Introducing the ElevateR
Message from Jack J. Blanchard, Associate Provost for Enterprise Resource Planning:
As you may have heard, the University of Maryland - College Park, along with partners University of Maryland Eastern Shore, the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, and the University of Maryland System Office, are reimagining the way we do business. The Elevate Program will transition many of our older systems to a modern cloud-based solution for our Human Resource/Human Capital Management, Finance, and Student Information Systems.
This transition is critical to keep up with the phenomenal growth of the University of Maryland - College Park and its partners. Many of our current administrative systems were developed in the 1990s and can no longer meet the complex needs of a flagship research university. These systems, including PHR, eTerp, and Kuali Financial Systems, grow increasingly difficult to maintain and present risks to the university community’s day-to-day operations. If we do not make this transition soon, our systems may become increasingly unreliable and present more challenges to students, faculty, and staff. The adoption of a modern cloud-based platform with one integrated system will also improve the user experience and enhance efficiency.
Of course, a project of this magnitude requires a high level of involvement and transparency with our entire community of staff, faculty, and students to ensure this project is successful. To help with these efforts to communicate, we are introducing the ElevateR, the official newsletter of the Elevate Program that will keep our campus communities informed on the progress of this multi-year project. The goals of the Elevate Program, as laid out in our Guiding Principles document, are to:
- Provide a positive user experience for students, staff, and faculty
- Make our campuses more efficient and effective through simplified and streamlined key business processes
- Allow the university to accurately collect, report, and analyze data important for decision-making.
- Ensure data security and privacy and meet all regulatory, compliance, and accreditation needs
- Ensure that our ERP systems are reliable and can be easily maintained and updated
Workday, an industry-leading cloud-based enterprise system, was selected as the new ERP system. Workday has been selected by a number of universities, including several of our peer public research universities, including the Ohio State University, University of Virginia, Pennsylvania State University, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Transformation
The Elevate Program will move PHR, eTerp, Kuali Financial System, and the Student Information System to Workday - a single integrated platform. Implementing an integrated, modernized system will allow us to optimize our business practices with an eye toward the future. Some of the core processes that will move to Workday include:
- Recruitment and Hiring
- Payroll and Benefits
- Procurement
- Grants management
- Budgeting
- Registration and Student Records
The Elevate Program will be implementing Workday in two stages. The implementation of the Human Capital Management and Finance systems began in January 2021, and they are expected to be completed (go-live) in Summer 2023. The Student system implementation will begin in 2023 and will be completed in the Fall of 2026.
Making Progress
Schedule for Human Capital Management and Finance
Plan
The Elevate Program successfully completed the Plan Phase of the project at the end of April 2021. During this time, the Elevate Team successfully built a foundation for the rest of the project's success. These activities included:
- Confirming the project's scope and establishing project management tools and processes
- Recruiting and onboarding 36 full-time and 2 part-time staff members onto the Elevate Program team
- Conducting an organizational readiness survey across all four entities
Words of Workday
Transitioning to Workday means that some of the words we use in our our processes will change. Let's get a head start and learn some Workday terminology and how it translates to our campuses:
- Employee: In Workday, this is a paid employee. For Maryland, this includes Regular, Contractual, Contingent 1, Contingent 2, and hourly workers. Employees could have Academic Appointments or fixed-term appointments and include graduate assistants and student workers.
- Contingent Worker: In Workday, this is a Non-Paid worker that needs to have access to Workday or downstream systems that are controlled by Workday. For Maryland, this translates to unpaid appointments only, including those that may only need campus services (many that currently reside in the affiliates module).
ElevateR Spotlight
The Elevate Program is thrilled to have a team of 36 full-time employees that have a wide breadth of experience and institutional knowledge. In each issue of the ElevateR, we will shine the spotlight on a staff member who is working hard to make our project a success.
Joseph Windsor, Benefits Lead
Joseph Windsor has been helping University of Maryland - College Park employees navigate their benefits since he joined University Human Resources in 2014 as a Retirement/Benefits Coordinator. Now, Windsor is bringing his knowledge and experience to the Elevate Program as the Benefits Lead.
Joseph has worked with Workday previously when he was brought onto the State of Maryland Online Benefits project. Windsor worked across UMD’s Division of IT, State of Maryland Division of IT, and the State of Maryland Employee Benefits Division to greatly improve the overall process, reducing errors and making enrolling in benefits easier for employees across the State of Maryland. Windsor looks forward to bringing his expertise to this new project. “It's exciting to move from a legacy system to a cloud-based platform,” says Windsor. “It gives us more options and flexibility with how we do business. I expect a new level of efficiency that can not be maintained by our reliable but outdated systems.”
Frequently Asked Questions
Will the Workday platform be accessible to all users?
The Workday platform will be accessible to all users regardless of abilities. Workday's approach to accessibility is in line with the University System of Maryland's web accessibility policies. Workday evaluates its platform and all new products or functionalities against international standards such as Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 A/AA and Section 508 of the US Rehabilitation Act.
What does it mean to "go to the cloud"?
Some of our current systems are housed in physical servers located in our on and off campus datacenters. We are responsible for maintaining and upgrading the hardware and infrastructure of these “on premises” systems. We've migrated many of our systems (e.g PHR, Testudo) to the cloud based Amazon Web Services (AWS) which has improved our hardware maintenance costs and system reliability.
While moving to the cloud-based AWS for our hardware and infrastructure is one step in the right direction, we must also address our software applications. We are still responsible for maintaining and enhancing these to meet our increasingly complex business needs in an ever changing technology environment. This requires a significant effort to stay current with best practices for higher education institutions. To provide software solutions that can better meet our needs for the future, we are moving our ERP system to a leading cloud-based platform, Workday, which will be responsible for maintaining both the hardware and software. This will free up our resources to provide better service across our campuses and improve the overall experience for all of our campus users.
Stay Connected
In an effort to establish transparency and collaboration, the Elevate Program will be sending newsletters like this one on a regular basis to keep our community informed. In future issues, we will be providing more information on Project Milestones, PIT Crews and upcoming events such as Town Halls and Functional Overviews including demonstrations of Workday.
From big picture planning to the impact of daily routines, we're available to answer your questions and address your concerns. Connect with us today by clicking the button below: