payroll began implementation by mid-year 2006, "with the goal to pay in the first pay period 2007. The total project was not without some opportunities and challenges, but we didn't slip any dates."
"Our experience with CIBER was good. I'm glad we engaged a third party for the implementation, because we don't have the staff here to do it," Nilson said. He added that the appropriation for the project included the "additional hardware, all the consultants, more permanent staff and about 11 temporary staff who were used as backfill for the life of the [implementation] project."
Nilson also praised the campus community. "Their commitment made it happen," he said of the extensive changes and retraining. "For example, on the first day we established IMUA — the Hawaiian word for 'moving forward' or 'progress,' or the Information Management Unity Accountability team. That put the responsibility for each area of campus on data stewards. MIS continues to provide technical support, but our new system has pushed responsibility — and capability — for the data down to the user level. Almost all PeopleSoft queries can result in an Excel™ spreadsheet, which can be filtered or spliced any way for reporting purposes."
Localized reporting is one of the things BYU-Hawaii Director of Human Resources, Tessie Faustino, likes the most about PeopleSoft. She explained HR previously had to download details through Datatel for the past 11 years and then reorganize the "shadow" information into a report on a personal computer through Access™ software. She added that before Datatel, HR used PRIME™. "All reports then were done by MIS," Faustino recalled.
"Because of data integration, we've been able to eliminate such shadow systems," Nilson said, adding that "shadow systems never showed up on the main system. PeopleSoft allows us to have one student or employee record, with no need to have 'shadows' or copies on an individual computer desktop. It's also a cleaner and more secure environment."
"Everyone who was involved in the discussions and implementation is owed a great deal of thanks and appreciation for their hard work. The whole attitude, when we had challenges, was let's find a solution. There wasn't any complaining."
"We are now finished with our 'statement of work' with CIBER Corporation," he continued. "All of the temps were done by March 31st of this year. In a nutshell, PeopleSoft now provides an integration of all IT aspects of the university, with better generally accepted accounting practices (GAAP) in Financial Services. In the Campus Solutions and HR areas we have 'self-service,' which allows students, faculty and staff to basically do all profile records online. They can actually change and update data campus-wide. They register and pay their bills online. They can use credit cards and not have to stand in line at the cashier's window."
Brian Blum, BYU-Hawaii Director of Financial Services, confirmed that PeopleSoft has made a big impact on customer service. "PeopleSoft has made our back-end operation run much smoother, but one of the most significant changes for the students is the ability to make payments over the Internet," he said. "They can assign the rights to look at their account, and a parent or sponsor can pay the fees with a credit card."
"This has gotten rid of the huge lines of people waiting to pay we used to have at the cashier's window," Blum continued. "Before we used to get just 8 percent of payments through credit cards, and 92 percent through the cashiers. Now it's flip-flopped: It's 92 percent credit cards over the Internet and only 8 percent at the cashiers. It's much less frustrating for the students, and we're also able to better monitor our accounts. PeopleSoft allows us to find data a whole lot easier."
"With this implementation, we're very positive about PeopleSoft and its future possibilities," Nilson said. "For now, BYU-Hawaii is very near the leading edge of information technology."
