the last link in the chain: addressing integration issues associated with enterprise financial...
TRANSCRIPT
The Last Link in the Chain:Addressing Integration Issues
Associated with Enterprise Financial Systems
Eric Stine, Vice PresidentJoshua Andrews, Technical ArchitectPhil Cifarelli, Chief Financial Officer
Exeter Group, Inc.
KUALI Days VI
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Agenda
Understand the Business Need
What is the end users’ expectation of the new system? General Ledger?
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Does the Chart of Accounts design support the need ?
Is the information needed to manage the financial responsibilities of the institution represented at the appropriate level of detail
Understand the stakeholders and roles that are needed to make the system implementation successful
Who does what and when?
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COMMON INTEGRATION CONSIDERATIONS
Phased Implementations Change Management
Interfaces Instances
Authentication Reporting Multi-System, Load, and Integration Testing
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SYSTEMS FOR AN IMPLEMENTATION
“Production”
Change Control(SVN, Perforce, VSS,
Sharepoint)
Interface Systems
Reporting/Data Warehouse
Authentication(LDAP)
ImplementationWebsite
IMPLEMENTATIONEXTERNAL/LEGACY
Student SystemHR System
Misc. Systems (Parking, ID Cards,
Food Services, etc.)
Administrative MachinesE-Mail SystemsOther Infrastructure Student Machines
GENERAL
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Finance systems touch EVERYTHING. Two kinds of feeder systems/two kinds of interfaces. Finance data feeds will be in batch – how does this impact reporting and user expectation?
Departmental? Managerial?
KFS
HR System
Student System
Misc. Systems (Parking, ID Cards,
Food Services, etc.)
Data Warehousing/Reporting
Transactions
KFS Data Feeds
Transformed Data
Finance Feeder Systems
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Understand the Business Need
Fiduciary Reporting and Control - Reporting
Federal, State, Agency
Board of Governance – Trustees etc.
Third Party – Banks, Foundations, Other Independent Entities
Faculty
Alumnae
Students
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Understand the Business Need - Reporting
Managerial
Budgetary
Departments
Initiatives
Programs
Schools
Instructional Perspectives
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Understand the Business Need - Reporting
Timing Real Time Standard (based on posting at the time of report execution)
Periodic Standard
Real Time Ad Hoc
Delivery Method Online
Printed Preformatted
Printed Ad Hoc
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Understand the Business Need - Transacting
Posting and Clearing How do transactions begun outside the financial system post to the ledger?
How – and when - are reservations, pre-encumbrances and full encumbrances created?
What are the clearing rules? How are commitment items relieved?
Will you post in real time?
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Understand the Business Need - Transacting
Procurement Will you be integrating third party e-procurement tools or marketplaces, such as
SciQuest?
How will the requisitions be generated? Approved? Converted to POs?
How is your strategy impacted when the funding source is a grant? A project?
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Understand the Business Need - Transacting
Payroll Do you perform salary or position budgeting?
Do you encumber payroll?
How is your strategy impacted when the funding source is a grant? A project?
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Understand the Business Need - Transacting
Student receivables When do you post student receivables to the ledger?
How is your strategy impacted when the funding source is a grant? Aid? Anticipated aid?
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Understand the Business Need - Transacting
Other business processes: Parking, Dining, Library, Housing, Pre-Award Sponsored Programs Endowment
What are the feeder systems? Are they documented?
Is the integration uni-directional? Bi-directional?
Do you report solely from the ledger/financial system? From the feeder system? Both?
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KUALI Days VI
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Agenda
Understand the Business Need
What is the end users expectation of the new system? General Ledger?
2
1
3
Does the Chart of Accounts design support the need ?
Is the information needed to manage the financial responsibilities of the institution represented at the appropriate level of detail
Understand the stakeholders and roles that are needed to make the system implementation successful
Who does what and when?
KUALI Days VI
Does the Chart of Accounts design support the need ?
Organizational View Institution Department Line of Business / Activity
Accounting View Account Cost Center Profit Center Fund Program Grant /Project Functional Area
Workflow and Approvals
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Conversion Considerations
History Detail Reporting Needs
Mapping One to One One to Many (Not Recommended! Makes reconciliation difficult) Many to One
Data Cleansing Beware of legacy accommodations Does the expertise exist to unwind issues
Control At what level will data be verified Can this process be automated?
Timing
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Conversion Considerations
How will you go-live? Complete history? Balance forward? Enterprise-wide? By location, but common functions? By function across all
locations?
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Interface Considerations
Staging Source System Feeds Mapping Table vs. Changing feeder system structures
Often a change to the detail coding block is required, unless you create a crosswalk. Do you make the change in the feeder system so that they can natively create the required accounting transactions or do you create a mapping table to convert the “old COA” to the new?
At some point you want to make the COA change in the sub system IF it is going to remain indefinitely.
Timing – how frequently will the batch run? Controls Incorporate into standard business flows Define new business procedures
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Process Considerations
Will the new system create process changes that require changes to feeder systems?
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Agenda
Understand the Business Need
What is the end users expectation of the new system? General Ledger?
2
1
3
Does the Chart of Accounts design support the need ?
Is the information needed to manage the financial responsibilities of the institution represented at the appropriate level of detail
Understand the stakeholders and roles that are needed to make the system implementation successful
Who does what and when?
KUALI Days VI
Understand the stakeholders and roles that are needed to make the system implementation successful
Direct Supporters VP of Finance, Treasurer, Office of Sponsored Programs Controllers Accounting Department Heads Principal Investigators Knowledgeable Accounting Staff
– Department /Organizational Finance Managers
IT Leadership – Development Resources
– Infrastructure Resources
IT Staff– Development Resources
– Infrastructure Resources
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Understand the stakeholders and roles that are needed to make the system implementation successful
Indirect Supporters Administration
Department Heads
Faculty, Staff , Students
Affiliated Institution Leadership
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Ensure that the users are prepared to run the system.
Testing strategy Unit Integration User Acceptance – what are your standards?
Training of new system processes – what is your training strategy
Reporting
Workflow
Be prepared to provide for the ongoing care and feeding of the system
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Good Habits – Plan a Phase for Requirements and Design
Document existing feeder systems Determine which will remain Identify necessary interfaces and directionality Determine whether to map to or change these systems to support new FI system
Document business processes Current state at, minimally, a high level Future state in detail
Develop a Comprehensive Reporting Strategy
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Good Habits – Implementation
Keep It Simple
Control Scope
Go Live in a manner culturally consistent with the institution
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Have you thought about or done? Systems monitoring? E.g. Zenoss, Tivoli, etc. Upgrading/adding more KNS applications?
– Do you plan to have new apps (such as Grants Management) share the same Oracle instance?– How will upgrades to production applications be handled?
Who controls security? Kuali ideally will authenticate off of LDAP, Active Directory, etc.– KIM in the future
Watch Out For…
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Questions?
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